Slashdot Mirror
Can Architects Save Libraries from the Internet?
theodp writes "Slate has an interesting photo essay exploring the question of how to build a public library in the age of Google, Wikipedia, and Kindle. The grand old reading rooms and stacks of past civic monuments are giving way to a new library-as-urban-hangout concept, as evidenced by Seattle's Starbucks-meets-mega-bookstore central library and Salt Lake City's shop-lined education mall. Without some dramatic changes, The Extinction Timeline predicts libraries will R.I.P. in 2019."
Since I started my studies, I spent exactly 0 hours and 0 minutes in the university libraries. I access all the scientific material online, and even the books. Those very few books that I could not find in electronic form online (and by online I mean in our university's electronic library) and I could not do without, I bought them. But the idea of walking into the library, borrow a book and then return in in one week, it just feels impractical at this point, to me.
For antique books, sure, libraries will always exist, but even there I'd prefer to see them as conservation points where they are transferred into electronic format(s) made available online. Being an antique book collector myself, I would hate to know that precious antique books are being touched by people who don't wash their hands, or worse.
So basically, I don't think libraries have much reason to exist in their current form. Perhaps something like a public study-and-discussion place, with refreshments and internet access?
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
The Extinction Timeline is total garbage. "Mending things" and repair shops are going to be extinct in 2009? Laughable. Secrets and text based searching, and the computer mouse by 2020?
Demented But Determined.
I also remember the first time I dialed into a BBS and discovered volumes of reading material I could freely download... next came my first exposure to the Internet through USENET and later the WWW. My excitement grew with each new advance in information sharing. These technologies were all logical stepping stone extensions to what came before them, and enabled me to access worlds of information that simply weren't attainable before.
Would I mourn the death of physical libraries where I can walk up and down the aisles? Yes, but for largely sentimental reasons. While the dreams a "paperless society" have largely been unfulfilled to date, the time is rapidly coming when many of the core concepts will be a reality. I'm an optimist in that I like to focus on learning about new ways to share information.
512 MB RAM, 20 GB disk, 200 GB transfer, five datacenters. $19.95/month.
Why would anybody want to head to a large public library and deal with the parking issues, the vagrants, the bureaucracy, etc. It is just a pain in the ass. Small local libraries are a better solution. But even they hold little advantages over going to your local Barnes & Noble and reading. I think it would be better that cities started contracting with book sellers for lending books than to continue their path towards oblivion. Perhaps the only libraries that are still flourishing are university libraries. And they are only successful because of their research material niche.
Libraries need to be seriously saved from being free homeless shelters. Match this with a collection of books that would make 1980s science and literature proud, and it's no wonder why people find it easier to go to bookstores rather than libraries.
The day libraries can prevent their books from being torn into toilet paper by careless patrons is the day they will stand a chance. Note I didn't mention anything about charging late patrons a fee twenty times in one run to earn revenue...
Netcraft confirms it!
.02USD
(sorry, just had to get it in)
Best thing about libraries is they are quiet places to study, read, write etc. I use them for research and when I need to get away from the internet.
So it looks like they are going to try to produce something that will be state of the art and competes with electronic media. This will be doomed from the start as technology changes so rapidly, any library built will probably be obsolete before it is finished. Probably the best thing to do is figure out a libraries strengths and play to them instead.
my
putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
"education mall"? really? only a politician who is trying to line his pockets could come up with something like this.
this has less to do with making libraries urban hangouts than subsidizing the shops that are now going into them.
even knowledge/education is a commodity/industry in america.
teachers will be called "knowledge technicians"
mr c
"Physics is like sex. Sure, it may give some practical results, but that's not why we do it." - R. Feynman
Yes, I get a lot of articles for my work from online journals, but sometimes (especially with older articles) they aren't scanned in and I have actually gone through stacks of old journals and dug up an article and photocopied it. Aside from this, whenever I do find an article online, I print it off if it's important and relevant enough for me to read it and then I highlight it to hell and put notes everywhere. You can't do that with pdfs (well, if you want to save it anyways) and I can't curl up on the couch, lie on my back and hold my laptop above my face for an hour while reading an article either.
It would be terrible if we lost libraries and books. I can't imagine a generation of kids downloading books and printing them out or staring at a computer screen all day reading one. I know that when I was a kid I couldn't afford to get my own books and my parents seldom bought them for me (well, once I grew out of books they liked me to read) so the library was my salvation. I never would have gotten into a great number of authors and subjects if not for libraries.
what's that now?
What is it about run-of-the-mill brick-and-mortar libraries, in their current form, that offer a substantial benefit to society over online sources? I can think of dozens of drawbacks, but it's much harder for me to see the advantages.
Just because some neo-luddite English teachers freak out at the mere sound of the word "Internet" and consider it an abomination that destroys "proper education" doesn't mean the rest of society should care. A certain amount of significant libraries (such as the Library of Congress) do serve useful purposes (historic, legal, cultural, etc.), but they aren't the one that suffer the threat of extinction anyways - it's the everyday district branch libraries which are at stake here. And they wouldn't be on their way to extinction if they actually offered some advantages over their electronic counterpart.
I CAN see ways that libraries become "social hubs" where people physically meet to share and learn ideas, something that can't be done as well over the Internet. Maybe we'll see some of these new-generation brick-and-mortar libraries, which would be renamed to "educational centers" (akin to cultural centers). But the old concept of the "quiet library" with the disciplinarian librarian saying "shhh" every time someone opens their mouth, is on the way out, and, may I say, good riddance.
Sure, they will be something different then we have today due to changing times/tech, but i don't see libraries ever going away.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
To expand on your point, it's good to remember that just because something is available on the Internet, it does not necessarily follow that it is automatically better/easier to view than something that it available at your library.
For example, most (if not all) of the New York Times archives are available on-line... but for a fee. The New York Times charges $3.95 for a single archive or $15.95 for a ten-pack of articles. Compare this to a archive of the newspaper in a bricks-n-mortar library which will allow you to look through their records for free as long as your willing to work the microfilm reader.
If, for example, you're a sports writer who is researching contemporary coverage of the 1972 Mets, you'd end up paying quite a lot more to do your research over the Internet as things stand now.
"Flag on the moon. How did it get there?"
The grand old reading rooms and stacks of past civic monuments are giving way to a new library-as-urban-hangout concept
As opposed to the library-as-indigent-hangout concept, which has been around for decades or maybe centuries.
Boogers! Seriously, just about every library book I have ever read has had at least one booger smear in it. Seriously, I am not someone who is overly obsessive about cleanliness.
I had some 3 reference librarians looking in the San Jose Library in the Silicon Valley for anything printed about restoring my 1952 chevy pickup truck, and they were unable to find anything. I'd check the library at UC Berkeley (largest west of the missisipi), but they only allow students into that library ..sheesh.. can I browse the library of congress catalog somewhere. By the way, I finally found something and it was in my Uncles garage - any help on any technical information would help.
M
Perhaps what's called for is a book vault, in the spirit of the recently built Norwegian seed vault.
I'm reminded of something from Max Headroom (a truly brilliant show for anyone who is not familiar with it, on par with greats like Blade Runner and Demolition Man for its crisp and witty vision of a possible future dominated by television). In the series, nearly everyone has given up all their privacy information to the computers, of course, except for a small few who refused, a long time ago, and have no records. They're called Blanks because society can't easily track or understand them. One of them, who is called just Blank Reg in order to have a name at all, gives someone a book at one point and says, "It's a book. It's a non-volatile storage medium. It's very rare. You should 'ave one." The insight of the throwaway remark has the deep understanding and precision targeting of many of the throwaway lines in The Simpsons or South Park.
The issue is not so simple as the loss of a thing we're all fond of. It creates the risk of a catastrophic loss of all of humanity's information, since books are more than just outmoded relics. What is not outmoded about them is their accessibility and their duration, which even given the lifetime of paper still well exceeds the lifetime of a typical CD or a storage format. The area of survivability seems like it comes quickly into play as a serious matter.
This is not to say that it's bad that Google and others have been scanning things, since that adds redundancy of survivability to the system. But it's to say that there's a risk in the other direction of the loss of technology that would allow Google to operate, and in that case, books are a very reasonable backup.
Kent M Pitman
Philosopher, Technologist, Writer
IANAArchitect (though I am an architecture student), but it would seem to me that decreasing relevance of the library in the urban fabric is more of a problem of programming than design, and one that is being addressed just fine already. As the Internet becomes a valid source of information and entertainment, the libraries are shifting focus, becoming more akin to public computer labs. While the appearance is different (rows of PCs instead of books), they still serve the purpose of providing free democratic access to knowledge. The next big shift is creating a more social atmosphere within the library, which as the TFA shows is ongoing and would seem to be effective.
Is the library changing? Most certainly, yes. Is it dying? Not so much.
A fine novel by a fine SF author (review: http://blog.wired.com/tableofmalcontents/2006/11/vernor_vinges_r.html) He forecasts (probably tongue-in-cheek) the end of paper-book libraries when a private company gets the contract to digitize all the remaining paper books by the equivalent of the Human Genome Project "shotgun" technique. Their quick and efficient method of digitizing is to throw multiple copies of the book into a shredder, blow the fragments down a tunnel lined with scanning cameras, and fast computers piece all the fragments together to make a 99.99% accurate representation of the original text. Naturally they are opposed by book lovers who consider this horrifying - but it's all incidental to the main story line. I love Vernor Vinge's ideas!
Our local library is beautiful, but the computer section is pure crap. The problem seems that around the mid to late 90's, there were too many sub-topics and not enough people reading each of them, so most of the books are about windows 95 and html 2.0 with a couple newer ones and then they just gave up. Unless they have the cash like a university library, they just can't keep up with the very expensive tech book collection required to satisfy a diverse range of knowledge.
their reason for being will simply evolve
this is even hinted at in the story summary
we still have colisseums, we don't feed christians to lions in them. we still have public squares, we don't have gallows in them
true, we don't really have forts with cannons and we don't have stables, but we do have military installations, and we do have garages
so its not like the need for a public place for information storage and retrieval will go ever go away, just how it is accessed will change and evolve
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
People have to understand that, no matter how many times Jimbo Whales says it, wikipedia is not reliable. As a whole, the information found on the internet is not reliable. It's nice for facebook and blogging, and yes, blogging can be a powerful tool when it gives voice to people that otherwise would be silent. But who guarantees that the information you're reading right now is correct ? Oh, sure, someone will find out that an article was vandalized, but how many people read that article between the time it was altered and the time it was restored ? How do I know that a blog article is correct ? Would you trust a doctor that uses wikipedia as a source ? I'm sorry but I wouldn't.
;-)
But as a engineer, I tell you I couldn't graduate without a library. Yes, I DID walk in a library, check out some books and study by them. If you want to study seriously, you will use more than one book, just because some authors explain some parts better the others, so you can learn the best from each book. Libraries are a necessary tool for education. I'm not saying that the electronic version of books isn't useful, but I use them as a reference, as I can search much faster for some specific topic. Good books are invaluable.
Besides the obvious point in education, what about ALL the good literature books out there ? Will you buy them all ? J. R. R. Tokien, George Orwell, William Golding, Aldous Huxley, J.P. Lovecraft, Shakespeare, Joseph Conrad ? Ok, I di want to own Lord of the Rings and some other works, but why not just check them out from a library ? It's free, and it's much better to read a book on paper than on a computer screen. Go for a stroll on a sunny day, take out a good book.
Call me old fashioned, but I think that libraries shouldn't be turned in to shopping malls. We should encourage people to go there and discover what they keep as a matter of culture, not because you can drink a coffee while you get to surf with free internet access.
Or my view is biased because my mom is a librarian
Cheers!
As another who has spent a considerable amount of time in a library, I do find that there is room for improvement. I don't think that they will be gone anytime soon, but I think that a large part of the problem has to do with financing. My university library (undergrad) was only a place for me to study. I NEVER USED IT TO DO RESEARCH. Furthermore, in medical school, the library served the exact same purpose. On the flip side, as a medical resident, I used the hospital library extensively. Why? I am not going to pay to get access to articles my library can get me. That is the only reason I used it. I was doing research and it required me to get access to things I couldn't otherwise pay for.
Growing up, I used the library to be able to freely read books.
I think this remains the fundamental and most important role of a library. Equalizing access to information that the public could not otherwise get to. Sure, as a professional, I can afford to pay for things, but it seems that costs are proportional. The specialized texts I want now are considerably more expensive than the texts I had wanted earlier.
As long as there is an underclass, the role of a library will remain important. Given trends in society, the underclass is growing and the divide between those with access to information will only further it. Granted most people with access to resources don't use it, but every now and then it will make a huge difference.
Furthermore, one has to consider the library in question. A community library serves a very different purpose than a university library. I think that a community library would be better off avoiding trying to provide large amounts of space towards computers. Should they have them? Yes, its important to provide a complete set of services for those who may not otherwise be able to have them.
What needs to be done to ensure the relevance of libraries? How about longer hours? With changing work schedules, knowing that the library will be open would be useful. I hate having to leave an hour after arrival because the place is going to close. How about an in library mirror of the Gutenberg free text collection to ensure availability despite loss of internet connectivity. Libraries have been known as warehouses of information; just because the data is digital, this should not change.
Printing services for this information. How about being able to select a text from the Gutenberg (or other) online collection and paying X dollars to have a copy printed and bound in some fashion for pickup. This can be both a revenue generating and role preserving improvement to a library.
A coffee shop. I think that Barnes n' Noble have done more to "hurt" libraries than any other place. They're open longer and I can drink some coffee.... Its a huge improvement.
Club meetings - chess, reading - local competitions for the kids. There are many services that can be provided through a library that many libraries have already adopted.
My main request would be that they mirror important literary texts locally. Given the questionable and temporary quality of electronic media, its important to have as many copies distributed as widely as possible.
done ranting... need to find another task to avoid reading.
When all else fails, try.
I think the mouse is already outdated.
My webcam should be tracking my eyes, and know exactly where I am trying to click.
Just transfer the left / right mouse buttons & scroll wheel onto the keyboard and I can stop moving my hands!
Seriously, does no one else think it's impractical we have to keep taking our hands off the keyboard?
Wow, parent is currently rated -1, Insightful. An Anonymous Coward has sucked insight out of the discussion.
"Be light, stinging, insolent and melancholy"
Predictions on the internet are not worth the electrons they are printed on.
For anything longer than a long magazine article I much prefer to read a hard copy than on-screen. I'm not the only one by far. The library has been improved by computers. They do not render them obsolete.
In Portland the Multnomah County library catalog is on-line. I can look up a book that interests me from my computer, put a hold on it, and it will be shipped to my local branch which is 3 blocks away from my apartment. When the book or CD arrives I get an email notifying me that I have 5 days to pick it up. All of this holds true for interlibrary loans, as well.
The computer has made the public library more relevant to me, not less. But an article about this would never be sexy enough to make the front page of slashdot.
Haven't RTFA'd, but aren't libraries a public good? Yes, when I was a university student I barely used the physical library, relying instead on papers I could get online, etc., but the reason I could get access to those paper databases was because the school funded my access, and I paid for part of it with my tuition. These were academic databases - as far as I knew, there was no equivalent database of fiction, non-fiction, etc., just bookstores, Amazon.com et al., and, yes, libraries. At my local library in town, I've got a library card (that was either free or $2, can't remember which at present) that provides me access to an immense set of writing for gratis. What large-scale databases of books - that is, mainstream current literature, not things that have gone out of copyright, such as Project Gutenberg - are present? If some version of the Kindle is both cheap and lets users read current books both legally and for free (some kind of checkout system?), the library seems likely to remain. On the point of public good: libraries are for everyone, not just the tech-savvy. Sure, it's great that people are getting connected, it's great that people have the disposable income to buy lots of books, but libraries serve many populations of people, not just those who are on the proper side of the Digital Divide. Do we really think that the digitally illiterate population of America (given that the topic is American, not that the digital divide is just a national issue) will have dropped to nothing by 2019? Because I am really dubious of that. tl;dr Just because many people on one side of the digital divide have disposable income and like their books on terminal screens, it doesn't mean that a service provided for the good of the populace as a whole will whither and die.
It wasn't me, it was the one-armed
The death of the library is a harbinger of the death of free education.
How we know is more important than what we know.
During my recent years at college I went to the library probably around 30 times. I never checked out a book, or have any idea where the different sections were located. The only reason I went was for a quiet place to work or to an area that I could collaborate with other students. Thanks to the Internet I could always find information available for writing reports and thankfully my professors never required me to have a book source. The biggest challenge I had on campus was finding a quiet place with no distractions to work.
You can't do that *yet* but I doubt if it'll be terribly long before you can. A touchscreen and a good program will let you take all the notes you want... an e-paper screen will let you read off a screen more comfortably and make it light enough and low power enough that you could hold it above your head to read if you liked.
Honestly there's no inherent value to printed paper... for now it's better then a computer screen for reading books, but it's only going to improve from here. I could see a really good e-book reader, good enough to fully replace books, by 2019... but I doubt enough of them cheap enough to replace books, though perhaps enough that printing will slow significantly.
Does a line appended to your comment give your post meaning in and of itself, or only in relation to those without?
But I still use libraries, and the internet has only improved my ability to use them. Now instead of straining my eyes reading a book hundreds of pages long or straining my computer trying to find a semi-illegitimate book, I just use my local college's LINK+ network to get almost any book ever written. From rare and obscure manga to even dungeons and dragons source books--if you know where to look, you can get almost any physical book you want. To make things better, the library itself has many public computers, printers and copiers for when my own break or for when I just happen to be out-and-about and unable to return home (and unwilling to play games with the school's wireless).
Ginga no Rekshiya Mata Each page.
That may be true in scientific disciplines. Right now, I have about two dozen books from the university library. Only a couple of them would be available online. Intensive reading is also much easier with physical books, which I read far more than papers: one of my courses required students to read two books a week.
University libraries are one thing; public libraries another. The local public library is very popular. Students do their homework there, access the Internet, or hang out after school. They have children's programs and other events. The building looks out over a sports field, with a view of mountains beyond: it's the sort of place people like to be. I drop by there several times a week. I borrow a lot of DVDs, but I also peruse the books. The key, I think, is that it's close by - I can walk there or drop in on my way somewhere else. If a library is integrated into the community, somewhere nearby and convenient, I don't see any reason why it shouldn't thrive. Books, movies, forums about the future of copyright, whatever - it will find a role. Unfortunately most of our communities are planned so that activities are isolated and reachable only by car. A library treated as a warehouse, to which patrons must trek to take out and return materials, is likely doomed.
That might have been a bad subject, but this is my point: If you can check out music from a library, and you can check out books from the library, and you can even check out dvd's from the library, why can't you just get them from the internet?
...so why don't we just get a big big big server from the library of congress to hold all books, audiobooks, songs, movies, etc on a web server, and give them free to the public?
Why don't the RIAA and MPAA call libraries piracy? Those who go to libraries think that sharing knowledge and "intellectual property" in the form of books is necessary and should be free. Those who "steal" music, etc off the internet do as well.
I don't think that the RIAA should target only the poor college age teenagers when they could get the whole government for property theft!
Those of us who think they know everything annoy those of us who do.
If a library doesn't have what you want, they're usually networked with other libraries around the county or state, allowing you to search for books through their databases. If you find one, you can request it to be sent to your library for pick up, essentially expanding your amount of resources tenfold. It takes a little time, for sure, but it's better than searching library after library looking for the right book. That's all thanks to that whole computer networking thingamajigger people have been raving about. Really nifty, too. Used it myself when I worked at a library.
Libraries are going to continue being the main source of information for people as long as they can maintain their relevance in the digital age. The way libraries can network to provide content is just one way of doing it, but it isn't perfect by any means - it can improve, either through a faster delivery process or digital transfers. The doomsday vault for books sounds good, too. But I seriously don't think Google is able to solve the problem of "I'm looking for that book that talks about the thing you mentioned yesterday." For that, librarians and library scientists are important. They can guide you to what you want better than any search engine could.
Another way to make a library better is to make sure the shelves aren't filled with crap written by authors like Kevin Trudeau or James Frey. As much as I love books and the information in them, it seems like anybody within earshot of an editor or publisher can get him or herself a book deal, for better or worse.
This is what our local library was recently reopened as, though presumably not because it's now far more difficult to "discover" the whereabouts of the few books which were left behind.
My university's library was also recently extended, for which it won the city society's "best new building" award, yet it is the internet facilities within the library which are most frequented, closely followed by the coffee shop rather than the book sections. This isn't surprising as researching on the internet is highly encouraged to the point at which it's easy to get away with solely using online references.
Maybe the traditional fine system needs to be reviewed in order to attract users back: when I was ticked off for the late return of a couple of books, knowing from the catalogue records that no other student hadn't bothered to borrow or reserve any of our reading list throughout the module, it did make me wonder why I didn't save myself the bother and just go on the internet instead. It's just that I prefer cutting out the "middle man", as online copies aren't guaranteed to be of quality or even complete, but also because I don't believe that Google is a replacement for a good librarian, particularly a subject librarian, who can locate far more using the tricks of their trade.
For years as a child, I spent the whole of every Saturday in the library curled up with a good book or 10. Maybe that's not what my son will be doing in a couple of years time, but I'd like him to at least have the choice.
I've been a librarian for almost 12 years now. If I had a nickel for every time I have heard that libraries were dying and were going to be replaced by the Internet, I'd have retired by now. The truth is the author nailed it right on the head on the very last page of his article, where he said "On the other hand, in its mutating role as urban hangout, meeting place, and arbiter of information, the public library seems far from spent. This has less to do with the digital world--or the digital word--than with the age-old need for human contact." Libraries are changing and growing to embrace the world of electronic information, while maintaining there links to the past. The stereotype of the library as a deathly quiet tomb being policed by shushing librarians is entirely out of date. My library is a hub in the community, where people can come to chat over a cup of coffee or sit and watch a DVD on a cold day or pop in over lunch to check their e-mail. Parents continue to bring their children in for storytime, but now the storytime might be filmed for a video podcast or shared with another library via videoconferencing. And I've yet to see an e-book reader that matches the quality, ease, and portability of a paperback (though I have no doubt that this will change in time). Even then, libraries will remain as a cooperative for the sharing of e-books to share with others, as there would be no other way for users to have access to as many items as they do in the library without having to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars per year on books. So don't count out libraries yet - heck, you should stop in some time and see how much your local library has to offer.
Being able to search the library catalogue, and reserve books, online has increased my library usage. One of the handier things web access has given me.
I concur. The availability of cheap, good quality, sophisticated and powerful tools makes it even more rewarding to build and mend stuff these days.
That the Internet provides inspiration for D.I.Y. projects is a big factor, too. Sometimes, I'm inspired by the World Wide Web to go to a library, even. Having library services available on the Web makes using a real library all the more worthwhile.
I think calling the Extinction Timeline garbage is an understatement. Sometimes I can make cool stuff out of garbage.
Blancmange
1) People like to read books. A computer screen is good for article length stuff for most people, but most people would never read a whole book on the computer.
2) There are not even remotely enough crap romance novels online to satisfy the women that read that stuff. They are a huge portion of the patrons of libraries. If you obliterated every other kind of book, there would still be substantial library traffic for books with Fabio on the cover.
2a) Libraries are the only places that know about romances for men. They are disguised as westerns, but they are flat out romance novels. I've worked at a B&N and no one had a clue about these.
3) Libraries are government institutions, thus their usefulness to people is neither here nor there. Even if no one ever went to a library again, that they are funded by taxes means they will never go away.
3a) Although they will not go away, they will continue to spend a lot of money on certain kinds of online resources which nearly no one uses, but makes the library administrators feel like they have a clue.
4) There are a lot of smart, educated and lazy people out there. The library is where we *ahem* they work.
5) There are areas where there are no bookstores, where the bulk of the parents and the kids in the area don't read. The libraries in those areas are the only way for the few who do read to get books.
6) There are quite a few databases that are available for a cost. And many library systems subscribe to those databases so it very well may be that you will get that info you need online, but because of the library's subscription to that database. I've helped gobs of guys with car trouble, a subject I am not exactly up on, by using AllData.
> The grand old reading rooms and stacks...
...library-as-urban-hangout concept, as evidenced by Seattle's
That's a library.
>
> Starbucks-meets-mega-bookstore central library and Salt Lake City's shop-lined education
> mall.
That isn't.
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
http://www.oba.nl/index.cfm/t/Homepage/vid/BC638BCA-3FFA-497D-9CA1C74A819C832A Facts and Figures The new Central Library will annually have contact at least 2.5 million times with visitors looking for information, culture, communication and education. Think of it as 50 times a full Amsterdam ArenA, or 1.500 times a packed to the rafters Concertgebouw. 2.5 million visitors per year, on average 7,000 per day, indicates the importance Amsterdam Public Library has for the city and the region. * 200 staff members * 84 opening hours per week: 7 days per week, 12 hours per day from 10am until 10pm * 1375 seats in both large and small scale spaces * quick-reference counter with expert advisors * 50 multimedia workplaces * 110 catalogue terminals * 26 lending machines * print and photocopying facilities * Pin and Chip payment possible * Education room for 50 participants * Accessible by train, bus, tram, metro, car and bike * 28.000 m2 * 1,000+ seats (600 with PCs/internet/MS Office) * 270 seats in the Library Theatre * 6 Meeting Rooms (space for 25-75 participants) * Meeting places (Foyer, Restaurant, 2 reading cafes) * www.oba.nl = online 24/7 * 1.200 parking places * 2.000 secure bike racks
It's not backlit.
They can be low cost gateways to a *lot* of Internet material you'd have to pay for. I can hit my public library's Web site, and have access to full text articles from 11,000+ magazines, archives of the state's leading newspaper, the local paper (back to 1859), all sorts of databases, etc. The list goes on and on. Most of it, of course, I don't use. But what I do use, I have to spend several hundred dollars to get without that library card obtained at nominal expense, then renewed for free.
It's also a pleasant, relaxing space. I enjoy being there.
It also has *books*. I can scan through several physical books I lost faster than I can perform the equivalent operation over the Web, even if the books were there. Checkout period is three weeks, and I can renew on the Web site. I won't even go into the audio/video aspects.
It also has *librarians*. The ones I've asked for help have been great; knowledgeable, friendly, and available. You get that sense that you're dealing with someone who enjoys their job. They also get points from me for ruining former Attorney General John Ashcroft's day when they fought him over warrant-less searches of what citizens read, etc., due to some of the more despicable bits of the Patriot Act. So anyone who wants to think of librarians as a bunch of little old ladies might stop and conjure an image of little old ladies putting down their knitting, and picking up their war axes.
This is in a town of about 50,000 people. The main library is centrally enough located that I drive within 2-3 blocks of it at least once or twice a week, without fail, but parking is dead easy. It's a great local resource, well worth supporting, and many people do. In fact, it's getting a much larger building, with a new location within about two hundred yards of the current location.
I just don't see it going away. In the first what, 13-14 [1] years or so of mass Internet, my local library hasn't just survived, it's thrived.
[1] I don't know how most people judge the arrival of mass Internet. I know I was building Web sites in 1994, and at the time I had to explain to most people what a Web site was.
What you do with a computer does not constitute the whole of computing.
Actually, you can, and yes you can save it.
See xournal for an example.
http://www.donarmstrong.com
If we find that people seem to be getting dumber, libraries are partially to blaim since they haven't stuck to their original mission.
Libraries are meant to lift up the community. To push knowledge into the dark corners that exist everywhere, not just in the minds of the poor. Funded by tax revenue, they increase the buying power of the average citizen and lower the cost to access knowledge. They increase demand for that knowledge by stocking it in warehouses. They make that knowledge easier to access by organizing it and providing assistance in finding it.
Some libraries have lost their way because they thought it was all about the paper. Some have simply become centers for the poor while the rest of the community is increasingly satisfied by the deluge of cheap, easy but often lower quality information found online. Notice how most of the information in wikipedia is pop culture? Where is the depth? The trend is towards the dumbing down of the citizenry.
Libraries have a mandate by the tax payers to continue to be booster for knowledge. Don't think installing a bunch of internet workstations is the going to be enough. They need to come to us, here on the internet. They need to put up websites where knowledge that normally costs extra, requires physically driving to a certain place or otherwise is difficult enough to access that more and more people simply ignore it, is made easily accessible. There is a lot of information on the internet but it lacks depth in key areas. Libraries have that information and can put it on the internet using public funds. The net result is that the average citizen is once again encouraged to delve deeper into the depths of knowledge and not be satisified by the common knowledge available on the street.
This boost of knowledge in a community can occur by:
1. Provide access to paid information services on the internet (newspapers, etc) for no extra charge
2. Scan and digitize information on a ongoing basis and make it available online. negotiate copyright access for the community
3. Organize information so that it is easier to find. this means developing websites that are easy to use and provide quick access to democratizing knowledge
And I am sure there is more, have to go before I can finish writing this...
Crazy. It's still not as transportable though.
what's that now?
I still don't like reading e-books. I think the only one I have ever read in its entirety was Neil Gaiman's Coraline on an evening when I was pretty feverous.
The internet seems to have eroded my ability to focus on blocks of electronic text that are larger than yae lines long, and xxxx pixels wide. (going to a laptop with higher resolution has helped this a little bit, as well as going back to actually reading books and making myself read the whole paragraphs until I was satisfied that I had read it).
The problem with books is the limited number of hours in which you can access them and the lack of information of what they're about (especially if they lack a cover with summary), not to mention the limited number of hours available for reading them (more if I didn't spend so much time on the internet typing up how I don't have time to read books anymore 8))
They're much easier on the eyes than the screen. I can only imagine what it would've been like on all those harry potter release nights if I was trying to read a PDF scanned in like some of my friends did.
Then some people might comment on the massive amount of room that books take up. I don't mind. My parents raised me with numerous bookshelves in my house, so there's a nice feeling of comfort from being surrounded by a few hundred books.
In my area, most of the people coming to public libraries are there for the internet access. It's kinda the public tranportation of tech.
I think the idea is a winner.
expandfairuse.org
As an academic librarian I'm not too concerned. We try to go electronic where possible. The Library isn't just the building anymore.
A large part of my working day is teaching people how to research. Generation Y may be comfortable using computers, but boy do they suck at putting together a decent search strategy. And they seem to be pretty poor at evaluating their sources.
I'm thinking the comment started at 0, then picked up a +1, Insightful, followed by two -1, Overrateds.
Disclaimer: I recently turned half a century old, and yes, I'm feeling every day of it...
You know, some people like those "grand old reading rooms and stacks of past civic monuments." That's why I go to a library. If I wanted to go to an "urban hangout," I'd go to an "urban hangout." (Which I don't, cos everyone there is younger, slimmer, richer, and better-looking than me.) I revel in the musty and anachronistic atmosphere of a traditional library -- it's a nice, quiet, relaxing environment that links me to the past and the thousands of other souls who have poured over those well-worn volumes before me.
But again, I'm just an old fart...
"Every great cause begins as a movement, becomes a business, and eventually degenerates into a racket." -- Eric Hoffer
The first library shown in the Salon piece should be torn down. No question about it. There are a lot of architectural disasters from the 60s that deserve the same fate. A library should be aesthetically pleasing, and functional. (Why is the functionalist design so dysfunctional?)
Public libraries should start to go under. Why does every single city or town need it's own public library? Here in the metro Boston area there is a library or branch library for every mile (at least). It simply isn't necessary to have that many libraries. The times that I'm generally free, the library is generally closed. Libraries around here closed at 8 or 9 on the weekdays, and if they are open on the weekend it is 9 to 5 on Saturday and not at all on Sunday. The collection at the BPL in my opinion is lacking. Too many books are marked as missing in the catalog and those that are in the catalog aren't on the shelves, probably missing. But at least they have a full collection of Xena: Warrior Princess and other high art on DVD.
I've become very interested in private libraries. Here in Boston there is the Boston Athenaeum. While the price at first seems high, $250 a year, it doesn't seem outrageous to me. $21 a month for a library whose catalog contains good books, books that are actually on the shelves, and they are able to enforce rules and exclude unruly people. The hours are actually a bit worse than the BPL which is unfortunate.
... as long as men need some place to go for anonymous gay sex with winos who need two bucks for a 40 oz.
Or so I hear.
Les Miserables Volume 1 now up with my reading of
Re: your point #1: I won't read a book on a computer, but I've been reading books on my PDA since 2000. They're electronic, but they're still books.
The book isn't the physical paper, and what makes the paperback more readable than the screen involves a whole bunch of stuff that doesn't have anything to do with paper. It's all about size, and convenience, and ruggedness.
On the other hand, "e-book readers" are nasty, pointless things. They don't maintain the readability of paperbacks. They're big, clumsy, and inconvenient. You can't stick them in your pocket, pull them out when you have a few spare minutes to burn, and read them... because they're hardcover sized and fragile to boot.
PDAs aren't so fragile. They're obviously not as rugged as paperbacks, but the smaller screen makes them significantly less likely to get busted, and there's a whole pocket industry of protective cases for handhelds... and whether they're high-end cellphones or pure PDAs a lot of people are carrying them anyway.
are giving way to a new library-as-urban-hangout concept
In my last two years of high school I lived in a town of 5000. My two daughters both, recently, finished high school in this same town and used the library in the same way; as a hangout.
In small towns it becomes one of the few places that youth can hangout without getting into trouble (by that, I mean excessive contact with the police). For over 20 years, it has had a large area with couches (yes the couches have changed), computers (apple II's back then), and audio and video alcoves along with study desks.
I still remember the rules because they haven't changed in 20 years. Yes, they were posted
1. do your homework
2. remember the librarian is here to help you, ask for help when you need it
3. no heavy petting
4. no cursing
5. no excessive disturbances
6. be careful with food and drinks
The librarian, generally, came by and asked us if we were done with our home work and reminded people to ask for help with their homework if they needed it. The library budgeted to pay advanced students to tutor other students.
So, on a typical winter afternoon, after school, the geeks would come in and do homework, the librarian would walk by once and ask if anyone needed any help. If the answer was yes, he would credit an advanced student an hour to tutor the other student (yes, this got abused; but, the results, work getting done, spoke for itself). We would then watch movies, listen to music, play D&D, whatever... until evening when it was time to go home.
Some people might call this babysitting; and so what if it was. Results speak.
It was cheaper than running a youth center (I have sense worked in youth centers, I know what they cost to run). It gave kids something to do that didn't get them into trouble. It advanced our studies and got our homework done. In short, it created a positive social environment.
I mention this because this is something that small towns have been doing for decades if library-as-urban-hangout concept really is new, then those urban areas are decades behind.
It gives the so called, self appointed 'technologists' something to do other than produce any useful work.
Here is my prediction: By 2020 people will finally get sick of these self appointed prophets and will hook them up to the Matrix to use as power sources.
I regularly go to Cambridge University Library, one of the largest in the world. There is nothing quite like the sheer scale of knowledge, able to walk amongst books that most likely never reach the internet. It is ever expanding - every book published in Britain and across much of the world goes there. Will it be replaced? Never. Will smaller libraries get shut down? Possibly.
Dunno, I personally find my Fujitsu U810 to be far more transportable than the few thousand journal articles I have hard copies of. (And you could probably do just as well with an eeepc or similar.)
Granted, there still are tradeoffs as it's not as high resolution as paper, but then again, the copiers in libraries have never been particularly high resolution themselves. (I'm always surprised at how bad a heavily abused 2 year old digital copier's output can look.)
http://www.donarmstrong.com
I believe I've written that myself, but I don't believe it. All public libraries do is get busier and busier. When they put terminals in place for the public they get mobbed. The terminals are busy all-day-long. There are never enough. Free WiFi is also busy all day long. these aren't all the 'information disenfranchised' who don't have computer at home either. Whether they have to compete with siblings at home, or find the library more convenient, or enjoy greater bandwidth (The local lib has fiber optic) I don't know. I just know they are busy.
Someone said the online resources are never used and are there to make administrators feel good?? How ignorant! Statistics show double digit increased use every year, from live homework help to academic magazine indexes, you can't get that at home without a subscription. Instead, the library pools its resources and buys subscriptions for the entire community. That's what government SHOULD do, leverage your taxes rather than simply tell you what to do. The average Return on Investment of a public library is over 800%, i.e.: If you had to purchase the information that a library gives out every year year and compare the purchase cost to the library budget (paid by taxes), you'd pay 8 times as much for the same thing. In my state the average cost to a homeowner for their local public library is about 25 cents per thousand dollars of value. In other words, a $400,000 house costs you $100 per year for the public library, less than $10 a month. What's that? Three lattes? It's not like the library breaks your taxpaying back. Look to the public schools for that. The library is flat out the best deal the taxpayer has, period.
Someone once described the Internet as a library with all the books dumped at random in the middle of the floor. What makes the library different is an organized body of knowledge with people assigned to help you. The people in public libraries generally have a Master's degree in Librarianship, and in academic libraries a second masters degree in their subject area. These folks are more familiar with your subject than you are and they've been doing database searches since well before you were born.
If you're one of these people who believe 'well-educated' means being able to search Google, read a blog, and search Wikipedia, then may God have mercy on your soul.
How about a moderation of -1 pedantic.
Benford's Law deals with the likely occurrence of a particular first digit in the values in a data set. It exists because Frank Benford noticed which pages in log tables got the most wear. The pages with the ones digits were always heavily used, followed by the twos and so on, and the nines digits barely got any use at all. Hard to imagine how he would have made that particular observation on the Internet.
Oh, yeah, it's not easy to pad these out to 120 characters.
which will be (hopefully) built in Prague :)
http://www.radio.cz/en/article/88974
and some more pictures: http://aktualne.centrum.cz/kultura/umeni/foto.phtml?gid=2175&cid=369145
I definitely find it very refreshing
I don't think it's very likely that libraries will be done with by 2019. Take the British Library for example, it would take much longer than 11 years to digitise their assets. Of course, if by "library" they mean places where you can read the newest bestsellers, then yes, we can all see the trend... but don't expect libraries (especially the older and bigger ones) to close their doors just yet...
"The majority is always sane, Louis." -- Nessus
http://slashdot.jp
The internet has conquered many traditional sources of information, but books are not one of them. There are articles, blogs, comments, old-style web pages, and the occasional long essay, but only the very best reach the quality level of even a moderately good book, and almost none of them approach the length. If you want to seriously study any field, you either read a book, take a class (but guess where your professor learned most of that stuff?), or spend years figuring things out on your own. The internet is great for intro-level stuff, but once you hit intermediate level good info is a lot harder to come by. In addition, much of the growth of the net is driven by blogs and news sites, which by nature organize information chronologically -- good for news and talk, bad for most other things. Thus, I feel that libraries are not threatened by new media, but by how people relate to old media.
I see a few overlapping possibilities:
1. Someone invents a good electronic reader and a format that will last forever. Books become an electronic medium, with older works being scanned in over time. Libraries cover the transition, then fade away to become more like museums. I'm assuming DRM will continue to fail, so local book repositories will be unnecessary.
2. People abandon books en masse in favor of shorter media like articles, TV shows, and radio segments/podcasts. Books become special-purpose/education only, and the intellectual quality of our culture declines. Libraries die out except at universities and major cities. There's been some movement in this direction due to TV and movies already, but it's pretty pessimistic to think it'll continue forever.
3. Modified status quo. The internet takes the place of TV and radio, but the convenience and other strengths of books allows them to hold on. Libraries undergo some superficial changes and benefit from technological advances in searching and indexing, but otherwise remain fundamentally the same as they've been for centuries.
Visit the
Idiots who want to get rid of Libraries are the same idiots pushing BluRay and more comprehensive media formats that make DRM more extensive. Copyright lawyers and the likes of them consider libraries to be nothing more than copyright circumvention centers allowing mass quantities of consumers to NOT put more money in their pockets (note I'm not dumb enough to say "put money in the authors pocket").
I work in a Library, and I can tell you that the usage numbers on our Library have gone up every year for 12 years straight in every single phase of service we provide. In the 9 years I've been employed there, our circulation numbers have quadrupled. In House computer usage is 15 times what it was 9 years ago. Our database service usage has increased over a 100 times. We've changed from being a book and mortar informational storage building to being a community gathering center and information access entity. We provide access to online databases, ebooks, and provide community services. We providing gaming for kids, reading groups for all ages, and so much more. Concerts, movies, and petting zoos... oh my.
An building architect isn't going to save our libraries (and thus, our intellectual freedom. Rather, the continuous adaption to the market demands will save our libraries from extinction. Unless, of course, Dubbya declares the election null and void and declares himself Grand Poobah for life, thus instituting his own brand of facism... which inevitably includes making sure no one has free and equitable access to the information. Just like the Taliban and Muslim countries that demand women not be allowed to learn.
Yes, THAT is what libraries mean. If your local library is in danger.. fight for it, because that Library is the "mine canary" of your freedom of speech.
both have their usages, but IMO the only way to get more people into libraries is to accept that people who are out enjoy talking to their friends. It makes a lot more sense to have quiet areas for those that wish to work, that to keep a lot of people out of the libraries by insisting on silence. My friends often used to do their work in the union pub instead of the union library because you get the work done faster if you can communicate without whispering even if it means you don't have the text book ( most text books are 1 week only and cost £20+ ). I hate silence so im in and out of my library as fast as i can.
OFC libraries will survive tho, they just need to adapt to a bit.
Libraries here (in the UK) could easily fill the void left by big stupid American coffee companies, and provide a place for educated discussion.
IranAir Flight 655 never forget!
should public money be used for this? Can't it go to feed the homeless instead?
No! Public libraries can and must continue their roll as repositories of verifiable information. Copyright law in it's current form makes this impossible and must be changed. It is not good enough for us to trust primary historical documents such as newspapers to their original publisher. We must allow libraries verbatim copy, and distribution. If we don't, what we will have is an Orwellian memory hole instead of a library. The same kinds of things can be said about all periodicals, journals and even books. We as a whole must never allow private interests to control information. Information must remain free and it will have to be truly liberated if it's going to be that way. DRM and dissapearning media have no place in free societies. Don't worry, if publishers don't want to play ball authors will. Universities are full of people working on "labor of love" textbooks and other material they expect no financial return on. B and N can keep their paper and coffee shop megaplexes, the rest of us want knowledge. Free societies require it.
The good news is that libraries of the future will be cheaper than those of the present. When you liberate yourself from paper you eliminate most of the costs of libraries - shelving, circulation and all that. The difference will be put to good use and free economies tend to minimize financial ruin.
A library is not just a room with shelves full of books. It's one of the only places in the world where you can go and have some quiet time. I have one right behind my house, and it's a nice place to go. Sure you can look stuff up online in the comfort of your own home, but you can't guarantee that you won't have world war 3 going on around you when you do. Also, there isn't any other place in the world where you can go sit and read all kinds of old books for free. Sure, there are places on the internet that let you read public domain books that are decades old. But the library will let you read something that was published in the last few months, the current newspaper, and other publications.
Libraries will also run events for the benefit of the surrounding community. They allow you to actually go outside and meet other people. Don't forget that it's also a place where a lot of people can even get access to a computer in the first place.
Libraries should still keep books, dvd's, cd's etc... all that is great.
But they should begin to digitize the stacks and keep it stored on an easy to access medium. Being able to search the entire stack for terms within all the digitized books would be teh most golden research tool evar. Invest in large LCD screens for purely research purposes - no porn allowed on the super-mega big screens. If access to the crazy computer terminals begins to be in extremely high demand, simply provide time limits for using the high resolution terminals. This can be determined by the number of terminals in use, and then ratio the amount of time available at those terminals based on how busy the library is. User logins according to your library account would obviously be necessary to make this work.
I would go just to use really large or multiple LCD screens so I could have multiple PDFs/documents/resources open and visible all at once while using a word processor at the same time.
In my opinion, I think digitizing and making all the content searchable is just the next obvious step for modernizing libraries. Complex, artistic over the top architecture is really not going to make research any better except for the possibility of good lighting and ventilation. Nothing sucks more than working in a stuffy library with the smell of stale books. Keep the fancy architecture for new libraries, otherwise, I'd invest more in digitization and computer terminals with slick monitors.
1. It is much more difficult for a nefarious entity (be it a government agency, a political opponent, an underhanded corporation) to "edit" to data with the printed page as opposed to the internet. 2. Information does not accidentally get deleted after 30 days with a bound book. 3. Have you ever held a rare book in your hands? Touched the history? See the margin notes from hundred of years ago? Marveled at the hand colored pictures? Can't do that with the internet.
First program like this I've heard of, makes me wish i lived in Tennessee.
https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html
Libraries are more like museums now. And the people who use them are part of the display.
With the internet, not only are libraries inefficient, but they are also a huge waste of time and resources for those who maintain them.
1) They provide educational resources for the community
In a very local, expensive, and analog way, yes. Today's kids are beyond that. And you cannot cut educational funding and argue for libraries at the same time if it is for education.
2) They provide a relaxing atmosphere for people to relax
Yes, and so does the Starbucks across the street.
Even before the internet, bookstores would cringe at the libraries having all the new books as soon as they did, but it didn't really matter, because EVEN THEN, there weren't enough people fully utilizing the libraries. However, if libraries did share all their books digitally online, that would be cringe-worthy not only for bookstores, but for publishers who still make people pay for the trees they shred and distribute. Of course, one unified federal library online would be enough. It would be more convenient, save tons of money, and would provide an unprecedented collection of books never before accessible by anybody ever. What a silly idea.
electronic books are a joke. they keep failing in the marketplace for a reason. technophilia leads some people to deduce certain things that won't really ever happen. you can't improve on wood pulp. for every plus of an electronic book, there is a negative, and then some. wood pulp has no backlight, true, and limited memory. but wood pulp is way cheaper, more durable, and the battery lasts a hell of a lot longer. electornic books will never replace wood pulp. i am no luddite. i just know that electronics can't improve everything
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
if libraries go the way of the dinosaur, we can certainly expect that the first first-world-nation to dispose of them will be the first to lose footing in the future. the evolution of the internet has helped to spread information and knowledge a lot more swiftly than in the past: this is excellent. does this mean that the internet can replace libraries? can a food-processor replace a knife? the whole idea of knowledge/information being power is almost a cliche, but that doesn't change its truth value. jean-francois lyotard discusses this in his essay http://www.amazon.com/Postmodern-Condition-Knowledge-History-Literature/dp/0816611734/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1204514280&sr=8-1"the postmodern condition", and i think it is something that the "powers that be" and the media should be examining (if this article is any indication of their feelings)
Is that extinction timeline a joke? They have "peace and quiet" disappearing around 2038: I would kill myself if that came around, but I know it won't, not by then at least.
Saying "the internet" will make libraries obsolete is like saying "tools" will make factories obsolete. The internet has allowed even the smallest libraries near-instant access to information they'd never have dreamed of having even ten years ago.
Say you're Brock Sampson and you need a copy of the Chilton's repair guide for your '69 Dodge Charger, since your copy was destroyed when the Guild of Callamitous Intent assaulted the Venture Compound. Used to be there was no way in Hell a local library would have something that specific. Maybe a book on general auto repair, but no way you get detailed info. If you were really lucky, maybe you could mail-order a copy from somewhere, get it in 4-6 weeks. Now, even the smallest library can have access to *every single Chilton's manual every published.* EVER. Every revision, every edition. Not only that, but the authors/publishers are properly compensated for their work, and not one tree had to die.
(and yes, you could probably buy the Chilton's guide through Amazon, eBay, etc, get it overnighted. That still doesn't trump free (nothing out of pocket) and instant.)
Even if that particular library doesn't have access to the data pimps....er....publisher's databases, the inter-library loan system has advanced to a point the local librarian can tell you if any library in the state / region / sometimes nation has a copy, or if the copy is available and probably get it to you within a few days.
The internet has "answers", Libraries have reference materials, sources, and most of all hard data. Digitization is nothing but a boost to libraries and Librarians. (Real Librarians anyway. Not bespectacled old bitties with their hair in a bun, a pocket full of "Shush", and an axe to grind because someone took away their perfectly good card catalog and replaced it with a solitaire machine.)
There are some people that if they don't know, you can't tell 'em.
Providence Public Library is pretty good. They've got a very large collection and their inter-library loan system is fantastic. Helps that Rhode Island is so small. They also get new books very frequently so when I see recommendations the first thing I do is search the online catalog and reserve the book. I'm willing to wait a little bit as I'm a frugal sort anyhow.
But I'd love a library like the SPL. That is totally awesome.
Businesses must adapt to changes.
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I'm a librarian although I currently don't work in a library. I've also been involved with digital libraries since the early 1990s, when 95% of the population had never heard of the Internet.
We now can do some amazing things with the Internet, yet public libraries are busier than ever. I challenge any of the readers here to find a public library in the middle of the afternoon which is deserted. You'll have a difficult time.
Public libraries offer many services now that go beyond their traditional role of providing reference and printed materials. What's really amazing is that many people still use libraries to borrow books. Most libraries out there report heavy usage of their printed materials. This is the main reason why public libraries won't disappear by 2019 or by 2050. People still read books. The percentage of the population who reads books may have dropped, but there are still lots of people out there who read books.
A great example of a library as a public hangout is the new Amsterdam Public Library designed by Jo Coenen.
If you are visiting Amsterdam it is the perfect place to visit. It has 600 computers with free unfiltered internet access. A restaurant with a great view on the city and free wired and wireless internet. great collection of englisch books, magazines and literature. If you are a resident you can get a card offering access to the huge DVD and software collection, (computer games and Hollywood movies on lend!) It has books too : )
http://images.google.nl/images?hl=nl&q=openbare%2Bbibliotheek%2Bamsterdam
But only if they're statically linked.
I have discovered a truly remarkable sig which this post is too small to contain.
Unless you guys have significantly improved the card catalog system in the time since I've been in fifth grade, I'm guessing a reference librarian using a library of choice will find a picture of a sheep facing left at sunset no faster than a fifth grader using Google. One of these search methodologies apparently requires a masters degree. Go figure.
P.S. [sheep sunset] gets four results on the first page of Google image search which fit the criteria you want.
http://images.jupiterimages.com/common/detail/01/88/22578801.jpg
Help poke pirates in the eyepatch, arr.
That's only cheaper if your time costs nothing. And digital information is much more accessible than paper or microfilm: doing a search on a collection of digital documents will give you better results, much faster than browsing those documents on paper. In your example, the sports writer would have to spend a week hunched over a microfilm reader, or 10 minutes in his search engine of choice.
Having said that, one of my biggest complaints about public libraries -- in the States, anyway -- are the lack of a good selection of books. I usually find myself hanging out in either college libraries or bookstores like Borders to find a good selection of books to choose from, and I even find Borders and B&N lacking in many areas.
Fortunately, for me at least, I do live near Boston and have ready access to the MIT area, where a lot of great bookstores -- mom-and-pop, university-run, and mega chains -- reside for my savory pickings. Each bookstore has it's distinct "flavor" of selections, and I kinda like that.
On the issue of public libraries, my suggestions on how to save them and make them more relevant to the 21st century:
Well, I could think of more suggestions, but I am overdue for my cafe fix for today!
Ruby Neural Evolution of Augmenting Topologies
The good about the classic library is the ability to jerk off in peace, like we used to...
(...If books turn digital, where to wipe cum? Ludicrous.)
Another long-held tradition once again goes down the drain.
A month ago, on a related note, The Guardian published a note about the world's 10 best bookshops. Worth looking at
just like C41, POTS, and business air travel.
This is all fine and dandy, but wont someone please consider the poor people, who can't afford internet access and computers (IE: the vast majority). If the libraries dissappear, how are the economically challenged going to be able to complete their hard work and study to get themselves out of the poverty trap. Oh, right. The point is they can't be arsed in the first place, thats why they're poor... yeah, who really needs libraries anyway
Darwin Hawking Blackmore
If people won't stop caring about Paris Hilton until 2023, I don't know if the the next 15 years are worth living. Drop me in cryo, please.
The libraries of the future will be much different. By 2030 shelves full of books will be replaced by holograms of Orlando Jones, a design which will surely last hundreds of millions of years.
Tinfoil hats don't read this....
With an RFID in your library card, and rfids in all the books you could have hours where there is no
staff. Enter through a man-trap, you must carry your library card or the inner door won't open.
When you leave, your card is read and all the books are noted and added to your taken out.
If there are two cards in the mantrap the outer doors won't open.
Oh, I have thought of a bad hack already - someone hides a stolen card in the mantrap... perhaps on entry the inner door won't open with multiple card rfids present.
I heard that libraries pay "special prices" for books just because they lend them out.
Whoah... I could swear you're talking about the library here.
:)
Same size town. Those same services. And a newer, bigger building is under way, about 200yds away from the current one. I wonder if you could possibly be talking about the same place.
In which case, oddly enough... I have the architectural drawings/plans for that new building right here next to me.
Judging from the sig, the name of the band, mail address, and prodding various servers, I think we are indeed talking about the same library. If the main library is within, say, 500 yards of _the_ mall, the name of the street between the old and new locations begins with 'W' and ends with 'y', then I'd call the odds extremely high.
Just sent you a confirming mail.
What you do with a computer does not constitute the whole of computing.
Yep, that'd be the one. I'll be darned.
:)
:)
(Although the street between is actually 14, not w.*y... it's pretty obvious you nailed the spot. I figured my info would be enough to narrow it down, if you were indeed in the same area.
No email... but my email info here has been out of date for a long while... you'll probably get a bounce. Just fixed it now, though. Give it another go, if you like.