How a San Francisco parking meter can benefit libraries

The [new parking] system will use electronic sensors to measure real-time demand for parking spaces, and adjust prices accordingly. When there are lots of empty spaces, it will be cheap to park. When spaces are hard to find, rates will be higher.

The range in prices will be huge: from 25 cents an hour to a maximum of $6 an hour...

So how can this idea work for libraries? It can work by adjusting borrowing periods and fines based on demand.

Say, I want the DVD for Diary of a Wimpy Kid, which will be popular and have a long reserve list; with a system like this, I could "bid" for a higher position on the wait list by choosing to borrow the movie for just 1 day.

Which means that I need to be ready to pick up the DVD the day I get notified and bring it back the next day. And if not, my fine might be 24X the normal fine (to use the above parking meter math).

I could also just put my name in for the regular borrowing period and wait the 3-6-12 weeks it might normally take to get a popular item.

In the original story, the supply and demand pricing is the only option. In my version, it's voluntary.

But I think this is a cool idea. If you can afford better service, you pay for it.

I want to see two lines at every desk in the library. If you want the librarian first, put your money where your mouth is and pay for my time. If you're not in a rush, then wait patiently until I finish milking this rich idiot for all he's worth. But since he can't figure out how to save to his flash drive, this could take a while: cha ching!

added note on how this is supposed to work:

PATRON A wants a popular item for a shorter loan period, so instead of going at the bottom of the list, she goes to the top:

present system	*	new "bid" system
NAME	*	NAME / loan period
Patron x	*	Patron A / 1 day
Patron x	*	Patron x / normal
Patron A	*	Patron x / normal

Now, Patron A needs to comply with new requirements and get to the library that day, in fact, we would need to split the day into 2 halves, MORNING and EVENING, to make these high demand items move faster. So patrons who wish to participate would need the ability to receive text messages and the library would need the ability to send them.

In this scenario, the daily FINE would increase to $2.40 a day at our library. If your library charges $1.00 a day for DVDs fines, then you might only be able to increase your find to $5 or $6 per day.

But I could see this working. A library could either keep a few items separate for these 1-day borrowers or if your software allowed for it, keep everyone in the same queue and let the system keep track of each borrower. But patrons would need the ability to choose whether they want the "express" (1 day) borrowing or the regular borrowing. And I would expect that a library who uses this would never have an "amnesty day" for forgiving fines. You could also let the patron keep the item once a $30 maximum was reached for that item... anyway...

Yes, it's complicated, but I could see it work if you wanted to do it.

Competition as a Motivator.

Competition is natural. It is the most natural thing in this universe. I wasn't paying attention when it was taught in school, but I think all physical objects compete for physical space.

I suspect that librarians won't admit to enjoying competition. Or maybe they only admit to promoting friendly competition during "game night" at the library. And they smile to themselves because they are unaware that the little group of old ladies who come every week have a $500 pot going on who can hit the most bullseyes on Wii Darts. Friendly competition still pits one against the other; it just sounds friendlier.

I wrote a fake story about game night competition here.

That's probably why kids don't participate in the awards program for the President's Council on Physical Fitness. Because it's a competition. And parents don't like when their kids lose. Although I'd read somewhere that it was because President Ford tried to submit an award requirement for "Tripping." But when I was in elementary school, we used to win badges we could sew onto our school sweaters. I felt like crap because I never got one. Our coach made us do 1,000 sit-ups (yes, that's 991 more than I can do right now) one day and I'm hoping that was for a badge an not because he was a former Nazi.

But we promote competition every day. We loan books and we give them due dates. This means that we force slower readers to learn to read faster. We force them to compete against a time limit to finish that book.

Yes, we try to be fair: we extended the normal borrowing period for those last two Harry Potter's because it didn't seem fair to give a kid only two weeks to get through 750 pages. Otherwise when asked about the events from Book 7, a kid might say, "I'm not sure. It was something about, VoldemortMinistryofMagicSnape Death Eatersdestruction Harry RonHermionequestVoldemort'sfourHorcruxes… but I can't remember because I had to read it so fast."

We have Summer Reading programs where our patrons compete for our limited supply of prizes. They read a few books and win a BOGO coupon for Rudy's Hoagie Palace. But every year those run out first. Because Rudy makes a damn good Hoagie.

We compete against ourselves, against past performance. I may run to beat a set time. Okay, not me because I wouldn't be caught dead running, but imagine a different person who runs. I (yes, imagine again a different person) may strive for better grades. I (different person) practice to get better at lots of things.

And getting "better" is just competition against one's self. There is nothing inherently wrong with competition. Without competition, the smarter, yet arguably less athletic sperm that tricked the quicker, stupider sperm by shouting, "Go back! It's just a Victoria's Secret catalog," could not have produced us, the librarians.

Yet, we look on competition negatively. Our library departments compete for funds against the police or fire departments. We compete for money from the book and supply budgets. We compete for meeting room space. Competition sucks when resources are slim. Competition is only fun when there's an open bar.

But think about how different things compete for your time. I continually ask, "Is this worth my time?"

Or think about how you promote library programs when you begin to make that flyer and wonder, "How do I convince them that it's worth their time? I'll add more clip art!"

So let's just pretend that Competition is a natural motivator in that we compete for space, time and money. It is not artificial. So how can we use this to our benefit. And remember, we've already done this in the library by offering shorter loan periods for high-demand materials or by awarding a prize to a "winner." This is competition.

The example from the "motivation video" in the last post says that organizations need to provide more purposeful autonomy. We need to give the freedom to create without (too many) conditions.

The video dude calls this freedom, but I say it's still competition. We compete against our reputations and against our abilities. When we have this freedom, we ask the question, "How is the best way to use my skills during this free time?"

And because what you produce will be seen by everyone, you're not going to use that time updating your Twitter background.


So what would you do in your library? What could you bring to your boss to convince her that giving you more freedom is a good thing? What ideas for change do you have?

Now, again, I think this is an awesome idea. As the boss, I will give you complete freedom to do whatever you want during one work day. And whatever you do will remain in play for one month. And next month, we'll do it again. And the only form of competition you need to overcome is your own satisfaction that you did a good job.

Here is the example: You do what you want on Friday. You can change a display or put all the science fiction in the front of the library. But you can't leave a mess. You need to get this thing done during the one day. Or you can put up a poster or find a place for the new library cat litter box or whatever. You can wrap all the mysteries in brown paper and put them on a shelf called "Mystery Mysteries."

But if it doesn't work; if people say it sucks, you need to be open enough to acknowledge that and slink away with your tail between your legs. But if people like it, you get the satisfaction of knowing that your idea worked.

Now should we credit these ideas? Like in the store where you see a shelf that says, "Staff Picks" and each associate has a book or movie next to his name? If you suck, everyone will know.

I believe this is competition. It's competition for your time. It's competition between what you do every day and what you feel you should be doing. It's competition against perceived (or real) limitations.

Because (hopefully) you will do a good job. And all your coworkers will also do good jobs. Because this is for as many people as I can get involved.

There is no money for your idea and you need to do the work to put your idea into practice. And your creation will live for the rest of the month, or until our library patrons band together with torches and pitchforks and tear it down.

This is just one idea. I already have lots of freedom here at work. And I think I give my staff lots of freedom. Because they know that I expect their best, within reason. Hell, I hired them; how good can they be?

Library Champions.

Bloggers who champion innovative, untested library services piss me off.

I hate people who have ideas to use a new thing and tell the rest of us what a "game-changer" that new thing would be, but yet, have no evidence that the new thing isn't just another turd on a stick.

You ever know a kid who thinks it's funny to jab a dog turd with a stick to pick it up so it's like a hot dog on the end of a stick like you might see in a cartoon of an old time campfire cookout? And then he runs around trying to tag someone with the turd. That's what these new ideas are like, to me.

If you are promoting a new idea that you have not tested and have no logical basis for pushing on everyone else, then drop it back where you found it or I'm going throw a rock at your head.

But we have these librarians who continue to shout, "Wouldn't it be great if..."

Yes, it would be great if... something. But the point is that you're too much of a pussy to try it. Or you're too small of a fish to get your boss to try it, or too flaky and you've already had too many of your big ideas fail that your boss it tired of you making her look stupid. Or you really have your head way up your ass.

"Would it be awesome if we let our library patrons blah-dee blah? And then they could blah-dee blah-dee blah-dee blah-dee blah so much better or faster or easier? Wouldn't that be awesome?"

That's why you can't copyright an idea. Because ideas are bullshit. But plans aren't bullshit. Where is your plan? But no, you have no plan. Just some vague feeling that some new thing will somehow validate all the time you spend sitting on your ass at your job while everyone else does the actual work.

"Now remember, I said it first. So when this becomes a thing because of some other librarian's actual hard work, don't forget to give me the credit!"

Your boss doesn't listen to you for one of two reasons: either she's an ass or you're an ass. Since she's your boss, and as a boss myself, I tend to lean towards your being the ass.

These asses see the library failing because it doesn't do or have all this different crap. When the truth is, the library already incorporates many cool ideas. One of which is the ability to get one location to move items to another location so you can pick it up from a more convenient place. Can I get Walmart or Best buy to do that? Hell no. I go to their website and it says that item is not available from my local store so I need to pay to have it shipped to my home. Libraries do this for free. This is a great, useful service that if we were a business, we might be able to charge a buck for.

And interlibrary loan? Why don't you go down to the Apple store and ask them when they can get you an Android phone? What? Apple doesn't cooperate with competing businesses? But the library will get you any book (within reason) from almost any other library in the country.

Why don't you write down all the things your library does now and see how this new thing is better? Do you even know all the cool shit your library does now?

Now I'm not picking on a specific group of assholes, or even one asshole, but you know who you are. If it's different, it's better.

Because you're the dreamer of beautiful dreams. You imagine a world where your ideas are the honey that nourishes the rest of us.

Don't get me wrong; I love ideas. Keep them coming. But don't think you invented something just because you post it on your blog. We all have good ideas, but most of us work on them at home to prove they aren't bullshit before we shout them out in public.

You know what happens when you shout out ideas that no one adopts? You look like some crazy person shouting out ideas. You might as well wear roadkill for a hat and load your pants with chocolate pudding. The key is to get your idea to work and then tell us about it.

And if your idea is really good, I'll steal it for myself. Because I'm the boss.

Oh, and you want a concrete example of this? But completely unrelated to the library world? How about Betty White hosting SNL this past week? She thanked Facebook because of some campaign to get her to host.

If you saw the show, it was funny. Betty was great. But you can bet that the person who started the FB page is congratulating himself, or FB corporate is congratulating themselves without any of them acknowledging that the writers had anything to do with it. If you've seen the last few SNL's then you know a slamdunk was not a guarantee. Betty's show could have tanked. And then what? All the Facebookers who joined Betty's group would say, "Hey, I did my part."

Yes, it was a good idea. But that's how it is with ideas: you need people to make them real.