The sun will come out.... tomorrow...

I don't know what to do about libraries. On the one hand, libraries are still doing some amazing things, but on the other, libraries are cutting staff to continue doing it.

Librarians have lost their jobs, but the business of libraries goes on. Is it enough to advocate for libraries while accepting the loss of librarians?

Librarians are professionals. We organize data and materials into useful collections. We archive that data for current and future library users. We attempt to establish some cataloging authority so that person A and person B can find information regardless of how they begin their search.

We don't put all the Education books in the front of the library in August and then move them to the back in October just because more people might want them when school begins. A book store might do this, but libraries don't. The books remain where they belong so that anyone can find them whenever they might choose to look.

But does anyone care that we do this? Some cities have thousands of restaurants, so they require lots of chefs to prepare the cuisine, but some places only have fast food joints, so any kid can drop the fries into hot oil. Maybe librarians need to get away from those places that only want to eat fries. But is all that fast food really good for you?

I believe that conditions will improve. I believe that libraries will become stronger. But I'm not so sure that stronger libraries will guarantee that more librarians will find more of those dream jobs. Or any job that requires their expertise.

The problem with being a librarian is that you can't really do it yourself. You can't open a private library down the street as you would if you were a dentist or an accountant. I don't know any librarian with a business card that reads, "Have Books, Will Travel."

Or maybe the librarian travels from town to town with a laptop performing Internet searches for people in exchange for a night in the barn and a slice of peach pie. And that's how we'll survive, leaving librarian chalk signs for each other about which towns are librarian friendly and which ones google everything and will run you out of town on sight.

My first clue that something could be wrong with the profession came in library school when I learned about the "give 'em what they want" philosophy. My thought was, if all I have to do is give people what they want, then why the hell am I learning all this crap and getting this degree?

The profession seems to be sinking. Maybe not the whole profession, but research and archiving and cataloging and acquisitions parts. There will probably always be a place for Children's librarians. But for everyone else, the conventions are still going where some celebrity tell a heart-warming story about a childhood love of books, and some futurist says that librarians need to evolve to survive and we applaud and cheer without realizing that 99 percent of evolution involves extinction.

It's like we're on the Titanic and we're trying to keep the people left on board, the ones without access to a life boat, entertained while the ship is going down:

I spy with my little eye... something that begins with W.

Is it water?

Yes. But don't just jump in with the answer like that. Ask a question. String it out a little.

Okay, next one. I spy with my little eye... something that begins with I.

Is it iceberg?

I get depressed when so many people seem to associate quality libraries with an extensive book collection, and not so many people mention how important the librarian is to that collection. It's like everyone feels that they can just do it themselves.

So I value my library degree. If libraries continue to hire librarians based on that sheet of paper, then at least that cuts the pool of job applicants down somewhat.

I think most people would agree that librarians have skills, but they probably wouldn't agree on just how important those skills are. Maybe I'm like some awesome cooper. How many barrels does anyone really need?

So to all the librarians still looking, I think things will get better. But since I have a job, I guess I have the luxury of feeling that way. But on the bright side, people are not getting smarter. They fall for the most obvious scams on Facebook and give out their personal information after clicking on those PayPal account verification emails. So they need us. They don't want us for what we've been trained to do, but they need us to help them when they fuck up. Which they will, daily.

But I will keep you in my thoughts and whenever I have to make decisions that could endanger the librarian's future in the profession, like the one I'm making now about hiring some robots to replace our librarians, I will do everything in my power to argue for the human librarian.

But, man, those robots are so awesome and they don't ever take breaks.

Phil, Phil, Phil... PHIL!

I know you mean well, but come on... You have got to kidding.

Phil Shapiro must be the.effing.librarian's nemesis. This is the second time I've had to comment publicly on his ideas for libraries. The last time Phil suggested that library users produce art, literature and music to sell to supplement (actually, I think he said, "start selling those creative things to fund the library's operations") library budgets. But I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt and just credit his contributions as "thinking outside the box."

But this time around Phil suggests that libraries should provide public kitchens.

10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, 0.... Did you let that sink in?

Phil says, "So public libraries ought to have some kind of cafeteria with a selection of healthy, affordable, nourishing foods... That cafeteria should have attached to it a public kitchen..."

What do you think about having a public kitchen in the library? When the McDonald's parking lot is covered with partially-eaten burger remains, stale mcnugget mini-pucks, solidified shake residue, and this is just the place where people eat, what would a public kitchen look like? Hell, our staff microwave oozes the same funk you might get from engineering a Brundlefly.

I would love to see an architectural design with the library here and then a nice open courtyard here with a xeriscape garden and the cafeteria over there, but I don't see it happening. And I can't imagine a public kitchen where "[y]ou do not need to leave the library unless you can think of a better use of your time."

If the library wasn't a homeless shelter before, it would absolutely become one after this. And then librarians can spend the day cleaning the tables and washing the utensils and texting people when their frittata is done.

Who needs a library?

Why do you need the library?

Why does anyone need the library?

Why do we need anything?

If we, librarians, could define the role of the library, then we, library users, could decide if we really need them. As it is, we are letting technology define the role of the library. Whereas I think that our service to people should define it.

I think it's a matter of ego. And Homo NOVUS, the superior iPhone-clutching human, can be a huge asshole. Whatever he needs, he gets, with a simple tap of his as-yet-to-be-determined-rightful-ownership-through-patent-litigation futuristic touch-screen. He (and She, the ladies can be assholes, too) is multi-tooled, unlike his club-wielding and single-minded predecessors.

It truly is ego. The new library is about who owns the authority. In the old library, the librarian was the authority. But things change.

ANTIQUUS (old library)	NOVUS (new library)
Librarian-centric	User-centric
Fixed Authority	Dynamic Authority
Repeated shushing	Constant bleeping

So clearly there's a power struggle. But it's not between librarians and library patrons, but between librarians and inanimate devices. NOVUS totes the device around, searching for signals, or wireless connectivity, and follows. So who is the master? the human or the device?

Homo NOVUS has less control over his own destiny. That electronic device is dependent on applications and services he can't control. Life on the Web is nomadic. There's the illusion of control with GPS and location-based services and instantaneous results, but NOVUS possesses none of it; it's all rented like a disco-era prom tuxedo. Both will induce shame over time.

NOVUS says, "Look at me. I command amazing powers." But the power is really in the device, and NOVUS is actually empty and powerless.

Now you must be saying, "Hey, the.effing.librarian, you big dope... are you just quibbling over the content delivery system? Does it really matter if people read from paper or from tiny cell phone screens? Oh, gosh, I didn't really mean to fly off like that and call you a dope. I love you. Can you forgive me?"

And I say, "Yes, of course. But you should never feel like you need my forgiveness. After all, Love means never having to say you're sorry."

But when people read from paper, they get more of a chance to consider the words before they react. You would read the paper then write a letter to the editor. Or you'd read a book and think about the story. But online, people react before they've even finished reading and leave comments and criticisms on the opening sentences or even the headline. Or they comment on other's comments without even reading the entire article. Arguments break out and it's all just me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me, me. Reading on paper allows one to internalize their thoughts while reading online fosters externalized responses.

But this isn't an argument about paper versus electronic. It's about whether the library is a place for people to learn or for them to sit on some furniture and look at their phones or netbooks or whatever. Anyone can provide wireless access, so why would we expect these people to support the library if free wireless becomes available at the local book store or department store or coffee shop or strip club?

Libraries should serve people, not devices. Whenever you write up your library service plans you need to put "People" at the top. You can have an 80/20 split for devoting your time and resources to non-people related services, but the vast majority should serve people.

Libraries are just our attempt at having some control over the glut of information. Libraries try to put chaos into order. Librarians take all those ideas that have some formal structure on print or in a database, and we organize them and give them a home. Libraries are a home for information. So when we promote libraries to our users, we should stress these ideals, that libraries are for helping people and for providing information with a home.

But don't express these ideas of home too literally. Because if your library is like mine, there are a few people who already treat the library like their home and you might just find them taking a nap in your office.

Money for Suck.

Here is an interesting proposal from Alex Beam of The Boston Globe: libraries should buy e-book readers for their patrons to show them how they suck.

He didn't actually say any of that, but he said to buy readers to show everyone "the possibilities and limitations of digital books."

Here is the full paragraph for context:

I worry that libraries, even the newest ones, risk becoming fortresses buttressed by books, protecting Gutenberg’s technology for reasons of principle rather than pragmatism. Librarians need to educate themselves, and us, about the possibilities and limitations of digital books. Right now, the Jeff Bezoses of the world - he is the rosy-eyed, huckster boss of Amazon - have the stage to themselves, and, as I write, consumerist lemmings are dropping $200 to $250 for e-readers, mainly because they are well promoted.

I understand his point. Like many libraries, we offer Overdrive ebooks to our patrons. But we don't have readers for them to borrow to experience what an ebook is and whether they might want to buy themselves a reader.

This is one area where libraries are ahead of the curve to the disadvantage of our patrons. We offer a service whereby they need to spend a lot of their own money to enjoy. In the past, from what I remember, libraries added DVDs to the collection after most people already had the players in their homes. And if someone still doesn't have one, he can get one from Kmart for around $20. And basic mp3 players for downloadable audiobooks are now around the same affordable price.

This is a similar situation with the computers we provide: these are big ticket items that many people can't afford. So the library buys computers and software to try to narrow the gap between the digital haves and the have-nots.

But with a new service like ebooks, once the library adds them to the collection through a company like Overdrive, it's like the library is choosing to actively ignore the set of our patrons who can't afford the readers. I can't think of another service we offer where the patron needs an expensive gadget to join the party.

So libraries should add this cost to the total budget for ebook subscriptions. If you have $20,000 for ebooks, pull off $3,000 for readers, and circulate those, too.

And maybe our patrons won't care about ebooks once they get a taste of them. Maybe they'll go back to their old reliable dead trees.

Or maybe libraries, as we currently know them, will cease to exist, replaced by download stations and a few USB cables, or a wi-fi hub and some vending machines.

No, I don't don't think an ebook reader could replace me. Unless there's a model that breaks down all the time and whose battery overheats and catches fire, then, yeah, my job is over.

The Future of the Library Café.

Is your library a Library? Or is your library a Community Center? Or is it a Café?

I'm not asking what your library is, based on its appearance or the hygiene of your "guests," but what is your Mission? Is your library here to educate or to entertain?

I'm asking because I think there is an important difference.

First, I am not a lawyer. I don't want to be a lawyer. If a lawyer bit me and infected me and I transformed into a lawyer, I would hope I still had enough of my wits to throw myself into a wood chipper. But first, I would file some lawsuits because that sounds like fun. So I haven't studied law. But I think I know a little about behavior and motive, having watched so much Law & Order.

Before automated materials acquisition, it probably took a month to get a new book processed and entered into the library catalog. Now we get bestsellers the same day (or in the case of the last Dan Brown novel, a few days before) they are available in stores. We can get most library materials processed and ready for the public to enjoy pretty near the same time the local stores have them for sale.

So libraries didn't used to be in direct competition with local merchants. Sure, libraries purchased the works of bestselling authors, but if someone was impatient, then the local bookstore made a sale. Otherwise, library patrons waited.

Also, we used to purchase educational materials. We bought videotapes for the stuff Blockbuster wouldn't carry because their customers didn't want it. We had tapes on 'how to learn Esperanto' or on 'a virtual visit to the Chicago stockyards' or 'how to display your shrubbery.'

We didn't pre-order the latest Pixar movies and have them the same week Target got them for sale. Libraries bought classics and art films and opera. Now we carry the unrated version of Turistas when we used to only have Tony Bennett and Woodie Guthrie with the London Philharmonic.

And the reason why I think this is important is that Libraries are given many protections because they are seen to support the educational needs of society. Not the need for fun. We are allowed to copy things and to loan things because our motive is to support an educated public.

The industries can complain about how we loan out books, music CDs, and DVDs for free, but since our primary mission is to instruct, inform and educate, we are protected from attack.

So what happens when the mission changes? What happens when your library transforms into an amusement center?

The Annoyed Librarian says (that boozy broad says lots of things - did I ever tell you how much she talks in her sleep? but it's not like we get much sleep. wokka! wokka!), "'The Library' doesn't have to be about books, but it has to be about reading, literacy, and education."
[fyi: I started writing this before I saw her column on that.]

She, AL, argues from the perspective of the taxpayer. But what about the library's competitors? We've crossed into their marketplace.

And this is my point. Libraries CANNOT become Unlibraries. We have way more to lose than we imagine. If your library mission is not to educate, then your library is not keeping its bargain with society. Movie theaters entertain, and shopping mall food courts are meeting places.

Target, WalMart, Amazon, Barnes & Noble: these are the places to get all the newest stuff, not the library. Should we compete directly with retailers and take sales from them?

Yes, we buy the books and DVDs we loan out. Sure we might buy 500 copies of The Lost Symbol, but those copies circulate 4,000 times. And we bought our copies for 40% off. So to a publisher or retailer, that's forty-thousand dollars in lost sales for all the copies they might have sold if the library had only slowed its acquisition process down.

Do a search and you'll find libraries boasting how their DVD collections are more popular than Netflix. Or that they dare to use Netflix to fill in gaps in their collections. Sure, the library has a legitimate Netflix account, but does Netflix want me to borrow something that I then loan out to someone else? Of course not. They want each user to have his own account and pay the monthly fee.

In these real examples, libraries cost businesses money.

I know libraries were less popular when we just loaned out 16mm films on Canada, Our Friendly Neighbor to the North, Bob Newhart comedy albums and copies of Little Women, but maybe that's all we're supposed to do.

Well, maybe not that. But I wonder how the business world is starting to view us. As a threat? Now that people spend their days here on the Internet instead of wandering the shopping malls and making impulse purchases. And downloading books and audiobooks. And borrowing current movies that the stores are trying to sell for $22.99. Especially in this economic slow-down? If so, what will they do?

I think AL's argument is more realistic, that taxpayers might see us as chair-fillers and time-wasters, twittering nonsense into the void. I don't even know if the business world even knows that libraries exist.

But since my fears are more insane, mine are the ones that will probably come true.

The 48-hour angel.

It looks like we all better find another career by 2009 when Emilio Estevez releases his movie, The Public, about the 48-hours when "a conscientious librarian tends to the homeless and mentally ill people who use the public library as a homeless shelter" during the two coldest days of the year, in Los Angeles.

I remember when I first read Chip Ward's article about the homeless and mentally ill situation in Salt Lake City Public Library. It was one of those moments of, "Yeah! Get those crazy people out of our library." But obviously, I didn't get it. Chip doesn't want the crazy people out of the library; he wants a social service network created to make the crazy people normal by creating housing and job training programs. He believes we all need to change.

The belief that we are responsible for each other's social, economic, and
political well-being, that we will care for our weakest members compassionately,
should be the keystone in the moral architecture of a democratic culture. We
will not stand by while our fellow citizens are deprived of their fellowship and
citizenship — which is why we ended racial segregation and practices like poll
taxes that kept disenfranchised Americans powerless. We will not let children
starve. We do not consign orphans to the streets like they do in Brazil or let
children be sold into prostitution as they do in Thailand. We are proud of our
struggles to meet people's basic needs and to encourage inclusion. Why, then,
are the mentally ill still such an exception to those fundamental standards?

America is proud of its hyper-individualism, our liberation from the bonds of
tribe and the social constraints of traditional societies. We glorify the
accomplishments of inventors, innovators, entrepreneurs, pioneers, and artists.
But while some individuals thrive and the cutting edge of our technology is
wondrous, the plight of the chronically homeless tells me that our communities
are also fragmented and disintegrating. We may have gained the world and lost
each other.
(from the Atlantic Free Press)

Now Chip is retired (and interviewed in the latest LJ), Emilio is relatively rich and famous, and librarians are waiting for things to get worse. Me, I'd love to change. Make me rich and famous so I don't have to work in the library after 2009 when this movie gets released and every crazy person in America shows up at our front door looking for Emilio to give them cookies and a cup of coffee.

Otherwise, I still gotta pay the bills.

One reason privatized libraries will fail.

Family files lawsuit in metal bat injury case

WAYNE, N.J. (AP) — The family of a boy who suffered brain damage after he was struck by a line drive off an aluminum baseball bat sued the bat's maker and others on Monday, saying they should have known it was dangerous.

The family of Steven Domalewski, who was 12 when he was struck by the ball in 2006, filed the lawsuit in state Superior Court. It names Hillerich & Bradsby Co., maker of the 31-inch, 19-ounce Louisville Slugger TPX Platinum bat used when Steven was hit.

The lawsuit also names Little League Baseball and Sports Authority, which sold the bat. It claims the defendants knew, or should have known, that the bat was dangerous for children to use, according to the family's attorney, Ernest Fronzuto.

Steven was pitching in a Police Athletic League game when he was hit just above the heart by a line drive. His heart stopped beating and his brain was deprived of oxygen for 15 to 20 minutes, according to his doctors.

Now, this is a tragic event, tragic because a child suffered a serious injury, but also tragic because there was a sporting event held with children participating and no adult there seemed to know CPR.

But what it says to me is that any "pain and suffering" can be used to link any two events. Now, Steven threw the ball, starting this whole cycle, and after the ball was hit, he was unable to catch the ball or deflect it from hitting him or get out of the way. Now, I'm not trying to be a hard-ass, but up to that one pitch, it seemed to be okay with his parents whenever Steven pitched to any other batter who faced their son using an aluminum bat.

So, again, up to the point of injury, Steven's parents thought aluminum bats were safe enough to let their son stand fifty feet away and throw a baseball at another kid who was swinging one.

But what does this have to do with the privatization of libraries? As long as libraries are public institutions, there seems to be the generally accepted belief that libraries are not liable for any injury caused by the reading of books or the sharing of ideas. So a lawsuit like this one shows me that there will be a point when a private library, run by a corporation, will be blamed for some future event. For example, if a parent plans for her child to grow up to become a doctor, but the child decides to become anything but a doctor because he saw it in a book, the library will be sued for lost wages. If someone gets fat because the recipes in a cookbook were irresistible, the library will be sued. If a child throws a baseball and another child hits it back with an unabridged dictionary hard enough to cause injury, the library will be sued. Library card paper cuts: sued; Adam Sandler movies: sued; gay penguin picture books: sued; Harry Potter turning your daughter into a Wiccan: sued; not enough parking spaces: sued; no cell phone use: sued; too many cell phone users: sued; Internet computer mouse slimy: sued; Internet too slow: sued; Internet down: double-sued.

Now I know this is America, and everyone is free to sue anyone for any damn thing they want, and that lawyers of the spawn of Hell, but how many more lawsuits does this country need?

"People who have children in youth sports are excited about the lawsuit from a public policy standpoint because they hope it can make the sport safer," Fronzuto said after filing the suit Monday morning. "There are also those who are skeptical of the lawsuit and don't see the connection between Steven's injury and the aluminum bat."

One of those skeptics is right here. Now all you parents with a kid involved in organized sports, go now and learn CPR, or lock your kid in his room. Oh, I forgot, it's America; do nothing now and sue everyone later.

And as someone who played baseball as a kid and pitched, one of reasons teams uses aluminum bats was because wood bats would break. I don't know what your experience is, but I was much less terrified of a ball being hit back at me from an aluminum bat than I was of a wood bat cracking in half and sending a one-pound chunk of jagged wood at me at 35 mph.

Equivalent Life Skillz.

So from lisnews, I see this story about Woodland, CA's new city librarian:

She has never managed a branch, a department, or a regular library program area. And, actually, apparently brings no professional librarian experience: Has never worked a reference desk or done readers' advisory, never selected books or other materials, never designed and carried out children's and young adult services, managed circulation and patron services, never trained and supervised library staff never done the work she is now responsible for managing and improving. Talk about on-the-job training!

And I thought, but maybe she knows the Guitar Hero tabs for "Eruption." Wouldn't that qualify one for a library job?

"Eruption" by Van Halen (midi)


And I wondered what my future CV might look like:

Another reason to love me.

I am at least six days ahead of everyone. When people look back at this blog, they will say, "effing was six days ahead of everyone." Some of you only read this blog once a week, so you don't notice it, but if you visited every day, you'd agree.
So. What caused the self-congratulatory outburst? I just saw that U C Berkeley just today had a student presentation on "tangible user interfaces."

I don't know if you were here the other day when I returned from the future with the news, but tangible user interfaces are gonna be the next big thing in libraries.

Berkeley says this about it: "A considerable amount of research has been done in the domain of Tangible User Interfaces, a new approach to HCI which focuses on the physical interaction with computational media."

From the Flickr pix, I can't tell if anyone is actually using my idea for a thermal-regulated rectal interface, but who knows what happened after class in the parking lot. Those crazy Berkeley kids might just stumble on my probe design accidentally (on purpose).

Just remember if you steal my idea, you might as well steal the marketing slogan, too:
The Gerbil: because your ass knows what you want.

The Future of Libraries, a pain in the...

So I just flew back from a library in the future and boy are my arms tired. But seriously, ladies and germs...


In libraries in the future, there are computer screens mounted on stands about 2 feet high. On the side of each monitor (or "vid") is an attached wand or stylus about six inches long.

When I grab the wand and wave it at the vid, a "librarian" (a pale, thin dudette of about 18), approaches:
"Hey, hey, hey, grandpa. What do you think you're doing?"
"I'm just searching the catalog."
"Searching the catalog. Yeah, right. And President Britney is my girlfriend. Bend over, and let's just get this probe up your ass."
"Up my ass? Why? What happened to the mouse?
"Mouse? Man, that's old skool. Nope, all we have is the Gerbil. Now bend over, pops and let's get this over with."
The Gerbil is inserted, but I don't complain. (Hell, I graduated from library school.)

"Watch the screen. Images will flash by. Temperature-based search tools deliver the highest accuracy. Social norms, paranoia, embarrassment; all these things kept people from telling the librarian what they truly wanted. Libraries suffered for years trying to design the perfect interface for searching. And then we found this. When you see what you want, tiny fluctuations in rectal temperature indicate we've found your requested item without the embarrassment you might feel from approaching the desk and asking some stranger for help."

"This Gerbil up my ass avoids embarrassment?"
"Look around. Everyone does it."

It was then that I noticed that everyone was doing it.
"Is this a Microsoft product?"
"Sirsi."

The Future of Not Reading

based on the future of reading:

[powerful movie trailer voice] "In the not too distant future..."

I just got a message on my phone: Where is your PapIrus®?

[powerful movie trailer voice] "August Treadmill has learned a terrible secret..."

I'm August Treadmill. The PapIrus is my reader. I downed Harry Potter meets Anakin Skywalker, the tenth Harry Potter book, and loaned my reader to my mom. What I forgot is that downloading is a two-way street. PapIrus logs anonymous user data and periodically uploads info like my location and current page on the screen, and time powered on/off, stuff like that. What I didn't realize is that PapIrus has a contract with Google for data aggregation, and since I just logged into my Gmail account at work (one IP) and my mom is at her house reading Harry on my PapIrus (different IP), they know that I'm not the one reading the "book." Which is a violation of the TOA (Terms of Agreement).

[powerful movie trailer voice] "A secret which could cost him, ..mmm... $800!"

Two seconds later, my phone rings and my mom tells me that the PapIrus reader just flashed an unhappy face with the phrase "acceptable use violation" and then turned itself off. Shit. My $400 PapIrus with all my marketing ($120) and tech books ($250) just went down the crapper.

With the libraries gone, I'm going to have to buy a paper copy of Harry from India for $30 and have it shipped as porn since the importation of copyrighted texts is a felony. Maybe it'll be here in time for mom's birthday.

The libraries disappeared because people stopped caring. Yeah, people are stupid. That's why my car is loaded with cans of baked beans and a manual can opener. I'm just waiting for the end of the world. Bon appétit.

[If you are a company developing a portable e-book reader and would like to use the name PapIrus, I am willing to sell you the name for $5,500. I sure hope you're that gullible because I would have settled for $32.50. Ha, ha, ha.]

I don't know what to think.

A blog for the Montreal Chapter of the Canadian Library Association linked to something I wrote. I hope they feel I had something interesting to say (?). But I can never be sure since I often post stuff without giving it much thought.
But anyway, if anything I have to say can help with the discussion at their Salon des Bibliothécaires, then cool.

Mostly, I don't know what to think. After all, I'm just a moderately amusing, extremely attractive blogger. Extremely attractive.

The Stupidity of Crowds

I have a different view of the world, one not shared openly by many people. I see video of people standing on the street watching a building burn and wonder, why the hell are you standing so close to a burning building? If you think you can help, go do it, but don't just stand there waiting for flaming debris to fall on your heads.

To me a crowd is just one piece of information that I add to other pieces of information. When someone asks which email provider they should use, they usually add that they've heard that a lot of people use Hotmail. And I tell them, yes, a lot of people use Hotmail, and that is why, from 2 to 3 in the afternoon, you can't get to your mail because ten million people are doing the exact same thing. So I tell them they might want to consider a different email provider, or go with Hotmail, it's their choice; I'm just telling them what I know about crowds.

Crowds make you wait. Crowds make you late. Crowds block your exits. Crowds make Tickle-me Elmos impossible to find at Christmas-time.

But crowds also make you feel safer. Crowds make you feel like you belong. Crowds make you feel like you made the right choice.

So. Here's an interesting article called, The Wisdom of Crowds from James LaRue, a library director.

His focus seems to be on technology and things, since his original question to "high level librarians" was, "Which technological trend or idea, in your judgment, will have the biggest effect on libraries over the next 5-10 years?"

The top answers all had to do with things: open source library systems, open source software, and convergence of mobile devices.

I agree that these will be trends, but they won't help libraries, except with old issues. They won't change the way libraries serve their customers. They will just make things a little easier. Going with my crowd theory, they will just make us feel like we belong.

The technological idea that should affect libraries is advertising. At some point libraries were branding and marketing, but they never got into hardcore advertising. And rightly so. It's damn expensive. His question didn't specify "positive" effects, I think advertising will have the greatest negative effect on libraries because people do what they are told and we can't afford to tell the people about libraries.

But if we could afford it, this is what I suggest as a campaign:

Searching is not finding.
Though search engines are good at searching, libraries are good at finding. When you get tired of searching through 10 billion web pages, ask a librarian to help you find the answer.
The web is for searching. Libraries are for finding.

And,

Do you want to stay a schmuck all your life? Go to the freaking library. Read a book, you moron.

I think every library should put a few bucks into a fund to create a national campaign to promote libraries. It would just be, Go to the library. Or Ask the library. Or something that won't exclude any library who puts some money in the pot. Keep it simple, but shove it down people's throats. Who even thought about toe fungus before some animated creep told us we needed some drug to cure it? Who knew so many old people wanted to have sex before the drug companies showed us all the horny old farts in the boner-fuel commercials?

You can't keep chasing technology. Figure out what libraries do best and keep doing it. And strive to do it better. And then tell everyone that we do it.

How do you value your library?

Do you define the value of your library by its physical space or its virtual space?

I wonder because some people want to convince me that my library's value needs to be calculated by its virtual real estate. Do we have a blog? a wiki? facebook? flickr? second life property? I agree that these things have value, but do they have more or equal value to books, librarians, shelvers, study areas, parking spaces, buildings...?

I wonder about these things since budget cuts can make the physical spaces disappear, but leave the virtual property intact (like a neutron biblio-bomb). If you move more of your library services out to the web, will that devalue your physical library space? How do you ensure that the value of your physical library space doesn't plummet? If the value of a business is dependent on location (location, location), why isn't a library's?

Is the library business model outdated? Is the idea of neighborhood brick and mortar structures no longer practical, or necessary?

I don't believe that virtual networking fills the same psychological or emotional needs as physical social settings. But I can only base this on my own experiences. Are today's kids, who develop bonds with unseen individuals in virtual settings (like gaming) the same as me? Do they need the same interactions?

What do we do well that can't be replicated during the online experience? What do libraries do better?

Anyway, I'm just thinking out loud... I might come back to this topic later. Unless you have some answers.

The Extinction of Libraries.

First of all, this extinction timeline must be a gag because Elvis is alive and well and enjoying a jelly donut and the good company of a Branson, MO Cracker Barrel waitress as I type, so right off, they can't even get that straight.
(You all say it now, "I love me the company of a good woman and a good jelly donut." Keep the King alive.)

And all these stupid things get killed off for the benefit of people living at the top of the curve. For example, "Getting Lost" will get lost in 2014? This assumes that people know the difference between right and left; and as scientists observing the public daily, we know this will never happen. When assisting the public, "No, your other left" has become one of our most-used slogans (along with "that doesn't belong in your mouth" and "if you don't put your pants on, I'm calling the police.")

And you know they're really screwing around because they add "lists of predictions" and "futurists" expiring in 2050.

But getting back to the extinction of libraries which the chart has at 2019; we know that libraries are an expression of a need and librarians are the professional representation of that expression. As long as the need exists, we exist. The form of the job may change, but the nature of the work and the work itself should still exist.

Some might say that helping people to find books and answers is a lost cause. People don't want answers that require them to think, they want answers fast. And that might be true. People might decide that they don't need us. Who knows, it's possible that we could all end up as researchers for the military if that's the only place that has any money.

But Google promises better results based on ad revenue divided by usefulness. And those aren't always the best results (so far). As librarians, we offer better results based on usefulness divided by public or grant funding. But it's possible that in the future, we might all be working for private companies. Truly, librarians are damn smart generalists and can fit into any organization that has the need.

Sometimes I believe the quote from I, Robot (the Will Smith movie): "I don't know, maybe you would have simply banned the Internet to keep the libraries open." And I worry about the future.

There are lots of magic tricks that still haven't happened yet. For example, you know that soon Google will provide proximity search results, whereby they use your IP to filter and get local information to appear at the top. If I search for "toyota," I should get the nearest Toyota dealer first. And in place of the worthless "I'm Feeling Lucky" button, they'll put a "there's no place like home" button which will produce that proximity search. And they can afford to buy that phrase from MGM or whoever owns it.

So there are a lot of things to worry about. Number one is how the public sees us. And they should always see us sitting above them, pointing and laughing at their mistakes. That's my opinion, anyway.

Oh, and for the record, they list Lindsay Lohan as becoming extinct in 2007 which I scooped them on in my hilariously unfunny parody post back in August. So future that, Ross.

Never Trust Anyone Under 30.

Here's more crap I think about. Someone named Sarah Long wrote this:

As a librarian, I worry about the future of libraries. I know that people
born after 1980 are very different from those of us who were born earlier. These
less-than-30-year-olds were born digital. All their lives they've had computers
and digital toys of various descriptions. There is some evidence that they
actually think and process information differently as a result.

Libraries are busy now, but will they be busy in 10 or 20 years when the "digital kids" will be running things? I worry that libraries will not change enough or change fast enough to keep the next generation engaged as users, and let's face it, willing
to pay the taxes to keep libraries vibrant and vital.

She's going to interview some people and post podcasts from the sessions.

But here's what I'm thinking: Never Trust Anyone Under 30 (except you, monster).
I see librarians in the future divided into several factions. There will be the "digital kids" who wear their "question authority" tee-shirts, but buy every new thing they're told to get; there will be the librarians who sold out and work in the Coca-Cola Branch of their library; and there will be "us." We will be the ones who remember the texts before digitalization and who guard the past for the future. When the Great Digital Conversion (GDC) happens in 2021 and all paper documents are converted to digital, nobody will ever know what the originals looked like.

Reading The Adventures of Tom Sawyer will look like this:

Tom appeared on the sidewalk with a bucket of Behr whitewash and a long-handled
brush. He surveyed the fence, and all gladness left him and a deep melancholy
settled down upon his spirit which reminded him to take his Cymbalta.

At first, the whitewash from sponsored by Sherwin-Williams, but Behr won the last bid, so they got the insert. Possession of the previous version with the Sherwin-Williams text is a class two misdemeanor.

So future librarians will be modern hippies, pirates, revolutionaries-- whatever you want to call us. And this will be our lives:

we live by night, scanning for clean terminals. we jack into slow servers, the forgotten servers, too slow for video. and that's where we meet. there's me: bartleby, and the brontes: katherine and phil. and there's ralph e. on the west side and ishmael (she's a she) up north. we run the lines for survivors: unaltered texts from personal hard drives, archived from before the project gutenberg deletion, when all the original files were trashed. and we protect it all. we have novels, text books, a dos version of frogger; the original nu aux oranges by matisse; adless search results in html from hotbot; whatever we can find that's original and sponsor free.

Join us. We have a hell of a bowling team.

[sorry, I didn't know who Sarah Long is...]