Library Geek Woes

Facing $2M Budget Cut, DC Public Library Would Reduce Hours

2008-08-04T04:50:00.000-07:00

The District of Columbia Public Library (DCPL), facing a $2 million budget cut (from a $9.4 million budget) by October 1, the start of the fiscal year, could see some 71 positions remain unfilled, three more eliminated, and significant cuts in hours: 15 hours a week at the branches and 16 at the central library, with Friday service eliminated. However, DCPL director Ginnie Cooper is optimistic that the cut will be rescinded and library service sustained. (Read the rest.)

Long Beach, CA, Mayor Would Close Main Library

2008-07-30T05:47:00.001-07:00

The mayor of Long Beach, CA, wants to close the Main Library of the Long Beach Public Library to most public use and would instead expand service at the branches, but the 11 branch locations offer less public service space combined than the downtown Main. See the full story here.

Attendance at Hawaii libraries drops

2008-07-21T08:25:00.001-07:00

(via LISNews):

The Honolulu Advertiser  reports Hawai'i public libraries are seeing far fewer patrons than they did just a few years ago.
So why the steady drop in patrons? There doesn't appear to be a simple answer. The cutbacks in hours and services are a big
factor, said state Librarian Richard Burns. "You cut 200 hours and that has to have a significant effect on circulation," he
said.

Sad headlines about U.S. libraries

2008-07-10T05:30:00.000-07:00

County budget: fewer deputies, no libraries (Oregon)
Hartford Public Library Workers Vote To Give Up Gains (Connecticut)
Hartford City Officials Consider Takeover of Library System (Connecticut)
Exhibit warns about the loss of libraries (Massachusetts)
State's underfunded libraries struggle (Tennessee)

101 places to find your answers online

2008-07-09T17:27:00.000-07:00

Amazingly, asking a librarian made the top ten. I'm pleasantly surprised.

UPDATE: As a couple of commenters pointed out to me, this list is alphabetical, not sorted by relevance (and I shall cease posting too close to bedtime when my brain is obviously in bed). So librarians aren't in the top ten...but at least we made the list.

LGW is now on FaceBook

2008-07-02T10:20:00.000-07:00

If you're on Facebook, you can now be a fan of Library Geek Woes. And check out the new logo, which will be coming to LGW-the-web-site soon. *

*Soon being a relative term. Often, relative to how much time I actually have to do these sorts of things. Or to the the ratio of cloudy days to sunny days in Cleveland. Whichever is longest, probably.

Even Hennepin County has budget woes

2008-06-30T04:49:00.000-07:00

The Hennepin County Library is looking at cutting about 50 positions from its staff of more than 700 in order to swallow higher-than-expected costs it disclosed this week.
(See article)

The actual replacement for the public library?

2008-06-24T06:11:00.001-07:00

Personal outsourcing is getting bigger all the time, as our actual days seem to get shorter and our task lists get longer. You may have heard about families that outsource minor errands like picking up the dry cleaning or returning videos. But as more and more of our lives have converted to online procedures, entrepreneurs have figured out that there's a niche for helping take care of those things, too.

Enter services like LongerDays.com. The list of what they can do for you and/or your business is long and, more importantly, mostly practical. Their goal is:

"Our goal is to free up your time, improve your lifestyle, increase your productivity, and reduce the amount of stress in your life."

Who wouldn't want that? Frankly, I was drooling over the list of possibilities, including the idea that they would take care of all my social networking, send personalized update emails, do my long-put-off genealogy research, and even call contractors for quotes and references for work on my house. Then it occurred to me that this type highlights a major cultural shift that may be adding to the perception of the library as irrelevant.

This type of service is dependent on the idea that people don't want to do it themselves. If you want to learn how to do something, the library is a great place to start. But it would seem that fewer people want to (or have the time to) do things on their own, and need ways to save time. If you're looking for information about your hobby, a library is a boon. But if you're just trying to get through your day...not so much. Going to the library becomes just another item on the very long "to do" list of many people.

One of the questions we need to be asking, as public libraries, is what are we really doing to free up people's time, improve their lifestyle, increase their productivity, and reduce the amount of stress in their lives?

Library prepares to end existence

2008-06-12T08:10:00.000-07:00

After 134 years of continuous service, lack of funds is shutting down this library in Hubbardston, MA. They also have to close the town's senior center.

“A community without a library is not a community that enlightened, forward-thinking people want to live in..."

It's not really about the money

2008-06-11T05:49:00.000-07:00

Web Facts Erode Research:

"Libraries may form part of the cure - and the cause - academics say. One expert says that library staff can help students to reverse what they've learnt through social-networking sites and Google. But another says that students may be using Google largely because of library underfunding."

I'd like to agree, but I can't. No matter how much money libraries might receive, the real issue is convenience. As long as Google is more convenient than a library, that's where students are going to go. If libraries suddenly get enough money to put all their content online, that would be more convenient, sure...as long as all the content was searchable with the same ease that Google provides. (And, so far, no information vendor has managed to do this, that I can see.) And then, where would that leave libraries, when already there is significant doubt about their relevance?

Money can't solve everything. And I seriously doubt that libraries are able to "fix" the problems with research in higher education.

Letter: With computers, why spend big on libraries?

2008-06-06T05:42:00.001-07:00

Like Michigan doesn't have enough troubles...now the Computer Revolution is equivalent to discovering fire. And libraries are irrelevant. Check out the letter here.

"Fail," indeed

2008-06-05T08:33:00.000-07:00

I'm trying really hard not to say "I told you so"...but I'm failing miserably. Check out this tidbit from Stephen's Lighthouse and his extraction from the Fail Blog.

I'm not the only one thinking the future is bleak...

2008-06-04T11:08:00.000-07:00

Check out this article about the depressed librarians.

A call for goodness

2008-05-29T09:06:00.001-07:00

I rarely, if ever, post things that are personal. But I received the following email (verbatim) from a friend today:

Please tell me something positive, good, or beautiful about humanity. Even something seemingly small and innocent. I've been barraged this week with cases of how evil, cruel, and disgusting our species is---against each other and especially against other creatures.

Tell me something beautiful or peaceful about people.

So, yes, I'm posting her "call for goodness" here, on a blog devoted to documenting the death of an institution. Anything good to say about people lately? Tell everyone in the comments!

Comments can be telling

2008-05-19T06:30:00.000-07:00

Undoubtedly, you've seen the story on DRM and the Boston Public Library; an organization that is anti-DRM, called Defective By Design, has demanded that BPL stop providing media that has digital rights management inherent in it. Old news, right?

What interests me more are the comments from the public, particularly when the story appeared on Digg. Perhaps the one that caught my attention most (and got 7 diggs):

Like I've even been in a library in the last ten years.
Thanks Google

Just sayin'.

Weighing in on One Big Library

2008-05-03T07:36:00.000-07:00

If you have somehow failed to see the announcement on other, more noteworthy blogs, York University in Toronto will be hosting a One Big Library conference in June. There has been some hubbub over the title alone...which I can only assume might have been at least part of the reason to name it that. Librarians, as a rule, tend to get in a snit when one mentions the idea that not everything needs local control. Collection development in particular is one area where librarians often become quite territorial. So the idea that all libraries could, concievably, be under the umbrella of one institution scares the bejeezus out of many of us.

I'm not sure where I stand on the idea, exactly. I wish I could go to the conference and participate, to really get a grip on some of the issues involved. But at first glance, the idea makes a fair amount of sense...depending on how it would be implemented. I could see libraries working as a type of franchise (please hold the "Want fries with that?" jokes...I know it's hard). Locally, libraries could choose the materials best suited to their localities. But the mother library organization (corporate headquarters?) provides guidance and significant marketing and PR investment on behalf of ALL libraries.

Individually, libraries just don't have the resources to do effective marketing in today's world. We attempt to brand ourselves individually with little or no result. Imagine if all libraries combined their resources and gave their dollars to one huge marketing effort geared to getting people into/using their local libraries?

An additional benefit of the franchise idea is consistent branding and fufillment of customer expectations. When someone goes into a chain store or restauarant, they are comfortable because they know what they're going to get in terms of service and products and atmosphere. Libraries don't currently have that advantage; each library is different, we all have different ILS systems, we can't share materials across borders easily, etc. A good marketing campaign could actually take advantage of that somewhat, promoting the message not only that libraries are useful, but each one is a different adventure in discovery. Let the customer expect that they will be different, yet know that libraries are important and there to serve the patron.

I think there could be significant issues with trying to create "One Big Library." I'm sure others have blogged about those already. But I would love to see "One Big Library Marketing Campaign."

Finish this sentence: "A public library is________."

2008-03-31T05:20:00.000-07:00

Conceptually, public libraries are in turmoil. And, collectively, our perceptions of what public libraries are might be at the root of it. This became very clear to me as I waded through my feed reader and one of my paper files this morning.

On the one hand, we have sessions like this at PLA. This session points out that the traditional public libraries model isn't working any more and that they need to challenge many assumptions of legacy librarianship. On the other, we have editorials like this that point out that that we are shooting ourselves in the foot because we are "attempting to placate those who perceive themselves as too busy to come to the library."

What is a public library? What is our mission? Has it ever struck anyone as odd that every single public library has its own mission statement? Public libraries are having major difficulties defining themselves and can't even agree on a consistent purpose of existence. If we don't define ourselves, others will.

"If public libraries become ineffectual and are consigned to the dustbin of history, I'm afraid we will have no one to blame but ourselves."--Harold N. Boyer

And again the question is being asked...

2008-03-08T07:28:00.000-08:00

Why pay for the public library? This time from Gainesville, Florida.

And I'm sure you've seen this one also...

2008-03-07T08:47:00.001-08:00

I know, I'm way behind on reporting these things...new jobs and moving and such will do that, I hear. Anyways, In case you actually missed it, here is the Slate slideshow about builiding libraries in the age of Google.

People can argue the question all they want. However, if the question is being asked in such a large-scale way, this is just further proof that the public libraries in this country are in serious trouble. When people question the need for an institution's existence, it would seem that the institution has done a poor job of marketing itself or instilling itself in the public perception.

Now it's official, libraries have a timeline for death throes

2008-03-07T08:41:00.001-08:00

If you read nearly any other library-related blog, you've no doubt seen this already. Nonetheless, it is part of the ongoing documentary here. Just being thorough.

Even this consultant admits that libraries need rescuing

2008-02-24T09:23:00.001-08:00

...and she is making a career out of it. Check out the interview here.

The devaluing of librarians

2008-02-24T09:17:00.000-08:00

From LISNews:

WI Librarians Demoted: "Librarians today do less complex work"

This should be a surprise to no one. This is a direct result of not educating the public about the importance of libraries and the kind of work that librarians really do. Public perception is based on what the public observes and believes, not necessarily on fact. I think we're going to see a lot more of this as long as libraries as a whole continually fail to market themselves effectively (or at all).

Courses they should teach at library school

2008-02-04T12:19:00.000-08:00

I'm really starting to like the Annoyed Librarian. I'm not nearly as anti-Web 2.0 as he/she is but many of the points this anonymous blogger makes cause me to silently cheer. This one, "Courses I Wish I'd Had in Library School," especially made me laugh (and remember, humor is funny because it has at least a grain of truth). The comments are particularly insightful. If you're considering an MLS, this post and the responses will likely make you think twice.

"Coddle those who cower in fear...? Never."

2008-02-04T09:20:00.000-08:00

"None of the BS about having to cater to the whims of non-technical people. Listen to them and their needs? Absolutely. Try to understand and meet those needs? Postively in every case. But coddle those who cower in fear and refuse to understand? Never."

--from a library IT staff person on how he would proceed if he were in charge

Many IT people I know are actually very patient teachers and understand that repeating the answers to the same questions, over and over, is simply part of the territory. What upsets them isn't usually repetition or hand-holding; it's dealing with the technophobic and even hostile reactions of some librarians.

Think about it for just a moment; how many times have you introduced someone to the Internet, or even to the mouse for the first time? What if that person is nervous or outright terrified? You'd probably be sympathetic and understanding, right? Now, imagine that that same person is being paid, as part of their job, to learn that skill. And they don't want to. And they're simmering with hostility and fear. And wanting to foil your attempts to teach them, in some underlying, vain hope that they somehow will be exempt from upgrading their skills. Getting the picture? Imagine if you had to deal with that attitude on a regular basis. Getting burned out yet? Maybe at least a little cranky?

IT people don't want librarians to necessarily love technology. I bet most wouldn't even necessarily expect everyone to like it. But I believe that most IT people in libraries would appreciate it if they didn't get shot as as the messengers, so to speak. Information technology requires upgrades to skillsets all the time, for everyone who comes in contact with it. We all get paid to keep up.

We all need to put a brave face on it and show that librarians are flexible and still relevant in this fast-paced world the Internet has wrought.

"Libraries are absolutely terrible online"

2008-02-01T05:29:00.000-08:00

From Tim Spalding, of LibraryThing, comes this bit of reality:

You can't Google a book and find out where in town to get a copy. You can't Google a book and find out whether your public library has a copy. Your library doesn't know the author is touring the area. The author doesn't know which independent bookstores are selling the most copies, and so where to read. Bookstore software is crap and most independent bookstores aren't online at all. The second-largest US bookstore chain—Borders—is less online that Powell's! Libraries are absolutely *terrible* online; you will rarely get a library in the first ten pages of a Google search because search engines can't "see inside" library websites. Library data is largely inaccessible and dominated by an inflexible data monopoly. Book data is mostly from Amazon or from a welter of other companies that don't or can't help any but the largest providers. Publisher websites a seldom more than 1990s brochure-ware. Small presses sometimes have good websites, but aren't included in the book-data game. There's no online network for authors and agents. There isn't even a decent "works" system for books—and to the extent there are systems like this, publishers and libraries have completely different systems.

This should not be a surprise to anyone in libraries; just another reason why $OPACS=="suck."