Comments on The Amazon Gorilla and the Future of the Academic Library

• how do you plan to deal with grad students and professors?
• Posted by Co on July 29, 2010 at 8:00am EDT

• I could see this working with undergrads, who have typically low useage (=they don't read very much, and most of their papers have fewer than ten sources.) But what about people who are actually professional academics? My impression is that most library collections exist for them first and foremost. And they need a high volume of sources and need them more or less on demand.

  Your vision seems like it would either be convenient but prohibitively expensive (the print-on-demand or Kindle option would really add up on those days when I check out--literally--a hundred books because I'm assembling a bibliography) OR cheap but really inconvenient (if I had to order all those books on loan from a central distribution site and it took several days to get them to me--plus, in a library, I do almost all of my own customer service, going and finding the books, whereas in the central-location system the labor has to be paid for.) Incidentally, I've once or twice been at a university that's moved a large portion of its collection offsite because of lack of storage space on campus. You can still get the books, but you have to wait, and that creates problems ranging from minor irritation to real issues (e.g. you want to look something up last-minute for a class you're teaching that day, but shazam, we own the book but you can't have it!) It sucks.

• Posted by Barbara Fister on July 29, 2010 at 9:45am EDT

• ....or we could just skip the whole inefficient campus thing and let Amazon give degrees. Buy enough books in enough categories, you just earned a badge! Post enough reviews? PhD!!

  Look, if we give up on having library collections (digital or otherwise) and outsource access to and preservation of knowledge to corporations, we will have neither access nor preservation. The record will be alterable at the flick of a switch, unpopular ideas could be suppressed, and our searches and reading habits will be tracked to enhance our experience through more targeted advertising. Handy for a subpoena, too.

  And by the way, the big bookstore chains based their retail look and feel on libraries. I get a tad annoyed when I'm told I should try harder to look like the people who are wearing a ripoff of the dress I designed, thankyewverymuch.

  The retailization of scholarship is already well entrenched. Libraries spend most of their budgets on information that's owned by corporations and rented at great cost. That's why we need open access - and libraries that uphold important values: freedom to inquire without risk, the preservation of culture, a public sphere for debate, and access to information regardless of a person's ability to pay. Little stuff like that.

• Not So Sure About That Genius Bar Idea
• Posted by StevenB on July 29, 2010 at 10:00am EDT

• Last week my colleagues and I attended our public services retreat. In the afternoon we discussed new service models and heard (via skype) from four different librarians who shared how they changed their service models - including some renovations. One of them created a "genius bar" in the computer commons area - it actually looks like a bar. After a year it appears the concept isn't working as well for the library as it does for Apple - and they may scrap it. That doesn't mean it wouldn't work elsewhere and perhaps the concept was implemented well, but just because it works in an apple store it doesn't mean it would work in an academic library. But I agree it's an idea of interest.

  BTW, I'm not so sure I agree with Barbara that bookstores copied the look and feel of libraries. I'm pretty sure that B&N didn't get the idea for their retail shops from the concrete warehouse I work in. Maybe they did lift a few ideas from the grand old reading rooms. I do know that many public and academic libraries have borrowed a few ideas from the local B&N - in fact there is one video presentation out there on library buildings - with several library architects as presenters - where they actually are advising librarians to create "zones" along the lines of what is found in the retail bookstore (like the "grab and go" zone or the "contemplative reading" zone).

• Posted by Barbara on July 29, 2010 at 10:15am EDT

• They copied a dress after we decided to ditch the mahogany and comfy chairs to go all boxy and ugly and utilitarian. Now we have to beg them for a dress pattern. (Grr.)

  The retail trend is, I think, a means of remembering what people liked about libraries and how we can make their experience better. I've written about this occasionally - once reporting on public libraries choosing BISAC over Dewey -
  http://www.libraryjournal.com/article/CA6698264.html

  and once asking "what if you ran your bookstore like a library?"
  http://www.libraryjournal.com/article/CA6547061.html

  Apologies for the self-referencing but it seemed relevant.

• Good idea
• Posted by TechieLibrarian on July 29, 2010 at 11:30am EDT

• The local book printer, in most cases an Espresso Book Machine, is also being used as the University of Michigan although not to the degree suggested.

  Given the turnaround time on the machines is about 4 minutes, with a small core collection of the most frequently used books and a easy to browse digital option it would not be hard for scholars and students to print out further titles if needed.

• Posted by Hillary on August 2, 2010 at 11:00am EDT

• One of the greatest conceptual hurdles to overcome in this model is the notion of patron-driven acquisition of library materials. There are many who believe that a library collection must be cultivated and curated, not subjected to whatever whims its users may possess from one week to the next. I would recommend that in fleshing out this idea you consider the possibility of permitting certain user groups (faculty, for example) to have more unmediated purchasing power than others (undergraduates).