My very last "thing" to blog about and then I am done! It's been a great learning experience...
If I could predict the future and know exactly what libraries will be like in 2020, I'd be a very rich person. Since I don't have special powers to look into the future, I can only offer my best guess. I have to disagree with the idea of libraries going by the wayside. My thoughts and observations are based on an academic library. I am sure public libraries and high school (K-12) libraries have their own unique set of challenges. I think one thing all libraries have in common is that every library user expects Internet connection whether it be to read e-mail, do research, do homework, and connect with online social communities (facebook, twitter, youtube, etc.).
As a library worker, I have the perfect opportunity to observe our library patrons and what their needs are. Each spring, our library conducts an online survey. One of the questions is how do you use the library. The results are split betweeen in person and remotely. I have seen students come in to the library very early in the morning to finish up their papers and use the printing services. I have seen them come in groups to use the group study rooms. I have seen them come in to read the articles that their professors have put on reserve. Our statistics show that the number of people going in and out of the library has increased over the years. I think in the future, there will still be a need for study space, and computers. For those students using the library remotely, there will be a greater need for them to be able to connect to our databases and online resources. With technology changing rapidly, there will also be a greater need for library workers to be able to adapt to changing technologies. Librarians and library staff will have to be constantly updating and improving their skills and knowledge base in order to assist patrons with the new technologies.
One example of a new technology that I think will take off is e-books, and streaming videos. As a cataloger, I prefer having a book in my hand, and matching the title, author, ISBN, publisher, publication date, number of pages, etc. I have also cataloged e-books and I can say that they are more complicated. We purchase them from the vendor in batches. We have also purchased a collection streaming videos and I am told we may be getting more. I think the number of available e-books and streaming videos will be endless. To complicate things, our e-books can only be downloaded onto certain devices. By the year 2020, I hope all the details will be straightened out. We have to start now to plan for the future. I recently bought an e-reader not because I want to read e-books, but because I want to be able to see for myself how to search for an e-book in our collection, how to download it onto the e-reader, and how to read it. Who knows, maybe someday in the near future, this will come in handy.
I am constantly amazed at the new technologies that are available. I am not sure if our library patrons will expect us to provide all those extra services. If so, the way libraries are on very tight budgets, I don't think we will be able to deliver all those services. I am hoping that the basic services will still be important: circulation, reference, academic reserves, information literacy, and printing. For me personally, I hope and pray that books will still be available. What would a library be without books?
Posts
I, too, hope that ereaders become more standardized. From what I hear from public librarians, one of their biggest headaches is trying to teach patrons how to download the library's ebooks on ereaders. The librarians have a hard time keeping up with all the different models of ereaders or even figuring out the help menus sometimes.
ReplyDeleteI waffle back and forth over whether this standardization will happen. Look at photography - in the early days there were all kind of formats, but then it become more standardized. On the other hand, how come every cell phone seems to have a different sort of (non-interchangeable) charger? This seems like something that could have been standardized long ago.