
Future of the library - Seth Godin - aghilmort
http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2011/05/the-future-of-the-library.html
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sivers
Real URL without top frame:

[http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2011/05/the-
future-o...](http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2011/05/the-future-of-
the-library.html)

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albedoa
Looks like this submitter might need an education:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=aghilmort>

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scorchin
As far as the user-interface of printed books are concerned there is a very
minimal, and understandable, set of features:

    
    
        - it boots instantly
        - has a high contrast and high resolution display
        - is viewable from any angle, in bright or dim light
        - permits fast random access to any page
        - provides instant visual and tactile feedback on the location
        - can be easily annotated
        - requires no batteries or maintenance.
    
    

Current e-Readers cannot meet all of these specifications.

Books do a great job of conveying static information; computers let
information change. In my opinion, the local library will continue to exist as
a place of knowledge if it can evolve to provide the tools to access
changing/shared information. Otherwise, it'll just end up being a quiet place
for students to work.

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dgallagher
My preferred way to read is to have a physical and digital copy. The digital
goes wherever I go, on my laptop and iPad, and is easily searched with a query
string. The physical stays at home, and has all of the advantages you mention.
I love having both, and feel handicapped if I only have one. But it's still
not ideal...

\--------------------

I envision a future where we'll have the best of both worlds; a physical book
with double-sided e-ink pages. The front cover is a touch-screen running
iBooks, letting you swipe around to find something to read. Touch it, and all
of the e-ink pages instantly display the book.

Now you can easily flip through it like a normal book, far faster than an
iPad. Text-searching is a breeze, impossible with a paper book. Using your
stylist, mark pages with notes, highlight them, do whatever. A small
microphone lets you record audio notes, tied to a passage of text. Everything
saves and syncs to the cloud, following you wherever you go.

Errata auto-downloads and updates your books as needed. A small camera,
integrated into the hard-cover lip that extends above each page, tracks your
eye-movements and watches what you read, looking at facial expressions and
pupil dilations, to determine what you found most important. In the future if
some information it saw you read is wrong, you'll get an auto-email or tweet
telling you about it.

Every paragraph in the book will be connected to a community-discussion board,
where you read and ask for clarification regarding confusing text, similar to
djangobook.com. It's a social reading experience, letting the community at-
large make comprehension easier.

Physically the e-ink Book comes in many different sizes, from small and
pocket-sized, to large and biblical. Text auto-adjusts, similar to the Kindle.
Battery life is measured in months. Embedded video, audio, and animation is
common.

Something like that will kill paper books and e-readers, since it marries the
best of both worlds.

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atacrawl
_The librarian isn't a clerk who happens to work at a library. A librarian is
a data hound, a guide, a sherpa and a teacher. The librarian is the interface
between reams of data and the untrained but motivated user._

It's really refreshing to read this -- my wife is a librarian, and when she
tells people that she has a Masters degree in library science, people will
literally scoff and say things like "why do you need a Masters degree for
that?" As a whole, it's a disrespected profession, not just because people
look down it, but because most people think it's irrelevant. (At least
teachers, who are shit on even more than librarians, are relevant in
everyone's eyes.)

 _And to teach them how to use a soldering iron or take apart something with
no user servicable parts inside._

He lost me here, is he really suggesting that modern libraries need to become
vocational training centers?

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hsmyers
The constant references to 'dead paper' belie the denials that Mr. Godin is
not anti-book. Of course he is. And with that blind spot in his perspective he
misses a number of advantages found only in a library. I've been wandering up
and down the aisles of libraries since just after I learned to read. The
number of things that I read that were not on any particular list is
countless. Bit hard to do with a search engine. And there is no point in even
trying to describe the problem of the enormous number of books not yet
digitized. Does anyone seriously think that just because a book is 'old' that
it's contents have no value? Most of the necessary and important books on both
chess and weaving (to name to disparate subjects) are 'old' and for the most
part are not available in digital versions. I guess in Mr. Godin's universe we
throw all of that away and start over. Small aside---did you know that there
is a library with over a 100k volumes on chess? These are just some of the
holes in his arguments that occur to me as a book-lover and library-fan...

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GavinB
A book is not defined by being made of paper. Godin is pro-book but recognizes
that the future of the book is as a digital file.

I don't think anyone is arguing that there is a continuing role for librarians
who act as archivists of valuable paper books. But that number of librarians
is vastly less than the number currently in existence.

Librarians who refuse to give up paper books are like record shops who refused
to give up vinyl. Sure, a few will stick around--but the vast majority will
have to move on.

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atacrawl
_Librarians who refuse to give up paper books are like record shops who
refused to give up vinyl._

You write this as though the "physical vs. digital" battle has long been
fought and won. The reality is that the landscape has barely begun to be
fleshed out among libraries, and despite that, libraries are already adjusting
their budgets to accommodate the inevitable sea change. The stereotype of the
stubborn librarian in sensible shoes and tweed, clutching her Emily Bronte and
refusing to acknowledge the existence of digital books, just doesn't represent
the mainstream position among librarians.

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adeaver
Nor does that view generally represent reality. Quite a few libraries are
fighting _for_ digital version of books to be allowed for lending and the
publishers are pushing back. In some cases if a library has a digital copy
they can only lend it out to a single person at at time, and are only allowed
to purchase a single copy.

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adeaver
While on the whole I agree with much of what Seth is saying (the library is
basically a warehouse of old books) I don't think the library itself as we see
it today is going anywhere or will change in any significant way until e-books
become far more prevalent than they are right now.

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paganel
With an online library how are you going to "serendipitously" find new books
from other domains you don't know you're interested in?

I remember when I was 14 or 15, I was going to our small-town's public library
once every 2 days or so, I was reading all the SF books I could find. The
thing is that the SF books shelf was just after the history books shelf, and,
even though I liked history, I never would have thought of reading history
books if it weren't for me passing in front of that history books shelf each
and every time.

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stcredzero
_With an online library how are you going to "serendipitously" find new books
from other domains you don't know you're interested in?_

Google could handle this with "I'm Feeling Lucky." I seem to remember
delicious.com doing something like this. How about a serendipity web app that
tries to figure out/crowdsource what you never knew you'd be interested in?

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bricestacey
We worry about this in my library. I believe the ultimate problem is that the
value of a librarian does not scale very well and incumbent librarians don't
necessarily have the skills or life experiences to pull it off. From my
experience, short of working with PhDs, very few librarians actually perform
complex tasks. So you have highly skilled laborers answering mundane reference
questions all day.

I predict most academic libraries will cease to exist and be replaced with
large computer labs and study halls, with their electronic resources managed
by IT departments and daily operations (circulation, interlibrary loan, copy
cataloging) performed by work-study students and paraprofessionals.

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jerf
It seems to me there's a harmonious intersection between this idea of the
library, and the non-Prussian-schooling approaches. Get enough of the non-
Prussian-schoolers and an open-minded librarian together in one place armed
with the right equipment, and this sort of stuff could just almost
spontaneously start happening.

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mcburton
I struggled reading past the "Netflix is a better librarian" comment. Netflix
is not a librarian, it is a library-like PLACE. Netflix probably hires
librarians or information professionals trained in librarianship to organize
their data and user experience. The public library system is only one of many
endpoints for a library trained information-professional. For the past decade
library schools have been re-branding as iSchools; producing UX/HCI
professionals who go on to work at places like Netflix (hence the "Netflix is
a library-like PLACE"). In the interest of full disclosure I am currently
getting a PhD at an iSchool so I have a different understanding of the social
categories "librarian" and "library." Even so, as every schoolboy knows, a
thing cannot be a librarian. IT'S PEOPLE, NETFLIX IS MADE OF PEOPLE.

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TheloniusPhunk
Libraries aren't going anywhere. I think they will transition from relatively
large storage place facility physical books, to a hub for study. It's already
happened, really. All my collegiate library studying took place via online
databases like EBSCOhost, but this much is pretty obvious. What is more
obscure, and will be more interesting to see is how the library evolves
culturally in the coming years.

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nkassis
I think this is an important function of libraries too. It's a nice quiet
place and with enough work room to read and relax. With that said, other than
at Universities, I doubt many people think that's a valuable thing. The value
of libraries is hard to quantify and in policy discussion that's not a good
thing for libraries.

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ganley
What about the people who don't have a computer (much less Netflix or a
Kindle) at home? 40% of American households have no broadband, and 18% have no
internet access at all. They can take a book home with them, and they don't
need a computer or an internet connection to use it.

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jerf
Read it again, more carefully. You've made an unjustified assumption.

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antidaily
I agree with him... if the librarian exists online and not in an old building
5 miles away. And kids have computers. That's not enough to lure them to a
library. Many libraries have Wiis and Xboxes these days. That's not working
either.

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docgnome
Seriously? Do you have an article that talks about game consoles in a library?

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antidaily
<http://www.aadl.org/aadlgt>

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albedoa
It's Monday, and it's early, so I read half of that wondering why Seth Godin
was writing for Reddit :-/

