smart libraries – smart librarians! lai cilip joint conference 2010
DESCRIPTION
Presented (on my behalf, thanks to that volcano!) at the Library Association of Ireland / CILIP joint conference on Smart Libraries, held in Tallaght, April 2010.TRANSCRIPT
Smart libraries – smart librarians!
Peter GriffithsImmediate
Past President, CILIP
LAI / CILIP Ireland joint conference 2010
Libraries using smart technology? ◦ Tomorrow’s plenary sessions – Web 2.0,
Information and society Libraries supporting smart initiatives?
◦ “The Queensland Government has a vision of a State where knowledge, creativity and innovation drive economic growth to improve prosperity and quality of life for all Queenslanders”.
◦ “Smart Libraries build Smart Communities” Smart Queensland : smart state strategy 2005-2015
What are smart libraries?
Libraries supporting smart communities?◦ Smart services are services that are informative, interactive,
innovative, improving and international in scope. Smart services enrich the lives of members of a Smart Community by enabling them to meet the business and personal challenges of the information age through the use of information and communications technology. Smart services provide networked communities with interactive software and multimedia content that is delivered through secure and private in-home, at-work or community access facilities to improve the overall economic, social and cultural well being of a community. Stan Skrzeszewskii, Building smart communities: what they are and
how they can benefit blind and visually impaired persons (paper 169-158-E to IFLA, Jerusalem, 2000)
Libraries supporting smart ways of working?◦ “McLaren F1 team formed a company that offers consultancy based on pit-stop
management – to improve e.g. aircraft turnaround, operating theatre team handovers”
EXPLOITING KNOWLEDGE How could you exploit your library’s knowledge?
◦ Moving beyond the provision of print information to clients who walk through the library door – unrestricted by location or hours of opening
Queensland , Smart libraries build smart communities
What are smart libraries?
Wired UK, April 2010
“Such countries are politically, educationally, socially and technologically advanced, however they are relatively small on the world stage; their national libraries, for example, are not global leaders in the same way as the Library of Congress, the Bibliothèque Nationale de France or the British Library. These small countries may have cultural identities under threat from globalisation, yet their very size might enable them to respond rapidly to changing circumstances. As such, they can be in a position to help each other in identifying and tackling issues of common concern and bringing solutions to the larger stage”.
“Small, smart countries”
National Library of Scotland,February 2010
Smart formats – ebooks, Kindles, Vooks and so on
Social networking◦ Generation Y behaviour◦ Information from peer networks◦ What information can you trust?
Google (plus its kith and kin)◦ “How do you know?” “I Googled it!”
New models of publication◦ Fee or free?
London Evening Standard or London Times?
Google Books settlement
Smart challengers
Adopting RFID◦ South Dublin, Antrim, Bangor …
public libraries◦ Express loans / check-in (UCD)
Implementing Web 2.0 technologies◦ Information portals
Queensland ECLECTUS portal – photo archive, arts resources and archives in a single portal delivered through library software (as well as library catalogue, Internet resources, etc)
◦ Delivering library services via mobile devices, not just services via mobile libraries
Smart practices in libraries
Social networking to inform and link students◦ Universities across the island◦ Web services
NI Library Authority single catalogue – cross-Province services and item delivery
Use of RefWorks, blogs, Twitter ◦ Queens Belfast, UU, TCD, NLI
Smart libraries in practice
Libraries and librarians putting a new perspective on traditions
◦ One City One Book Dublin City Libraries bringing this
successful format to Ireland Initiative in its fifth year
◦ Libraries preserving historic locations Carnegie libraries, former
courthouses, churches, market houses…
Smart traditions
Library under construction in former Courthouse, Ballymahon, Co Longford
Lessons from the past Ennis - what succeeded and what didn’t
High residual levels of IT literacy – and of information literacy??
Building Ireland’s Smart Economy◦ Creating roles for Library, Information and Knowledge
professionals
Pointers to the future◦ The Internet of Things –
Cork Institute of Technology key card system – tracks
A new world of embedded technology
◦ Managing knowledge in data and things
◦ Managing knowledge as well as its containers
Applying traditional skills in new and smarter ways
Smart futures
Google’s ambition is to manage the world’s knowledge◦ That’s what we do
Google wants to find and present the most authoritative sources of information◦ That’s what we do
Google wants to support communities of information◦ That’s what we do
So, how smart are we?
Google values information◦ That’s what we do
Google puts a retail value on information◦ That’s what we don’t do (even in special
libraries)◦ Information is a commodity, not necessarily
an accurate one◦ Auction results are served to enquirers
above authoritative answers
Spot the difference
where P1 = price paid by advertiserB2 = next highest-placed ad’s bidQ2 = quality score of next-highest-placed adQ1 = advertiser’s quality score
The equation that determines ranking in Google sponsored links, according to Wired
“Google acts like libraries. It is the mission of both to organize the world’s information, to make it openly accessible, to find and present the most authoritative (by many definitions) sources, to instil an ethic of information use in the public, to act as a platform for communities of information, to encourage creation”.
“Isn’t Google already running the public library of our digital knowledge?”
Jeff Jarvis, Library Journal Newswire, January 22, 2009
So has Google copied us?
BTW this was an April 1st issue!!!
Are libraries and Google inevitable enemies?◦ “Kill the book to save the book”
Hyperlinking the content of books Print is portable but wi-fi and broadband are
becoming ubiquitous Digital Britain [May 2009] FCC rural broadband report [May 2009] Ireland’s Broadband Performance and Policy
Actions (Forfás, January 2010)
◦ Are we guardians and interpreters of form or content?
◦ How can libraries be “Googlier”? Curating the web Reviewing content and creating expert online
communities
Didn’t Google already digitise some libraries?
What Would Google Do?
Libraries are organisers of knowledge
Libraries are collectors and digitisers of information resources
Google is open to anyone worldwide, not restricted bylocation or membership of a particular customer group
Libraries are currently developing universal access schemes
Google constantly values and brokers information
Google micro-auctions information millions of times per hour
How Google-ish are libraries?
◦ Information as commodity
◦ Retrieving auction results, served above answers to enquiries
◦ It has passed into the English language meaning to search for a topic on the Internet
◦ Yet users are surprised when they learn of its shortcomings
◦ Information as a free good
◦ Retrieving the answers to enquiries irrespective of cost
◦ Often a shorthand term for an image of slightly outdated service and selective stock
◦ Users are surprised when they learn of our excellence
Google vs Librarians
Jorge Luis Borges’ vision of the universe as library Every combination of alphabetical characters in a book
somewhere – so all of knowledge is there as well as every kind of nonsense
There is no order or key – although somewhere must reside a volume that is the catalogue
Related ideas are found in The Name of the Rose (Eco), Discworld (Pratchett)
The whole of information when unordered equates to a total lack of information
The role of the smart librarian facing Google’s “Last Library”
The coming search for routes to co-existence
A Library of Babel?
Defining the wider profession◦ Not just libraries …◦ Reviving information science◦ New professional interests
Archives and records management Information security and assurance Information literacy Information governance
Steps to a smarter profession
Librarianship for the 21st century◦ Adopting Web 2.0 to build Library 2.0
◦ Smart Librarians using social networking for CPD
You can follow conferences for your CPD via social networking (e.g. #CIL2010) and online
◦ Meeting user needs
◦ CILIP’s Manifesto for the UK general election
◦ Understanding the commercial approach
Google adwords are NOT an indicator of relevance
◦ Examples of good practice
Steps to a smarter profession
New roles for professional associations◦ Widening their interests, widening their spheres of influence◦ Preparing their members for the new world of information
and knowledge management◦ Lobbying, explaining, engaging with decision makers◦ Working together – LAI and CILIP Ireland, RMS Ireland Group
New roles for library and information professionals◦ Widening their horizons◦ Adapting CPD to acquire relevant new skills◦ Promoting LIS skills and potential in new fields and to new
clients
Acting and thinking smart!
Building the smarter profession
Questions and comments
Text and slide layout © Peter Griffiths 2010The images used in this presentation are for illustration only and any copyrights are acknowledged