[13072] in Public-Access_Computer_Systems_Forum
Re: My Library the Bookstore??!
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Jack Kessler)
Thu Aug 12 20:02:02 1999
Date: Thu, 12 Aug 1999 13:44:41 -0600
From: Jack Kessler <kessler@well.com>
In-Reply-To: <37B08DA9.E5B38537@incolsa.net>
To: PACS-L@LISTSERV.UH.EDU
Reply-To: Public-Access Computer Systems Forum <PACS-L@LISTSERV.UH.EDU>
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----------------------------Original message----------------------------
'Seems to me that discussion of Steve Coffman's "Building Earth's
Largest Library" article would be an ideal function of PACS-L...
Other than Roy Tennant's April Current Cites posting, I see no
discussion of the article here. Steve said here on May 3 that he
had received "over 150" messages, 250 by his July / Aug Searcher
followup, and that there will be more publication and conference
activity and even teleconference activity on his ideas coming up.
So I'd like to take a stab, in hopes that others here will
follow. Steve says he wants / needs library community input on
this. The online fulltext of Steve's original article is at,
<http://www.infotoday.com/searcher/mar/coffman.htm>
and there is additional material at,
<http://www.infotoday.com/searcher/jul/coffman.htm>
<http://www.infotoday.com/searcher/jul/dahn.htm>
Margaret Mohundro summarizes Steve's points as follows:
> What if we dropped our local catalogs and allowed our patrons
> to select anything from the 40 million items in OCLC's
> WorldCat?
Too bad that one outfit gets the job, but OCLC does do their work
well and perhaps somebody's - gotta - do - it. My own general
thought, however, is that monopoly never works even in a
commercial situation like Amazon's for the very good reason that
one size never does fit all:
The suggestion of one perhaps only is melodrama. But the idea of
having a _few_ major databases, perhaps specialized among
themselves, rather than unnecessary duplication scattered
everywhere, is an old one in online information retrieval -- I
first heard it myself in library school in 1988, and it had been
around for some time then.
Regional / national consortia might fill Steve's bill -- on the
order of the OCLC / RLG / other structure in the US but also of
the national collective cataloging effort now supervised by the
BNF in France. Perhaps this is an evolution which is occurring
anyway, local cataloging efforts gradually defaulting -- albeit
reluctantly -- to an increasing reliance on several, or two or
one, centralized national databases?
I would be interested, myself, in others' reactions here, not so
much to whether such centralization is a good thing but whether
it in fact already is happening -- in the US? in other countries?
> Suppose we stock only the most commonly requested titles and
> rely on other libraries, wholesalers, and publishers to
> supply the rest?
This does sound just like ILL, and the whole set of traditional
questions and problems associated with over - reliance on that
service. The fundamental objections, I believe, would be two:
1) "default" becomes the only option -- library patrons are far
more likely just to make their selections from among what is most
easily available / currently on the shelf than they are to press
for obtaining something else, via ILL -- so much the much worse
for society if all libraries were to stock the same "default"
collection, as could happen under this suggestion as - stated,
regional specialization practices and agreements notwithstanding;
2) "commonly requested" is dangerous -- current popularity never
has been the best, and certainly not the only good, selection
criterion -- in commercial terms, as Steve likes Amazon so much,
"commonly requested" would spell disaster, as a firm certainly
has to keep popular items in stock but will "die on the vine" if
it just looks at current popularity in making future acquisitions
-- "taking a chance / educated guess" is a key to commercial
success, and so it should be in book / information selection.
> What if we use the Internet, electronic delivery, and
> low-cost shipping to bring the library to our patrons rather
> than requiring our patrons come to us?
This is what lawyers call a leading question... Of course, Steve
-- good idea, but obvious -- one of the chief boat anchors
weighing down the library community in the digital age is that
libraries still are sitting around waiting for the customers to
come in while the competition, the commercial firms and above all
the Entertainment industry, are "going out to get" the customers.
So, as a long - time Amazon fan and investor, I'll join Steve in
his enthusiasm for libraries' learning from commercial successes
in the information field, but warn him against adopting the
commercial model hook, line and sinker. Mohundro's second point,
about stocking only "commonly requested titles", conjures up
nightmares of outdated inventory even in a commercial sense, and
access restriction and even censorship and control in a library -
as - cultural - institution sense, which must be very carefully
thought through before such a policy ever might be implemented.
Take a look at John Gray's _False Dawn_, Steve, and some of
George Soros' latest writing -- the US commercial model which you
admire and perhaps envy by no means is universally accepted,
certainly not outside the US -- there are some implicit
assumptions and sacrifices hidden in there.
To be fair to Steve, the points discussed here are Mohundro's and
not his own, and he may wish to distinguish or elaborate. His
original Searcher article is long, and thoughtful, and carefully
constructed. More important to me than Steve's own qualification
of his words, however, would be librarians' reactions to them,
and the posting of same here on PACS-L. I would like very much
myself to read consideration by the profession of the Amazon /
commercial model which has so excited both me and Steve, and some
discussion of the distinctions between that model and what people
think still is being done differently by libraries?
Jack Kessler, kessler@well.sf.ca.us
