It's happening!

Robots will be replacing us in libraries! Sure, this article says the intention is to relieve librarians of "menial" tasks but that's only to get their foot in the door. We all know that our robot overlords are just biding their time, gradually insinuating themselves into our everyday lives. Before you know it, we'll all be scurrying around like rats in the rubble of our meat-bag civilization as the robots take over.

OK, maybe I'm getting a bit carried away. This is actually a really interesting technology. The robot could search the stacks at night, and help us humans find mis-shelved and lost items in our stacks. The Hutchinson Public Library has well over 250,000 physical items. It takes a considerable amount of time to keep the shelves in order. It is also very time consuming to look for items that didn't get checked in properly.

I'm looking forward to this step towards Skynet myself.

Library Closures hit Canada

An article from CTV News states that nearly half of all the public libraries in the provinces of Newfoundland and Labrador will be closed. The provincial budget included a million dollars less for public libraries than in the previous year resulting in mass closures of branches.

So I will leave you with these two quotes to be used alternately:

“When the going gets tough, the tough get a librarian.” 
― Joan Bauer

...unless you live in Newfoundland unfortunately.

OR

“Whatever the cost of our libraries, the price is cheap compared to that of an ignorant nation.” 
― Walter Cronkite

And that is the real danger.

"Taxes are Evil"

I apologize in advance for the wall of text. I assure you though, that this is important.

The chickens are coming home to roost in Kansas. What enjoyed great popularity some 30-odd years ago, "Reaganomics" or "Supply-side Economics" is seeing something more than a resurgence in Kansas. Really, it's a doubling down on an idea that has demonstrably failed to do what its proponents claimed. In fact, it didn't work very well when Herbert Hoover tried it in 1932 in response to the Great Depression with his Reconstruction Finance Corporation. Whatever you want to call it, this theory of economics, coupled with a now ingrained mantra that taxes are evil have led Kansas to where it is today. For all intents and purposes, the state is bankrupt. The old way of doing things, a balanced, moderate, common-sense mix of property, income, and sales tax has been cast to the wind.

In its place we have no income tax for a certain group of "job creators", a movement to limit property taxes, and a rise in sales tax. Maybe the old system wasn't always fair. Maybe from time to time some taxes were disproportionately high. But now, the no income tax group who are supposed to now be generating more jobs aren't doing so; the loss of revenue is forcing local governments to look at increasing property taxes; while the high sales taxes are punishing the working class and causing Kansans to even cross state lines to buy basic goods like groceries!

Kansas is in a downward spiral because "taxes are evil". We want a business-friendly environment to make Kansas an attractive place to start or relocate a business and increase employment. But that will never happen in a place that can't govern itself properly. This legislator gets it. No one wants to pay taxes. But grown-ups understand that in order to have good safe roads to carry individual AND business traffic, you have to pay for them. Grown-ups also understand that if you are moving your business someplace, that business will be looking for an educated, motivated workforce and guess what - you have to pay for that by funding public education. Grown-ups also understand that while taxes are unpleasant, the rewards of properly funded, prudently managed public services make everyone's lives better. It doesn't matter if you are rich or poor, I would wager few want to pave their own potholes, fix their own water mains, all the while home-schooling their children, having to buy all the books and database access they need for that, and simultaneously hoping no one in the family gets sick and has to travel across counties to go to a hospital.

Yes, taxes are a boor. Taxes suck. But taxes are not evil. Not in a modern society that cares for the common good. Just as an example, I gladly pay taxes for public schools. Yes, I have school-age children. But I pay them for the other families and children as well. I don't want to live in a society of illiterate, low-skilled citizens. Lack of education leads to lack of opportunity which in turn leads to higher rates of incarceration.

Let's get back to the the days where fiscal conservatives, social reformers, moderate what-evers, social conservatives, the left and the right or whatever you label yourself agreed to disagree, but worked together for the common good. I don't understand why everyone seems to think that success is winning EVERYTHING. Success is getting on with it. Shutting the hell up (ironic, right :-) ) when you are being non-productive, stopping and listening to the other side, and finding common ground to advance the common good.

All this to say:

I hope my colleagues who drove to the State Capitol on Monday were successful in explaining to our legislators on the Committee on Taxation that their bill to defund regional library systems in Kansas is a dumb, shoot-yourself-in-the-foot idea. Thank you fellow librarians for your action.

Robots in the work place

Most of the time, when you think of robots in the work place, you think of those giant arm-like machines precisely and rapidly welding automobile frames. In the world of telepresence though, robots, controlled remotely, roam around offices. These kinds of robots allow telecommuting or travelling employees the ability to "be present" in meetings. A staff member controls the robots movement and sends it from place to place allowing the human to interact with co-workers as if she were actually present.

This is one example, there are many companies making these.

I've been thinking a lot about these robots and how they could be used outside of the world of business. While researching, one of our staff members discovered that they are already being used in schools to allow home bound students the ability to participate in school and classroom life.

What about other uses? Another HPL staff member suggested nursing homes. This seems like a fantastic application to me. Imagine being able to visit your Great Aunt Betty by arranging use of the nursing home's telepresence robot! You could roll to her room and have a visit no matter where you are in the world.

Health care seems like a natural place for these sorts of robots. With a fairly sensitive sound and vision package, a doctor in a distant hospital could consult with local doctors and even be present when examining a patient.

I'm interested in these robots at HPL for gimmicky reasons like using one to roam around the Smallville Comic con to answer questions a la  Barbara Gordon (Bat Girl) who was the librarian at Gotham City's Public Library.

But, HPL could also lend the robot to other organizations including schools and medical facilities if they needed it. It could be lent for other purposes as well. What do you think?

It's the same all over

Only in some places the scale of the problem seems massive relative to one's own issues. Take for example the City of Birmingham's (UK) problem with overdue books. They currently have 145,671 overdues! Now, of course Birmingham is a large city and the library system there holds well over 1.9 million items. Just in raw numbers though, that's a huge bunch of books. But my reading of the article linked below makes it sound like that 145k number is a snapshot; in other words a total from a specific day but looking back over a ten-year period.

You can read about their predicament in this BBC report.

To put it in perspective, the Hutchinson Public Library holds a total of about 260,000 physical items. We currently average (this is a guesstimate based on number of notices we send out per day) about 300 items overdue. Also, we consider items that are "overdue" for a long time, say a year, not "overdue" but "lost".

A Library of Things?

I can't decide if this is horrifying (thinking about everything that will have to be repaired all the time) or fantastic:

Sacramento Public Library : borrow a sewing machine?

What do you think would happen here in little ol' Hutchinson with such a project? What would be popular? Places like Auto Zone allow you to use tools to repair vehicles, locally, Reger Rental will rent you all sorts of things you might only need occasionally, but what about those folks who can't afford a rental?

The "Rich Guy" and "Those People"

It's no secret, I'm sure, that expectations for public behavior seem to be at a low ebb. People that work for public institutions and tend public spaces deal with daily behavior that 20 or 30 years ago would have been cause for calling authorities.

Today there is a much larger percentage of people whose sense of entitlement leads them to believe they can let their children (or themselves) run rough-shod over the rules. We at the library try to be there for all - young, old, rich, and poor. We try to create rules that make use of our library available to all. It's a balancing act.

Behavior and our expectations for how people should act in public occupy a lot of our time at the library. But there is a deeper issue at work.

When you combine an educational system that won't allow or acknowledge the failure of a student, an economic system that has bred chronic un- and under-employment, and a culturally embedded feeling that laying blame is preferable to taking responsibility you end up with people who don't know how or don't care to behave well in public.

I don't know how to cure society-wide ills like this, except through education. Unfortunately, public education is under such unwarranted pressure that that solution seems less certain now than in the past. I do know that most of what we are changing here at the library are attempts to contain undesirable individual behavior.

So, what do we do about behavior in the library? We continue to encourage good behavior, try to enlist the cooperation of our patrons, and ask that people be considerate of others, by pointing out unacceptable behavior before asking people to leave.

Sometimes this involves moving things around. For example, we're moving the smoking area on the West side of the building. Many people entering the building have complained, not necessarily about the smoking in the area, but the attendant bad language near where children enter.

We have moved an adult reading area from right next to the E.L.F. family area. Many adults have an expectation of quiet that we just can't provide near our children's library.

The behavior for which I have no answer has come in this form: "I don't go to the library any more because there are homeless people there." When I first heard that there are folks in our community who won't use their public library because "there are homeless people there", I was more than taken aback. I was hurt, and then curious (with a tinge of paranoia). Who do they say this to, and why?

Is it a surprise that those in need might make use of what few public services there are? Society at large has failed to end joblessness and homelessness and has failed to treat mental illness and drug abuse. I am not sure I can change a well-to-do person's assumption that homelessness=criminality or a well-to-do person's desire to avoid being uncomfortable when confronted by the reality of our local economy.

Now I'm just mad. Mad at the selfish, hard-hearted attitude. Mad and disappointed in an influential person in my community. The public library is THE place in a community where everyone should feel on equal footing. We will work hard to make sure that everyone is welcome here and that everyone is safe here. We will encourage good behavior and will not tolerate behavior that takes away from others' experience at the library. You are safe here, rich guy. I'm sorry if you have to see a homeless person (not really, I actually think it's good for you). But I can almost guarantee that it isn't the homeless person you need fear, it's your attitude and the behavior it breeds. HPL has a dizzying array of tools for everyone and for virtually every educational, inspirational, and even entertainment need. It is a place that can offer hope to anyone who comes in. The library is not a religious institution - no need "convert" or "confess" to get help. The concept of the public library is a societal good. A gift to us made possible by a compassionate, forward-thinking society that valued education and wanted it available to anyone. And if there is no where else to go, the "good" the library does for a person might simply be to let her or him warm up, sit, and maybe, just maybe pick up something to read.

Warning: Education Rant Ahead!

Ordinarily, I try to not stray far from the areas of reading, libraries, the effects of technology on libraries, and activities at HPL here on this blog. But today I am going to stray off topic and into the realm of education, migration, and the economy. With that in mind, the following are my opinions, not my library's, and I am expressing them to blow off steam...

First, education: Our great state of Kansas has long struggled with providing public education. Wide-open spaces, few people, and a great divide between the rich and the poor have long caused strife and acrimony. Mostly, we've ended up in court because we can't decide how to solve the problem ourselves as citizens and law-makers.

This past go-round has been different. The courts ruled that the legislature needed to better-fund schools. The legislature though, caught up in the lunacy that is "all taxes are bad, no taxes would be Nirvana", are on the verge of crippling our state by failing to provide any real solutions to the education issue. The group to suffer? Maybe you think I'm going to say the poor or disadvantaged. Of course, they always end up with the raw deal. No, the people who are going to suffer most are all of us. There are so many things wrong with the current funding proposals, I am not at all sure where to start.

Lawmakers in Kansas seem fixated on destroying public schooling. They hate Common Core (you can read the standards yourself at that link). Whatever. I hated No Child Left Behind because of its good intentions but unintended outcome of forcing teachers to teach the test so that they didn't lose their jobs. After reading about it, I can't imagine Common Core will be worse. What I find outrageous about the funding bill are the attempts to eliminate more taxes while supposedly fulfilling the funding obligations of the State. For example, Kansas lawmakers have tied tax breaks for corporations to private schooling in the education funding bill. What? If the schools are broken, we'll give you money to go elsewhere RATHER THAN SPEND THAT MONEY TO FIX THE SCHOOLS? What happened to providing for the common good? I am a tax payer with children in public school and in no way do I want to support an "opt out" philosophy. Well, hey, at least we're not embarrassing ourselves debating evolution or something.

The real problem though is my second and third gripes;  Kansas lawmakers keep cutting taxes to businesses saying that it's the only way to grow the economy. Information has come out that shows Kansas, despite gutting its revenue streams lags all states around us in economic growth post-recession. The State collects less in taxes, but has shifted much of the burden to counties and municipalities. The economy is still sluggish. That leads to more people moving away. Of course, that has been a topic of worry since I was in school some 30 years ago. Youth leave and never come back. Interestingly, the trend of folks (not just youth, but all ages) leaving the state at a faster rate than before has accelerated.

Here's my theory: people want to live in a place with a sense of responsibility. A place where corporate interest is balanced by responsible taxation. No one wants to move to a state where you can (theoretically, 'cause it ain't happenin' here!) get a great job, but have terrible, under-funded schools in towns that have to charge high property taxes just to keep the doors open. Would we all like to pay zero taxes? Of course! But reality intrudes into that simplistic desire. We want good education to build smart, capable young workers, to attract business...to grow.

OK, rant over. If you've stuck it out this long, here's a picture of Batman riding an elephant as your prize:

We've been "MacMillan'd"!

Maybe that's not the catchiest phrase, but public libraries have been graced with the possibility of "buying" and circulating ebooks from one of the Big 6! This should be great news, right? It is not terrible news, but it fits in the grand scheme of things at about the "meh" level.

First, it is a pilot project. Second, the titles are from the backlist of MacMillan's Minotaur imprint which publishes mainly crime/mystery fiction. Third, the titles will cost libraries $25 each and have a "shelf life" of 52 circs or two years, which ever comes first.

In other words, we get to circulate to you, our patrons, old titles you may already have read and unlike old PAPER titles you may already have read, they won't languish on our virtual shelves - they'll automatically weed themselves in two years!

Maybe I should be more worried, sooner rather than later human librarians will be obsolete.  We are being replaced by publishers who are cutting out the middle man.  Don't worry though, the business men will look out for culture and history.  They'll make it all available to the individual, I'm sure...for a low recurring monthly payment.

Why do we have public libraries?

Some (most, probably) will think I'm a little slow-witted asking this question.  The "educated" technophile might say public libraries are an anachronism and that everything needed research-wise or recreational reading-wise can be obtained online or through Amazon.  The hard-line libertarians would most assuredly say that the money spent on them would be better utilized by the individual to choose to spend on their own education if she/he so desired.  The cynic might say that we (society) have to provide SOME place for the homeless and disturbed to hang out.  Yet other people never even think about the library as a useful tool at their disposal, having had at some point in their lives a bad experience with fines or fees or even SHHHHHH! ... librarians.

There are some days where I can at least see the reasoning for some of these stances.  I have to remember that I have a vested interest in this whole concept.  And yet...

Many of the same social conditions that existed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries and that were the impetus for creating free public libraries, exist today.  In fact, poor educational level, poverty, sub-par work skills and the accompanying lack of upward mobility have intensified since I became a librarian in the mid-1990s.

Back to the title of this article: Why do we need public libraries?  Early childhood literacy.  If I could say nothing else about them, if I could answer in only one way, this is a role public libraries fill and succeed in like no other "free" public institution.  Study after study has shown that the single most important factor to success in school is mastery of basic math and reading skills by Kindergarten.  Public libraries have been working diligently at this for decades.  Bring your child to story time, check out some books to read with her at home and BAM!  You've received a huge ROI on your tax dollar because your child is positioned to succeed in school and ultimately in life.

Honestly, we need as many avenues to literacy, competency, life skills and work skills as we can possibly manage in our current world.  The gap between the rich and poor has grown once again to an enormous chasm.  While libraries need to remain relevant by adapting to new media, they must continue to focus on their strengths.  First, the librarians and specialists that can instill the love of reading and learning at a young age and provide support and training throughout the lives of our patrons. Second, the power of being free to all who want our services.  Third, the willingness to explore those new tools as they come around and to bend them to our will - helping our patrons grow and learn.

TED again

I've been doing some background work on what to do about the live stream of the next TED conferences because I think there would be interest in the library hosting it.  But one of my colleagues sent me this link, and now I hesitate.  The article, while obviously opinion, points out some strange inconsistencies regarding the organization.  For my part, I was not aware that TED existed before its recent rise to Internet glory.  Also, I think that while a case can be made for whether the "censored" talk was good enough to be posted, there is a fair amount of insular, "out-of-touch-ness" in the quoted portions of the article that bothers me.  I'm going to have to do some more investigation before we shell out the fairly steep sum (for us) to buy the right to stream their conferences.

After all, I like the TED talks.  They are often thought-provoking, if only rarely earth-shaking in their topic selection.  It bothers me though that an organization would claim to not be censoring their content when their "permanent" members list includes people fitting exactly the description of the type of person targeted by the censored talk.  The action has that "where there's smoke, there's fire" feel to it.  As a library, we stand for freedom of speech perhaps, these days, more than any other institution in the country.

et tu, Random House?

Random house has announced new ebook pricing for libraries.  I think it's called gouging.  Here's a definition, so let's see if the situation fits:

Price gouging is a pejorative term referring to a situation in which a seller prices goods or commodities much higher than is considered reasonable or fair.

An example given from the March 12, 2012 issue of Library Hotline stated that a purchase of Jean Edward Smith's Eisenhower in War and Peace was made for $40 on February 29th.   On March 1st, that price had tripled to $120.

A Random House spokesperson stated that they felt the pricing was fair considering ebooks don't "wear out" and that new titles are made available to libraries at the same time they are released to consumers.  The question in my mind is, "When were we (librarians) asked about these criteria?"

The answer is that there was no attempt (with which I am familiar) to sit down with librarians and talk through a different model.  We are reasonable people.  We can help publishers and authors.  We help grow readers who in turn become book buyers.  We will, at least at lil' ol' Hutchinson Public Library, agree to a reasonable scheme for maximum number of ebook checkouts per copy before we purchase new copies.

The alternative is to set up our own system for circulating ebooks and negotiating our own contracts with willing publishers and the authors of the MILLIONS of ebooks published outside of the traditional publishing industry.  That seems like a great ecosystem in which public libraries might play the role of publisher as well as outlet for budding authors, local historians, and others who have a story to tell and no way to tell it through the traditional publishing process.  The time for temerity is now - no "best" way has appeared for libraries regarding ebooks.  In order to survive, we must blaze our own trail.

So it's not just libraries?

Apparently, Penguin is out to alienate ALL of its customers.  I was just reading about the latest shenanigans involving Kindle versions of ebooks through OverDrive in this news brief from TechDirt.  For some strange reason, they are forcing Kindle users to borrow books only through USB connection, not wirelessly.  I'm not sure what this is supposed to accomplish, other than acting as an irritant.  Perhaps it is just another bump in the long, slow decline of major publishing houses.  They seem to be taking the path of the music industry giants by trying to throw up higher and higher hurdles for people to get access to their products.  I think this is a poor strategy since self-published titles rose from 29,000 in 2004 to 2.7 MILLION in 2010.  The savvy author doesn't need a huge publishing company to get a book out there anymore.

I cannot stress this enough - libraries have a great opportunity here.  This is no time to panic, this is the time to act, and act decisively.  Libraries have the rare opportunity to be the SOLE middle-man in the author-to-reader supply chain.  Libraries could directly interact with the authors of many of those 2.7 million titles and publish and help distribute those ebooks if only we set ourselves up to do it.  That means the network and server capacity to circulate and even potentially act for authors and readers as a store-front or a gateway to book sellers.

This article makes me think we might want to add extra precautions opening boxes of paper books from Penguin as well!

More eBook Nonsense!

WARNING:  Long, but extremely IMPORTANT!

[EDITED 2/12/12]
Sometimes I get frustrated with people.  Usually, it is because communication hasn't worked properly and has created a misunderstanding.  Sometimes though, it is because communication has been completely disregarded and subsequent faulty reasoning has led to a poor decision.  Now, whether or not that faulty reasoning has been mine or the other party's...let's just say I'm willing to discuss it.  The same can't be said of the 5 publishers listed at the end of this post.

Sometimes when trying to communicate, I must assume that the other party has completely gone off the rails and is just flat wrong.  Case in point:  Penguin ends eBook sales to libraries.  This news means that 5 out of the 6 "big" publishers have chosen to not sell eBooks to libraries.  Random House is the sole remaining "big" publisher still selling eBooks to libraries (thank you Random House!)

Those other publishers, rather than work out a solution, have chosen to walk away.  They want you, the reader, to only have the option to buy an ebook, never to borrow.  This despite decades of hard work by librarians, promoting authors and books for these big publishers.  Librarians want people to read.  We relish helping to discover new, great authors and sharing them with our patrons.  Librarians want more books to be published and more writers to succeed.  Librarians want publishers and publishing to grow.  These big publishers, apparently, want only our money.  And by "our" money, I mean ours individually.  They don't seem to care about choking off a source of free promotion and business that (although they dismiss it as inconsequential) has benefited them for years.

Here's the harsh truth:  Just as it disadvantages individuals, a lack of access to a popular format, a format that may reign supreme in the coming years, will kill libraries.  It will kill them utterly because while a new format changes habits and usage patterns, complete lack of access to that format will bring us even further along the road to a society of "haves" and "have nots".  Public libraries have always acted as a great leveler - providing resources to those who cannot afford them.  Public libraries work hard to create readers: Life-long readers. Voracious readers.  And we don't especially care if they buy books, borrow them, or both.  HPL's children's outreach brings books and story times to 600+ pre-schoolers per month with this single goal in mind.  That's 600+ potential book buyers WE are creating for you, MacMillan Publishing (and you other ingrate publishers).

Lack of access will also kill one of the other main reasons libraries exist - to accumulate and make available the totality of human knowledge.  Eh, so what, right?

Librarians are not unreasonable people.  We will negotiate terms, conditions, restrictions, whatever.  But we can't negotiate when the other party is acting in a childish fashion and simply takes their toys and goes home.

If this situation makes you mad, here's a list of contacts to which you can express your anger.  I will be contacting them myself and I hope you will too.

Macmillan
175 Fifth Avenue
New York, NY 10010
646-307-5151

customerservice@mpsvirginia.com

SIMON & SCHUSTER, INC.
1230 Avenue of the Americas
New York, NY 10020
PHONE: 212-698-7000

http://www.simonandschuster.com/about/contact_us

Penguin Group

375 Hudson Street

New York, NY 10014

Phone: 212-366-2000

ecommerce@us.penguingroup.com

Hatchette Book Group

466 Lexington Avenue #131

New York, NY 10017

Phone: 212-364-1100

http://www.hachettebookgroup.com/customer_contact-us.aspx

Brilliance Audio, Inc., 

1704 Eaton Drive

Grand Haven, Michigan 49417

Phone: 616-846-5256

consumerhelp@brillianceaudio.com 

[EDIT]  Here is a considerably more measured blog post on the Penguin / eBook topic, but one that also points out many of the very real, but bordering on whiny, problems of librarianship these days.

Interesting Rumor...

...or not.

I heard a new rumor today, that the Hutchinson Public Library is closing.  First off, I want to say that this rumor is FALSE!  We've been here for 110 years and Melville Dewey willing, we will be here in another 110 years.

Second, I wonder if this has anything to do with our "Are you Prepared...?" program series for 2012?  It's going to be fun, and we're taking a light-hearted approach to the impending end of the "Mayan Long Count" calendar.  Of course, it never hurts to be prepared and we will have a variety of lunch-n-learn type activities and much more to help you get ready for what comes next.