Hitting Them Where It Helps

Checked into another Booklist Webinar, similar to one last year (see earlier post) on online references. Scholastic's Grolier Online, Encyclopedia Britannica, World Book and ABC/Clio showed their interfaces, although this time they did seem to mention content and search results more than entry points and Facebook-like home pages.

ABC/Clio's rep talked about technology and the limits thereof, that technology without content is no answer to the question of how to reach students. His company's products are "not a content dump from the backlist" (Snap!) but vetted reference material offering context and analysis.

Other presenters touched on the value of databases over Google, which delivers so many links that even a refined search will blast the student with an overwhelming pile of largely irrelevant material. (None of them mentioned Google Scholar, which I told a high school class about, figuring they were still going to head to Google, even with all the library's marvelous digital resources.) Type "cougar" into an encyclopedia database, they noted, and the hits, so to speak, won't be on the middle-aged female sort of cat.

Grolier was new to me and seems to have some unusual features. It is provided over the Internet, requiring the library to have no special software and not taking up its server space. It includes 1,300 magazines from Ebsco, 1,200 clickable maps, and a staggering 340,000 editor-vetted Web links. (How many people do they employ, I wonder, and what do they pay??) It now has seven separate homepages, from elementary school to adult and librarian/educator. And it has 30-second and 60-second "GoTube" videos for quick intro to subjects, plus TrueFlix, which includes 47 ebook and video "True Book" series titles, with quizzes and other interactivities.

But at this Webinar, for a change, the best was saved for first, a brief talk by Harvard's Susan Kane on digital natives. Having barely survived millennial training, I rolled my eyes at first, but her descriptions seemed less stereotypical than most and also aimed more at helping libraries engage those people who, poor things, never new a world without a Wide Web. This makes me feel not so much a dinosaur as cosmic dust, but apparently even 40-year-olds' brains are wired differently than these dignavs.

Among Kane's points: Dignavs like to make and create as well as consume information. In Olden Days this might have resulted in a research paper, or article, or art, all of which involve the individual reprocessing input and molding it into a new form. Now, whatever it is, it is shared with friends because dignavs have an "ambient awareness" of their social group at all times, even when not physically in the same space. They also don't need to tone down the chatter of all those open tabs and iPods and videos and emails and tweets and Facebook posts etc. in order to focus. And problem-solving is one of the things they enjoy. On the negative side, Kane said, somewhat apologetically, these kids have "difficulty with linear thought." No wonder. "Read read read learn learn lear.... oh look a new text msg."

So, how to grab their attention? Focus on delivering the data, Kane said. And the content is more critical than the wrapper -- make sure the information is there, not just the flashy stuff. Then, distribute it through multiple channels, make it easy for them to share with that omnipresent-even-when-absent social group. Because sharing leads, as we all know, to FBI Piracy WARNINGS and long jail sentences, Kane urged that the vendors consider more creative licensing. For example, she suggested that a link to copyrighted material be available for a defined time, say, 24 hours (after that, it's history anyway in this interconnected universe), so kids can share it with their cohort.

Kane also recommends that librarians "friend" their patrons, sharing with them stories, games, what you're reading, and meeting them where they live online, not just on the library's Web site or in the physical building. In a broader context, she gave the example of the Contra Costa library, which has bus cards with QR codes so that commuters can download audiobooks right there on the bus. Bring the service directly to the people, Kane recommended.

For an intro to ways to draw customers with QR codes, read this. This picture of the Naperville, Ill., library is included in that article. I hope this is a kosher use of it.

Back to the Webinar: Allow the dignavs to teach as well as learn, Kane said. And isn't that a wonderful idea, to have teen volunteers or perhaps teen pages provide some one-on-one computer help to patrons who are more terrified of computers than of snakes.

And finally, lend them things they can't afford, for example the technology to access content.

The archive should be available soon at booklistonline.com/webinars. Do watch at least Kane's talk. Or view the slide version.

Going Digital, Pixel by Pixel

Information seekers dream of the day when all the world's knowledge will be at their fingertips, just a few keystrokes away. Certainly the Internet has boosted the availability of facts -- as well as bottomless opinions. But the day when digital libraries and archives can truly compete with the old bricks-and-mortar model with its dusty, book-laden shelves is still years, if not decades, away.

Having recently read that 41 percent!! of Americans think the Second Coming will occur before 2050, if not this May 21st, perhaps the future of the digital library isn't worth troubling about. Here are some of the more earthly stumbling blocks to virtual omniscience, as outlined by Maryland State Law Library and Maryland State Archives staff members.

1. Physical and monetary limits. Digitizing takes time and, yes, the sort of digits still found at the ends of arms. The Archives has a spiffy microfilm-to-digital machine through which the fiche flies. Not so with print that has not been converted to microfilm. In the Archives' small and crammed digital images lab, high-tech scanners digitize documents, page by page, with constant oversight by Human Beings, who also have to make the decisions on how best to copy fragile works. Digitizing all of Maryland's land records, archivist Mike McCormick said, took eight years and $15 million.

2. Copyright. The Law Library puts legislative bill files on microfilm. These are the collections of supporting documents and hearing records that form the history of legislative action. Why not digitize them?

Legislative Services makes the decisions on what/whether to digitize. Informing that decision are copyright laws. With the bill files, for example, microfiche is allowable because only limited copies are made and are available only to those who enter the building (or get the material through interlibrary loan). While much of the content of the bill files is public record, the files do include copyrighted works such as news articles. Rights would have to be obtained for each such work if a complete file is to be digitized.

Another example is the annotated code. The annotations to the laws, which are by their nature public domain, are written and published by legal sources. These copyrighted annotations again cannot be included in the digital version without permission from the publisher, and possibly, a fee for use. And by the way, because of Point 1, the library is behind in digitizing in any case.

3. Accessibility. Digital is not always better. The Law Library maintains the historic Baltimore Sun on film. "Sometimes the database is not as searchable," librarian Catherine McGuire said.

4. Longevity. Biodegrable as it is, paper is still a format to be trusted. After the Rapture (see above), when computers may not function optimally, or at all, and the last remaining microfiche reader needs an irreplaceable part, those volumes of Old English law will still be housed in the Law Library. I do worry about the loss of climate-control, but still, there remain the physical, readily accessible books. The Smithsonian ran into this sort of dilemma a few years ago, when the ancient tape recordings in its collection could no longer be played because of the lack of the ancient technology to play them.

Another kind of longevity problem is due to the instrinsic evanescence of the Web. So much of what was once "published" online is gone for good, hence the need to clean up your dead links periodically. This problem gave rise to entities such as the Chesapeake Digital Preservation Group, of which the Law Library is a partner. They term the aforementioned broken-link problem "link rot." What the group's site includes:

• Reports and studies relating to U.S. government and policy
• Selected state, federal, and foreign government documents
• Materials relating to public policy and legal issues in the state of Maryland
• Publications issued by Virginia's judicial branch of government
• Materials by and about the District of Columbia

Be sure to read the Chesapeake Group's copyright policy.

The Law Library also is trying to capture "born digital" information and records, print them out and bind them so they will be retrievable after they disappear into the ether.

Relevant reading:

Robert Darnton in Chronicle of Higher Education:

"Despite the efforts to preserve the millions of messages exchanged by means of blogs, e-mail, and handheld devices, most of the daily flow of information disappears. Digital texts degrade far more easily than words printed on paper. Brewster Kahle, creator of the Internet Archive, calculated in 1997 that the average life of a URL was 44 days. Not only does most information not appear online, but most of the information that once did appear has probably been lost."

Bobby Glushko in American Libraries:

"Any library with a good scanner and some staff hours can make high-quality digital copies for online distribution or provide patrons a place to comment on and discuss materials online. Many libraries don’t, though, because they are unsure whether they can legally do so."

This just in from Chronicle of Higher Education, via Library Link of the Day.