The future of libraries

“I have seen the future of libraries: It is to spend the future discussing the future of libraries.”

I had to share this wry comment with you, courtesy of Tim, founder of Librarything.com and its blog; Thingology last week. I think Tim makes a fair point; too often we can wax lyrical about a 2.0-monikered piece of tech and not enough about actually applying it.

In saying that, I think we are seeing evermore promising and exciting times for libraries really utilising such technology and with credible outcomes. This may be something like the BL’s digitisation project, Turning The Pages or Sound Archive online offerings, or as mentioned last week, the dauntingly ambitious Open Library initiative. 

With this in mind I have been keeping an eye out for some practical advice and information on other library 2.0 experiences. I think these may shed a little more light on what is out there and how it is being used.

Choice Reviews Online has some good material this month. You do have to register to access this content, but there is a free two month trial on offer; all for the price of some demographic information. One weighty essay; The Social Tools of Web 2.0: Opportunities for Academic Libraries, comes from InfoTangle contributor Ellyssa Kroski.

Kroski discusses which kind of 2.0 tools to use, why an academic library should use them and how they benefit both it and its users. For example, topics covered include how content collaboration software such as wikis can be usefully applied in a library environment. This includes everything from subject guides to a website or intranet. Then there is social bookmarking software like del.icio.us that easily assembles substantial lists of online material. This can be applied to things such as reading lists and subject guides. Bibliographies have benefited from a tool called CiteULike which has been particularly well used with various journal articles to record full citation information and then shared with others in the community. Sharing different formats of media such as the BL, digitisation example I gave above, shows how effective information distribution can have many different dimensions. Perhaps most importantly, through the re-engaged relationship libraries have with their users

There is also a fairly substantial buyer’s guide available from Choice. It details a stack of online academic resources available. It’s pretty much a software directory, so there is no need to go into much detail about those listed, suffice to say that if you are in the market for some new heavy-weight kit this might be a good resource to refer to.

Finally, for a slightly quicker run-down on what other applications the e-learning community are using, have a look at the Centre for Learning & Performance Technologies site. They have been asking their community members what their choice online tools are, compiling a favourites list. There are familiars like Google and Firefox – that will come as no surprise to most of us, but there are a few applications in here that might be worth checking out. If you have any to recommend yourself let us know.