The informal theme of this institute — I think I heard LJ has done about 20 of these? — is, in Joseph Sanchez’s terms, “library as question mark.” Sanchez, from the Auraria Library at the University of Colorado, was on an opening panel where he and Matt Hamilton from Anythink Libraries talked about the impact of changes in the reading ecology on how library space is used, with a lot of conversation about users creating digital content. Traci Lesneski from MS&R talked about the library as extrovert: more transparent, more visible — a point that resonated as I thought about our library becoming more proactively welcoming.

Nevertheless, for all the talk about content creation, library gardens, gaming, and so on, implicit in all the sessions that day was the idea that when users walk into a library, they want to see people and products (versus wandering into an empty space –  I saw this at a fairly new university library where my first thought was that the first-floor lobby was a missed opportunity).

Those products will probably include books, but can also include DVDs and other media. In some cases, the users themselves may be the attraction, on display as they create, browse, and read (not unlike watching the pizza maker twirl his dough). And build in a visible location for a helpful human presence — call it a librarian or library worker, but I hear the word “concierge” a lot these days (waving at West Hollywood!), and think that’s a good fit for that role.

There were tours the previous day which my travel schedule didn’t let me attend, but I did get the tour of Denver Public Library, which for me had several ah-hah moments. As one librarian, a facility manager, observed, I got the tour I needed. It’s a midcentury building about the same age as my library, and it had a renovation and expansion in 1990 led by Michael Graves. So their challenge was to preserve an iconic look and feel while bringing the library into the technology era. I don’t have those challenges per se, but renovating a pre-technology building with “good bones” is certainly relevant.

Two Benches, Paired

Plus I saw Michael Graves benches scattered about DPL, and thought, Perfect. Benches. Which leads (rather loosely, like a dog galloping ahead of its owner) to a point made at the Institute: the project lead for a library design need to be outgoing and friendly, but also firm. That describes me to a tee on my best days. (I will refrain from commenting on what I’m like on my worst days.)

The leader must also have strong and well-communicated ideas and opinions–like, those benches are a great fit — but be flexible. One strong idea I had early on (courtesy of Linda Demmers, a bit more on her below) is that our library would absolutely need a thorough facility inspection before any other design activity moved forward (with the exception of the computer classroom), and that’s wrapping up as I write this. (By the way, who knew there were so many ways to use asbestos?).

I was right, and sticking to my guns was the right thing to do. It doesn’t mean I’m always right, or that, when I know I’m right, I always stick to my guns, but when I’ve got the Greek Chorus of Experienced Library Administrators chanting “You’ll be sorry if you don’t do that,” I do try to do the right thing.

I realized as well that I am beginning to synthesize and organize my ad-hoc education in library facilities. During one interactive session, people discussed how to guide users through a library. “Power paths,” I peeped up. I had seen an example of these in a public library when Linda Demmers came to our library for a day-long consulting visit and did a slideshow. Think of how Ikea pulls you through a store.

There are many ways to design a path, and they don’t have to be underfoot, either — think of that part of O’Hare where you are guided through a connector by undulating lights. The group liked the power-path idea, as did the architects (for whom it wasn’t a new concept, as became apparent when they pulled out their drawing, which sure enough featured a power path).

I’m also getting to the point that I feel I at least know the major vendors in the field and can pick out an Agati easy chair at 20 paces, plus figure out whether that media desk is from Steelcase or KI. But even more significantly, I’m feeling the landscape of this knowledge area and beginning to understand where my rather significant gaps are — for example, sustainability.

Most of all I realized I’m catching the facility bug. There was a time when a renovation or new-building project only interested me in the most abstract, utilitarian manner possible. I have even felt relief that my career had not overlapped with anything more involved than upgrading computers and so forth. Now I’m genuinely excited to be on this journey; it is a big part of what puts spring in my step as I walk into the library every day.

Anyway, the following is just a pastiche of ideas gleaned from the day (sans synthesis, but with a bonus digression or two). LJ also encouraged everyone to see the LandMark Libraries discussed in their May 15 issue, and to watch for the July 1 issue for academic libraries.

1. Content creation is more than just about digital experience — it can include visual, applied, and performance arts; crafts; library gardens; etc.
2. Using local materials roots the building in the community
3. IT costs are hard to quantify because you always want more
4. Under-carpet wiring has improved a lot (aside: I remember dealing with an under-carpet wiring issue over a decade ago that was originally presented as an electricity shortage; staff were actually taking turns using computers because there “wasn’t enough electricity.” My dad was an electrician, among other things, and that popped my B.S. flag. Sure enough, there was plenty of electricity, once it had wiring to flow through).
5. Openness and flexibility can interfere with comfort. Broad open spaces don’t make us feel comfortable, and don’t make us want to linger. Look at creating rooms within rooms. (We have these spaces under stairwells I’ve wanted to equip with easy chairs, small rugs, and hanging lamps. Maybe this will help me find the time to do this.)
6. Lighting: libraries tend to use the same lighting everywhere in public areas. Focus more on task lighting — it’s more flexible. The brightest light is not the light you always  need or want.
7. A good design must be founded on sustainable principles (this is one of the Landmark Library guidelines).
8. Develop a strong statement that establishes guiding principles for the project. People may come and go from all parts of the project; the project needs coherent, continuous coherent direction.
9. Yes, you need good signage: big, simple, and clear.
10. Question assumptions.
11. Get big results from small decisions.
12. Bring in the light (walking through the Denver airport where there was a display on city architecture, I learned that’s called “daylighting”).
13. Think privacy, but think collaboration.
14. Rediscover quiet (amen on that one: one of my summer projects is to visibly zone the library into noise levels).
15. Respect history.
16. In comparing construction costs, be sure you’re comparing apples to apples.
17. Keep your facilities people involved.
18. There is no greener building than the building that already exists.
19. Don’t build a 15-year building; don’t make them so  cheap that they can’t last a long time.
20. There is no value in value engineering. “Value engineering” only prolongs the problem ; it will end up costing you more. N.b. those comments intrigued me even as they resonated. Worth hunting down relevant articles.
21. Hiring an architect with a lot of library experience is a cost-cutting exercise; it’s incredibly important to the success of this project.
22. Design spaces that can be used for a variety of purposes and at different times.
23. Look at your existing assets and find ways to leverage them better.
24. Drywall on masonry is  putting 15-year material on top of 100-year material.
25. Sustainability is ultimately about using less.
26. A great location makes it much easier to get people in the library.
27. Be buyer-aware about the people who are going to use your money.
28. Integrated project delivery is the newest PM approach; the whole team is put together at the beginning. Instead of silos, the team is more like a studio.
29. Watch out for project soft costs: construction, land, shelving, furniture, technology, infrastructure for wiring for phones, computers, etc; adding more books, collection development, research to start the project, site surveys, geotech consultants, lawyers for reviewing contracts,moving costs (especially if doing the project in phases), developing a phasing plan.
30. Costing sustainability: don’t guess, bring an energy analyst on board to work with the design team to evaluate cost decisions.
31. LEED isn’t the be-all end-all of sustainability, and can be an expensive, difficult direction. You can design a sustainable library you’re proud of even if you don’t get a plaque. (That said, I bet a workshop or class about LEED would be a great introduction to sustainability in construction.)
32. Nobody said this, I just thought it: “iconic” seems to be a synonym for “expensive and difficult to renovate.”

So yes, it was worth it. As with most activities, networking with others was a major part of the experience. There’s a lot of wisdom in LibraryLand, and some of it is translated into building and updating enduring and beloved landmarks.

Finally, this is an area where I want to grow. As noted on Facebook and Twitter, at the closing reception I asked a library director, how can I learn more about library building projects? There’s so much to know! Him: um… by reading books? OH RIGHT, BOOKS. I’ve found two to start with (and I visited Donald Barclay’s library and he knows whereof he speaks); recommendations welcome.

Bookmark to:

Musee Mechanique

As many of you know, last week Random House raised its Overdrive ebook pricing a lot. Not 20-percent-a-lot. More like 300-percent-a-lot. Enough so that a cart of 9 ebooks I had in Overdrive, only some of which were Random House, suddenly bloated to nearly $500 before I deleted the RH titles… dropping the total to $78.

Here’s how this price increase impacts the reading ecology:

If librarians fill demand for RH titles, we have to buy fewer books from other publishers… not to mention fewer RH copies. If you’re responding to user demand for the most popular titles, that means more small publishers go on the chopping block. (Adios, Cassoulet!)

If you reduce the number of RH copies you purchase, your users now have much longer hold waits for these books. Like everything else in life these days, something that is a public good is rationed through an increasingly narrow funnel.

If librarians do as I did and stop buying RH ebook titles (because I’m not running a public library, and our popular-reading is important but not our top-tier priority), readers who want these books only have the paper option. You may say that’s perfectly fine, but stay with me while I detour to discuss in brief one of the less-insightful commentaries that emerged.

Over on TechCrunch, a writer opines that this price increase is a necessary evil. Devin writes, “These companies are faced, after all, with the prospect of selling one book and having it lent to a hundred people at once (though that is not the case here)” — my emphasis.

Right, it’s not the case here. The way Overdrive works, books are “checked out” just like paper books. These books can’t be renewed, and they can’t be loaned to others. One person, one book. We’re all aware it’s a horseless carriage of a workaround based on a known model, but all the players do get how it works.

Furthermore — and this is where the comment about paper comes in — for all the enormous, sparkling crocodile tears trickling down the face of Random House, as Bobbi Newman pointed out on Twitter, they had a boffo good year last year in re profits, and a lot of that was due to ebooks.

Why shouldn’t they have had a good year? They now have a supply channel that (to turn the publishing industry’s own NewSpeak back on itself) is almost frictionless. They don’t have to print, predict, ship, store inventory, ship it back when it’s not sold, or pulp it. I’m no tax lawyer, but I also suspect that publishers get a major revenue boost by no longer having taxable inventory sitting in physical warehouses.

And of course, publishers aren’t turning any of this revenue over to the people who make the books worth reading — the authors.

If you read the ensuing comments on the TechCrunch post, you’ll see that the author subscribes to the publishing-world-is-going-away model (or at least backpedals to that idea, in the face of indignant responses). In this model, if I’m reading him correctly, the publisher’s behavior is rational (if not appropriate) because they’re raking in money before Everything Changes and the current publishing model disappears — which I suppose we could label as thoughtful behavior for publishing execs whose children expect to go to college.

I won’t spend more time guessing what this writer believes, but what I believe in is nothing less than Ranganathan’s First Law: Books are for use. They don’t exist if people can’t read them–can’t read them because they can’t access them; can’t read them because they, or agencies acting on their behalf, such as libraries, can’t afford them. Books exist for us, for the life of the mind, to build the public intellectual commons.

Librarians aren’t stupid. We know that a lot will change in publishing and libraries, even in the next few years. Some of it will be traumatic and difficult, but some of it will be amazing and wonderful. And at core, the enduring values will abide. We as librarians believe in books, believe they belong in people’s hands, believe in the right to read, believe in authors, believe in readers, believe that reading changes lives, believe, believe, believe in what we do. And we also believe there will always be not just a need, but an innate urge for intelligently-composed, well-edited, carefully-curated intellectual content — some of which, for a very long time to come, if not forever, will be realized in booklike objects, shared within a reading ecology.

Where we go forward at this moment is important. I appreciate ALA talking to publishers. I understand the place we’re in. But so far, what’s been happening hasn’t had any effect; as I pointed out last week, it’s almost as if the publishers are thumbing our noses at us. If anything, despite our best efforts and strategies, we’re beginning to look  a little bit Neville Chamberlainish.

Exactly what’s next is unclear to me, but about a year ago a friend approached me with an idea: what about legislation? At the time, I wondered why or how that would work. Right now, I’m wondering why it wouldn’t.

I’ll close by repeating a comment I posted to my own blog last week, because it involves a working strategy:

Note that publishers have had their eyes on libraries for a long time. A pioneering librarian, Marvin Scilken, led the charge to expose imbalance in bookstore/library pricing decades ago, which resulted in an agreement on library pricing that no doubt has stuck in publishers’ craws ever since. (See his Wikipedia bio, cf. the section “1966 Senate Hearing on the Price Fixing of Library Books.”) Depending on who is in office, there would have to be some similar sympathy these days. Studying those hearings and their arguments might be useful. (Just like studying librarians of yore is valuable. Definitely at least one entire week in my Fantasy Library Class.)

How Marvin proceeded, and succeeded, might be a very useful research question to pursue in the ALA library and ALA archives — and could be a great class project for that class I don’t have time to teach. But one thing’s for sure: the good work Marvin did in 1966 is now being upended. Then again, maybe, in its own way, it can be repeated.

Bookmark to:

People are beginning to notice that big publishers are not really all that interested in authors or readers; they are interested in consolidating control of distribution channels so that the only participants in culture are creators who work for little or nothing and consumers who can only play if they can pay.

Barbara elegantly collapses into one sentence the last several years of the ebook wars and, even more importantly, identifies all stakeholders in the reading ecology: not just publishers and libraries, but authors and readers.

The Growing Crisis

Over the last year or so, there has been spluttering (sometimes from me) at individual publishers such as HarperCollins (they of “26 checkout” fame), distributor-packagers such as Overdrive, and of course, the idiot library administrators who sign contracts they obviously haven’t read, or they would never have entered into those agreements, right? (That spluttering definitely didn’t come from me, being one of those administrators.)

But Barbara is pointing out that while the problem has many moving parts, the entire reading ecology is at risk; we are, in her terms, in an “apocalypse.” It is really nothing less than an outright assault on fair use; the publishing-industrial complex won’t be happy until readers are paying, not just by the title, but by the page-turn.

Barbara and I have an interesting convergence: we are both librarians-authors-readers (except she can write entire books, while my attention span ends at the essay). By author, I mean (full disclosure: HUSTLE AHEAD!) non-industry writing, such as the forthcoming The Cassoulet Saved Our Marriage (Roost Books, Fall, 2012; edited by Lisa Catherine Harper and Caroline Grant), in which you will find my revised and republished essay, “Still Life on the Half-Shell” (first published in Gastronomica) about oysters, the locavore movement, and how I came to terms with life in Tallahassee. My essay includes exquisitely clear instructions on eating oysters Southern-style (complete with a photograph), making Cassoulet an obvious “must buy” for all library collections.

But my point isn’t about whether I am expecting to make a living from essays such as “Half-Shell.” My day job is my income; I can’t even remember if I am getting a small one-time payment, though I had such good editorial input from Lisa and Caroline that the revision process was its own mini-post-grad workshop, and I have a food essay floating out there that is significantly better for the lessons learned for “Half-Shell.”

My point is that it’s important, both ethically and strategically, for advocates of the right to read to understand that creators should have the option and the right to make a living from their creations, and that our advocacy, right now, at this moment in history, is crucial to ensure that right.

It’s also the reader’s right to support creators, which they can do either directly (buy my book!) or indirectly (fund libraries, and they will buy my book). Some of us in society will “buy” books, by way of funding libraries, that we never read ourselves or that we choose to purchase on our own, but we understand that the town pump benefits everyone — a take on the world that is less popular in certain circles, but only underscores our value to society.

Tied to the Tracks

What happened?

In the past, the writer-publisher-library-reader model had a modicum of equanimity. It is now obvious that the nature of the technology — the printed book — largely regulated that equanimity.  All of us in the reading ecology — librarians, authors, repackagers, readers — are tied to the tracks by the Brobdingnagian power wielded by the highly consolidated publisher-industrial complex that is then magnified a thousand-fold by the conveniently elastic, virtual nature of digital publishing.

As Steve Lawson observes, publishers can get away with limiting access, so they limit it. As Kate Sheehan points out in a comment on her own post, publishers can cut us out of the conversation, so they cut us out. Though it has been proven time and again that library reading boosts individual book sales, that’s not good enough for for the publisher-industrial complex.  They smell an opportunity, and their greed is overwhelming any vestige of decency or sense of social fairness.

Deep down, the publishing-industrial complex will not be satisfied until they can do away with those pesky librarians, they who broker reading as a public good, champion the right to read, and advocate for equitable access. Penguin invoked the term “friction,” in reference to the ease of checking out books; but I see the real “friction” as the Bonus Army of librarians, authors, and readers who are speaking truth to power. How convenient it would be if we were starved out of the reading ecology.

We’re also back to my ancient observation about Google: “don’t be evil” does not translate into “do be good.”

What is to be done?

I’m not a fan of…

• Dwelling at length on the supposed sins of any one publisher or redistributor; this isn’t just HarperCollins, Penguin, the other publishers who won’t even deal with Overdrive, or Overdrive. It’s bigger than that. (Note: I lay aside the Elsevier boycott, which works for other reasons, in a different situation and a different reading ecology.)
• Singling out individual libraries over their Overdrive contracts.
• Assuming Dilbertesquian cluelessness on the part of librarians struggling to provide ebooks to readers.
• Arguing that Information Wants To Be Free and therefore creators should work for free and make a living some other way. That’s not only naive, it leaves just one profiteer in the equation: publishers. (Again, this relates to the for-profit book industry. Scholarly publishing also relies on slave labor to line publishers’ purses — which is the point of the Elsevier boycott — but it’s a different ecology. There ain’t no such thing as a free lunch, but sometimes it’s hard to point to the money on the table.)
• Assuming “they” will solve the problem. Much as I appreciate ALA going to meet with big publishers, one of those publishers, Penguin, subsequently thumbed its beak at the reading ecology, withdrawing from Overdrive with a timing that can only be labeled impertinent.
• Indulging in magical thinking; the clock isn’t rolling backwards, and ebooks are here to stay.

I do think we need to…

• Recognize this crisis as a reading-ecology problem and a fight for the right to read, not just a public-library problem. It doesn’t matter that this has primarily been about Overdrive, whose customer base is overwhelmingly public libraries (though Overdrive has higher-ed customers, including Yale, Pitt, and my tiny library).  We’re all part of the reading ecology.
• Inform and engage our stakeholders, such as the Free Library of Philadelphia is doing., and as Peter Brantley did through Publishers Weekly, though I was a little uncomfortable with his portrayal of public libraries. They aren’t all urban catchbasins, and strategically, we need the large middle-class voting base to understand their stake in this crisis.
• Study the structure of our reading ecology and have economists and other strategists propose workable solutions. I know there has been talk about “buying” Overdrive, but even if it were for sale, would acquiring the repackager/redistributor solve anything? We need some serious theory at work for us. This is made even more challenging because library “science” is an iffy discipline at best.

I wish I had more ideas, but I solicit yours.

Bookmark to:

As far back as the libraries of Pergamon and Alexandria, libraries have combined functions of storage, sifting and activation. They have been places of burial, preservation and worship of a certain past, where retrieval, resuscitation and animation of dormant/stored knowledge was integrated into the shaping of the present and future. It is the access, animation and activation pieces that are now moving front stage and center, while the storage and burial functions move offsite even as they remain just as essential as ever.

Back in November I held the first of three sessions of a Library Vision Task Force. This group (and do we have fun), composed of representatives from nearly every department on campus, is charged to develop a mission statement and then a vision statement for our library. This vision statement will play a crucial role in driving development efforts for a library that has largely not been “re-thunk” since construction completed in 1958.*

Some of the re-thunking can’t wait for The Vision Thing, most specifically our 10-year-old, heavily-used computer classroom that is receiving development attention as we speak. But the “bigger things” can and must wait for broader direction; as much as I and Team Library might have all the bright ideas in the world, and as eager as we are to move “forward,” it is crucial that the library reflect the will, direction, and zeitgeist of the entire campus.

(N.b. I adopt an air of Yoda-like mystery when I am asked if we should renovate or rebuild; honestly, until the facility assessment is funded, how the heck would I know? The building appears to have lovely bones, but I don’t have X-Ray vision or a degree in seismic engineering, architecture, or accessibility design.)

Floating Conference Room (Brisbane, AU)

The pre-work for our meeting were observation exercises — their call whether they did them in our library or in a new or newly-renovated library (of any flavor). I left the observation activities wide open. All they had to do was observe.

Most of that first meeting centered on sharing those observations, some of which surfaced during a slideshow I presented , which was not so much a talking-head presentation as a call-and-response — my favorite and most unexpected moment was the sheer horror the Visioneers expressed at that suspended conference room in Brisbane, Australia; a thing of beauty, yes, but emotionally uncomfortable to people living in an earthquake zone–something that mirrored my initial reaction when I saw that room, though I thought I was being a sissy.

One key finding from the observations was that people often use the library out of context of library-owned materials. They bring their own books, or they tote laptops, or they simply sit and “be.” Some study in groups, some read, some meditate, some stroll. In fact, though I have incontrovertible proof this activity still takes place (and in our library is anomalously on the rise), the only recorded observations of users retrieving books from library shelves came from public libraries.

So I posed the questions: We observe all these people coming into the library with their own materials. Why don’t they just use the student center, the computer labs, or their homes? Do we still need academic libraries, and if so, why?

And from among the chorus of rational behaviors arose the word sanctuary. Not sanctuary as in a place that was always and for every use absolutely quiet (although the need for quiet space, group and solitary, came up repeatedly). But the idea of a place steeped in the symbolic behaviors associated with libraries, from quiet contemplation to cultural enrichment, resonated through our entire meeting. A place where people felt safe to engage in reading, research, and memory work. A place that was dedicated to the life of the mind.

After the meeting, one of the LVTF members even walked back to my office (where I had rolled the whiteboard so it wouldn’t be erased by accident), took a whiteboard pen, underlined the word “sanctuary,” and trotted away.

Perhaps it is no accident that Milton Pflueger designed the campus so that the chapel and the library face one another like balancing weights on a scale: the life of the mind and the life of the spirit. So many people comment on the library’s “right” location, without being able to articulate exactly what they mean (visibility and symmetry are two frequent terms).

Like the Visioneer’s reaction to the floating conference room, I believe what visitors are sensing when they talk about “symmetry” is not so much a rational response (the physical symmetry) than the harmony of spirit and intellect, a perfect reflection of our university’s values. (The chapel is at the top of a steep flight of stairs, so the mind “rises” to the spirit.)

It is interesting, then, that the accumulation of print materials in our library — so rapid in the latter part of the last century that new shelving added to the main level was not even bolted or braced (a problem we are addressing this spring and beyond if need be through what we call the Big Shift, which will also restore the spacious study areas of the original library design) — is actually interfering with “sanctuary.”

We do not have enough of the right zones (quiet, cultural, group) to simultaneously support all the activities we can and should be doing.  Noisier events have to take place in the first half of the semester (because we have no dedicated event space) and students who are trying to concentrate complain about the group studiers who leak out of the study rooms we carved from former AV rooms because there isn’t enough room for them.

Meanwhile, 6% of our print materials drive 100% of our circulation, and though we have had a major surge in circulation in the last two years (so far this year alone we have checked out more books than we did for any of the academic years from 2000-2009), we will never again see the numbers we saw before the e-resources arrived. We also have 26,000 uncataloged books (shelf zombies, I call them) — well, they were cataloged, but not in this era.  I would estimate 80% of our space is devoted to roughly 5% of our usage.

I am definitely print-plus, not post-print (just as I was in the late 1990s, when I began saying that the print-based book would be an anachronism in my lifetime), but any librarian paying attention has to conclude that the future of academic library design has to be predicated on what a library does, not what a library contains.

That doesn’t mean “no more books.” It’s back to Ranganathan 101: Books are for use. (I sure hope Schnapp and Palfrey used Ranganathan in their library design course. If they didn’t, I scold them.)  “Use” can even be decorative — the books in our south event space are more trompe l’oeil than anything else — or artifact-focused; is there a librarian who doesn’t appreciate a rare-book room? But with so much memory work charged into the digital landscape, the print book has to take its place alongside all other uses — and above all, not preempt them.

Because in fact we who are true librarians have always been about what a library does. It has never really been about the book as artifact, but about the ancestral homeland the book represents, the accumulated wisdom and history that like Ipukarea adds up to far more than its literal self. The book is host and wine for the intellectual transubstantiation that for thousands of years has drawn  humans into libraries to read, to dream, to study, to be taught, to imagine, to be alone, to be with others, to grieve, and to celebrate. We who love libraries can only protect and future-proof our homeland by holding fast to these ancestral truths.

###

* There were several re-thunkings: space carved out for a men’s room, after the school went co-ed; reorientation of the circulation desk, I believe so it would be adjacent to electrical power; a journals room turned into a classroom; and then the “rezoning” activities on my watch that have replaced periodical indices and thousands of reference books with student seating, event space, and gallery space. But overall, the library even has the same furniture it had in 1958, barring a few office chairs here and there.

Bookmark to:

The over-abundance isn’t so much about raw materials (books, articles, movies, websites, etc.) as the vast and discordant array of vehicles for all this stuff–a world that is also more contradictory, spotty, motile, and “analog” than many think these days.  This isn’t new to librarians; it’s our life. But it’s good to actually walk the walk once more (and outside of the area of library science).

My first intentional “reading” was a viewing last night of the movie Samoan Wedding (known in New Zealand as Sione’s Wedding), which introduced me to the rather slim oeuvre of Samoan New Zealand Bromances (Twitter friends tell me the sequel debuts this very week).

Like most bromances, Samoan Wedding was crude in all directions, but I liked it very much — for a bromance, the women were exceptionally varied, and the story kept us laughing and involved. There were some interesting sartorial moments; I am trying to identify what the men wore to the wedding (lava-lavas?).

We watched Samoan Wedding because it was available through Netflix instant viewing. I queued DVDs for a few more movies I found via these two Wikipedia pages (which in true Wikipedia fashion overlap and contradict one another, and yet are very useful). I put a few more DVDs unavailable through Netflix into my Amazon queue, with a note to self to purchase a region-free player, since the DRM for DVDs is managed through an inexplicable geopolitical system which presents all manner of obstacles to access for honest viewers (and based on the web chatter, little problem for the dishonest).

What I wanted to read first was The Penguin History of New Zealand. I requested the book as a pickup at my local SFPL branch (after paying my fines…), since I see the 2012 edition is due out in February and I am too cheap to buy a waning edition. Meanwhile, I’ll slake my Kiwi Fever by using my Kindle app on my iPad to purchase the Lonely Planet guide while I start digging up books to request via interlibrary loan (I loved the back-and-forth about Lonely Planet vs. Rough Guide — a fine customer debate).

Using WorldCat Local, I have also been browsing contemporary and wartime narratives, both of which I find a window into understanding the world. I see that the closest print copy of New Zealand at War is in… New Zealand, which is also true of New Zealand servicewomen, World War One, and so forth.

I found an interesting title about mariners in World War II — Hell or high water : New Zealand merchant seafarers remember the war — and will buy it for my Kindle app, but it is here I must pause to ask my fellow writers to stop using the phrase “Hell or High Water” in their titles. The fact that copyright law generally does not apply to book titles does not make you any cleverer for forcing searchers to page through piles of identically-titled books (just as I was going to call this post A Fine Bromance until I Googled it–I’m several years late to that party. And yes, my Yogi Berra title isn’t all that clever, either).

At any rate, I’m at that early point in the research process, well before the refinement period, where research is inchoate because I’m not sure of the questions I’m asking. It’s an interesting journey–still quite picaresque for now.

Bookmark to:

I have had some bad habits in my life: being too hard on others and myself; rushing to judgment; piling on too much at once. And that, of course, is just a start. But I’ve also learned some good habits, learned from good people, and they port well to our era:

Be kind to TSA agents. Keep smiling. Say thank you and I’m sorry. Nobody grows up wanting to smell your dirty socks or rummage through your suitcase or be hollered at by snotty first-world businessmen. Make it easier on everyone.

Make airline travel easier. Not long ago I agreed to move so that a mom and kid could be seated together, and the flight attendant comped me my glass of wine because “I didn’t hassle her.” Geepers. I am not a particularly virtuous person, but who wouldn’t let a mom and kid sit together–seriously? If the plane gets stuck, if the baby cries, if the mom and kid need to sit together–this isn’t a 20-year prison sentence, it’s a few hours in your life, and a chance to do the right thing. Do it.

Tip. Tip waiters, and the cabbies, and the hotel maids. Tip the guy who drags your suitcase to lobby and carries it upstairs; tip the room service (above and beyond what’s built in). Go ahead and be a little generous. Note: I probably don’t have to tell you this, because I’ve heard librarians are generous tippers. But unless you really have a reason not to, please give service workers a little extra sugar.

Attend someone’s award ceremony. Anyone’s. I haven’t ever been at any awards ceremony that was over-attended, and even when I don’t really know the people being awarded, I end up crying as if I’m at my best friend’s wedding.

Praise a presenter. ALA is still largely a “stone soup” operation, which is remarkable when you consider that tens of thousands of librarians are stirring that soup-pot. There’s always time for constructive criticism, but if someone does well–especially a junior someone–tweet it, blog it, or just run up to that podium and do a little happy-dance.

Attend the exhibits. Give the vendors some love. Having spent a little time being a vendor, I have huge sympathy and respect for most of those in Vendorland.

Help a colleague. There will come a time sometime during your conference when you can show a little tenderness to a fellow librarian. You will know it when you see it. You will never regret doing the right thing. It could be a little help getting somewhere, or it could be a sit-down at a coffeeshop where you hear whatever is going wrong with their life/marriage/job. As a dear colleague says: “ALA: Come. Bitch. Be Renewed.” They may not be in a place where they want to hear YOU… that’s where karma comes to play. Your turn will come around.

And so commenceth my 20-year anniversary schedule…note: I am interim secretary of GLBTRT, hence the GLBTRT-y focus.

Thursday, January 19, 2012

Fly in.
Presenters’ dinner, 7 p.m.

Friday, January 20, 2012

Academic Library Summit (hosted by Springer Publishing) 10:30 AM to 2:30 PM, Joule Hotel. Note: I’m a panelist, “ROI on Campus (Proving the Library’s Worth Internally,)” 11:30 AM to 12:15 PM
LITA Happy Hour 5:00pm – 8:00pm City Tavern, 1402 Main Street (I’m thinking I’ll be there 6-7, plenty enough time to be “happy”)
Dinner with CLH and LN, 7:30 PM, TBD

Saturday, January 21, 2012

GLBTRT Steering Committee I 8 – 10am SHER – Houston Ballroom B
GLBTRT All-Committees Meeting 10:30 – noon SHER – Majestic 03
(Possible stop-in) GLBTRT Over the Rainbow Committee I 1:00 – 5:00pm SHER – Pearl 1
(Possible stop-in) GLBTRT Rainbow Project Committee I 2:00 – 5:00pm SHER – Trinity 3
LIAL 2011 Dinner 7 – 9 p.m. Location TBD

Sunday, January 22, 2012

SCELC Camino (Navigator Group) 9:30 – 10:30 OCLC Suite
WorldCat Navigator 10:30 – 11:30 OCLC Suite
(Possible stop-in) GLBTRT Rainbow Project Committee II 9:00 – 5pm SHER – Trinity 3
(Possible stop-in) GLBTRT Over the Rainbow Committee II 1:00 – 5pm SHER – Pearl 1
GLBTRT Social 6:00 – 8:00pm Dallas Public Library, 1515 Young Street
Dinner w/Friends, 7:30 p.m.

Monday, January 23, 2012

GLBTRT Steering Committee II 9:30 – 11:30am DCC – C144

Fly out late Monday afternoon

Last thoughts

Looking back… 1992 wasn’t just before smartphones and Google maps. It was before (for all intents and purposes) all forms of immediate communication. When you boarded your shuttle to the airport, you entered a tunnel of disconnect that generally was only broken until your return by family or national emergencies. When you wanted to meet up with someone at the conference, you arranged it in advance, and if that changed, you posted your update to a large message board and hoped for the best.

We have it good these days. I’m not nostalgic about the Olde Analog Tymes. It’s just fascinating to look back on how it was.KjoMSfPQUCA

Bookmark to:

I will be one of the keynoters at the 2012 annual conference of the Library and Information Association of New Zealand Aotearoa (LIANZA). The conference is to be held in Palmerston North, New Zealand.

New Zealand

I am thrilled not only to be speaking at this conference and traveling to a country I’ve never seen, but also to use my best librarian skills to embrace the theme of the conference, which is: Ipukarea: Celebrate, Sustain, Transform.

(I borrowed and reworded the following language from the keynote invitation.)

Ipukarea (from the Māori language – Te Reo Māori) refers to the ancestral homeland, a significant water or land feature which relates to identity and source of livelihood. It is a place that represents New Zealand history and emotional attachment, a place to go to be rejuvenated, a place that represents the hopes and aspirations of the people and the life-giving waters from which they drink.

Within this broad theme there are the following strands:

Manawa: the heart of the community; library as place, physical and virtual

Returning home: holding to core values and principles in a time of change

Telling our stories: celebrating the great things happening in the libraries of New Zealand Aotearoa

Renewing the heart: experiences that refresh, revitalize and refocus

Transformation: embracing and shaping change, moving forward

These are all great themes for a library conference in 2012, and they also represent the strands of my best keynote presentations from the last fifteen years–as well as the renewal I am part of where I work now.

I adore how these themes are both forward-leaning and reflective, and fully positive. The tenor of these themes reminds me of the discussion about Appreciative Enquiry led by Maureen Sullivan at last summer’s LIAL. I am also reminded of the great team I work with–their ability to provide full-on librarianship  unblinkered, unbowed, relentlessly positive, full of good humor–an A-Team all around.

(Sidebar: It would really be all right if I never attended another keynote address where librarians were chided and mocked for their seemingly backward ways.)

I know almost nothing about New Zealand, which is rather convenient, as it means I have no misconceptions. (I do know three things: it is near Australia; there are over 40 varieties of kiwi fruit–not all indigenous to New Zealand; and some of the best hops come from the land of Ipukarea. I hope for on-ground research on the latter two topics.) So January will be devoted to building a bibliography of key readings on the history, geography, and current issues related to New Zealand. Suggestions greatly appreciated. I’m still mulling over the organizational tools I’ll use to manage my research.

One of my other goals for 2012 was to post more frequently. At first I thought “I’ll blog every day!” But then I had a reality check with myself… right, that’s not happening. However, I can establish a weekly deadline for posting where I am with my Ipukarea journey… and, consider that deadline established.

Bookmark to:

Once you have interviewed for a library position, you have established a relationship with that institution and its interview team that stays on your permanent record–yes, the one you were warned about in the first grade. Your paths may never cross again — at least that you are aware of — but you’ve now had an intimate encounter with a number of people who spent an awful lot of time asking themselves if you were the right person for that position.

Perhaps you walked out of the interview and thanked Baby Jeebus you had the common sense not to work for those nut jobs. Perhaps you downed a quart of Rocky Road in a convenience-store parking lot on the way home, just so you’d stop crying, because you knew you blew it.

(Note: herein I break the narrative to state that I have never once believed I nailed the job interview–not ever.)

Perhaps you just had a big ol’ bucket of meh when you walked out of there — nice people, but not a fit for you or for them. Or maybe you immediately had another interview for the AMAZING LIFE-CHANGING JOB, and the other position pales in comparison.

Regardless, do the following:

* Write a thank-you letter, immediately. You can do it by email or you can do it by hand, but write that note and thank the head of the interview team (at minimum) for the opportunity to interview. Yes, even if you think they are all devil-worshippers, or even if you are completely dazzled by that AMAZING LIFE-CHANGING JOB. Write it. Now.

* Exercise patience. Everyone who interviewed you now has to recoup that time to catch up on whatever they didn’t get done during the interview process.

* File away your interview errata where you can tap it later. Like, possibly, decades later. Because they have it on file, too.

* Follow the guidelines for inquiring about the status of the position. You do not have to sit on your hands, but if they say email but don’t phone, then DON’T PHONE.

* Understand that in today’s litigious environment, the interviewer may not want to help you understand where your interview could have been better (I do get asked this question).

* Look for signs of an open door. If the head of the interview committee invites you to apply for future positions, take that at face value. You would be surprised how often interview teams see a quality candidate who isn’t a fit for a particular job and hope they can invite them back someday.

* Sometimes interview teams behave badly. Sometimes paperwork is lost or misdirected. Sometimes major life events interrupt the process. Regardless, under no circumstances should you write the interview team to berate them for not following up. (Yes, I have witnessed this.) If before you were forgotten, now you have made yourself completely unforgettable, and not in a nice way.  If a polite inquiry or two doesn’t do the trick, thank your lucky stars you aren’t working there, and press on.

Bookmark to:

Yes, I Eventually Do Explain The Parrots

Here is a very interesting question others have posed: are libraries that license ebooks through Overdrive violating state patron-privacy laws because Amazon retains user data?

(For context, Sarah Houghton-Jan, who last spring proposed an eBook User’s Bill of Rights, recently taped a video recording her thoughts about the Overdrive-Amazon deal enabling Overdrive books to be checked out on Kindle devices and apps. To save time and  skip over the f-bombs, fast-forward to the 4-minute section, where Sarah talks about the complicated privacy issues.)

Full disclosure: I am a happy Overdrive customer. I do not, unlike Sarah, feel “screwed” by Overdrive. As a customer, I knew (most of) what I was getting into with Overdrive’s Kindle deal with Amazon. I knew in advance that Amazon keeps a fair amount of information about its Kindle book customers. I’m not surprised that they keep this data regardless of how the money goes in the pot – through a direct customer purchase, or an indirect library-purchase transaction.

At the start of the deal, the Overdrive-Amazon deal benefited people who already own Kindles, and presumably librarians don’t nanny the world. But that conversation changes with the first person (or library) who purchases a Kindle in order to check out “free” (to them) library books.

My “what next” thoughts: my take is that this is a prime time for libraries to work with eBook vendors, publishing and library associations, and standards groups to nail in some basic rights for readers AND authors AND publishers. It’s also a good time to review the mishmosh of issues and organizations related to accessibility and eBooks. And finally—and this is a librarian task—we should all look at state patron privacy laws and ask if they provide enough protection and the right protection.

I am setting aside other complaints. There’s a moment during the Kindle eBook check-in where Amazon nudges me to buy a book. Perhaps that should bug me. But I don’t see this as The Man. As a writer, I wouldn’t be offended if after checking out one of the books I’m published in, you then chose to buy it. And that’s because I want people to buy my books (whether through the agency of a library or strictly on their own).  I would be even happier if they actually read them.

Is this a bad thing? As a librarian, I partner with our small university bookstore, which is invited and encouraged to sell books at our readings—the same books available for checkout.  I rejoiced at recent readings when our bookstore manager sold a few copies of a professor’s book—two of them to our library, to fill requests. Isn’t this how it should work?

I see Overdrive as a company brokering a useful but transitional technology for placing current reading in the hands of mobile-technology users, leveraging known processes and practices. Overdrive is quaint—designed around the way fair-use works with print books–but it works for now. When things change, weeding will be a breeze!

However, if Overdrive’s current approach is transitional, eBooks are with us for good. (Am I allowed to again note that I was heckled in the late 1990s when I said the paper-based book would be an anachronism in my lifetime? Oh, and I do want stuff from Overdrive, but that’s another post.)

All of us in the reading ecology need to step back and do some serious rethinking. Some of us already are.  Take a look at Gluejar, where Eric Hellman and other thought leaders are proposing a digitization model for existing books that honors everyone in the process — readers, authors, publishers, and yes, libraries. (Eric’s blog, Go to Hellman, is required reading for all stakeholders in the reading ecology.) But while we’re rethinking, we also need to provide services.

We also need to leave the door open for conversations with data-lovers. The traditional librarian narrative wants me to be outraged, simply outraged that Amazon has all that user data, but in reality, I’m jealous. I’d like to have rich user data. I’d like to understand user behavior better. Frankly, I’m jealous not only as a librarian, but as a writer. Who among us of the writerly tendencies would not like to know more about our readers?  We need to at least acknowledge that this data has tremendous appeal.

I’ve held on to this post because I couldn’t figure out how to conclude it, so I’ll wrap it up with this non sequitur: hey, the wild parrots flew all the way from Telegraph Hill to visit us in the Inner Sunset! I have pics AND a video.

Bookmark to:

Pollyanna

Two years ago today (Sunday, October 30) I started my journey as a library director at Cupcake U (as I sometimes call My Place Of Work).  These first two years have been exhilarating, challenging, growth-inducing, hair-graying, mind-bending, mirth-generating, and never boring. (I’m always surprised when librarians say budgets are boring. There’s nothing boring about money! Yum, yum, money!)

I have the following 15 reflections. Many are not new revelations for me–not in this job, not even in this career. But they are the reflections that resonate with me when I think about where I’ve been since October 30, 2009.

1. It’s worth repeating: it’s my job to stay positive, and to build that point of view in others in and out of the library. Plus staying positive feels good. That doesn’t mean I can’t see or respond to problems; it just means that I intentionally hold at bay what Karen Armstrong calls our “reptilian brain.” My proudest moment was when someone referred to me as “Pollyanna-ish.” Radical optimism? Bring it on!
2. Practicing radical hospitality in a library is spiritually profound. It makes me a better person to constantly ask, how can we serve our users better? How can I go the extra mile for them? How can I surprise them with better service than they expected? How can I grow our extravagant welcome? (That can mean everything from improving the foyer signage to adding a fantastic new service to communicating better to dealing with difficult people and enforcing reasonable guidelines.)
3. I am getting a fresh lesson in the signs of a welcoming organization: people sleep in our chairs, eat at our tables, hang out just to hang out, ask to hold events in our rooms and spaces, joke with us and at us, run into my office to ask if I have any pain reliever (or a pen or a piece of paper or whatever), respond in droves to our surveys, sign up for our Vision Task Force, and above all, use our services. Print circulation — which I had written off as dead, and frankly wasn’t focused on — has tripled from a year ago, with no one single driver responsible. Everything else–walk-in traffic, e-resource usage, event attendance–is growing.
4. With all that, I still have to remind myself that I’m working in a library that has had almost no updates in over 50 years, has a computer lab with 9-year-old PCs, is hot in the summer and cold in the winter, etc. I continually force myself to step back and see the library with the eyes of prospective students or faculty (as well as the eyes of a librarian who has toured countless libraries, often with camera in hand).
5. Building and maintaining relationships is my core library service. I think of it as a bus. I am always asking, who’s on board? Who needs to get on board? Who’s moving toward the door?
6. The buck really does stop here. A stopped sink or a student worker who doesn’t show up is my problem. It may not be something I solve directly, but I own it.
7. Success is never owned; it’s shared among many. It takes a village.
8. Higher education is fascinating. I mean that sincerely. It’s also extremely predictable, and again, I mean that sincerely. You can bet that any time you see a situation or observe conflict between agencies, or note a pattern of behavior in a particular species (Homo Facultus, for example), it’s not even close to sui generis.
9. It is easier to problem-solve around enduring traits than to try to change people. If faculty don’t read email, then make friends with their admin assistants, who do.
10. It is harder but more rewarding to supervise four people (plus sundry interns and whatnot) than 300 people. I have done both (and everything in between). Supervising 300 people really means supervising upper-management. Supervising a small group means I am upper management.
11. I swear on the Gutenberg Bible, if I ever again work in a library large enough to have an admin assistant, I’m going to treat that person like gold.
12. Then again, the right undergrad, trained properly, can do mighty fine copy-cataloging. And yes I do check their work.
13. There’s a world of difference between “no” and “not now.”
14. The question is always what do OUR users need and want. That’s important to keep in mind when assessing the latest trends–not just for adopting new services, but for deciding when to retire, sustain, grow, downsize or even resurrect a service.
15. It feels even better to thank someone, and to praise them, than it does to receive thanks and praise.

This is also the 90-day anniversary of arriving at the Harvard Leadership Institute for Academic Librarians; I’ll have a post about that in a week or two.

Bookmark to: