Collection Development for My Random Life.

Another article in last week’s Economist caught my eye from their Technology Quarterly. We have all by now heard of open source software where users can tweak the open code to make it better, more functional, and even create new products all together. The article in the Economist was about open hardware where the specs for various products such as phones and various other consumer electronics products are available for customers to tweak, redesign, and make better. I think the concept is readily summed up by this quote from the guy behind Chumby (which is really awesome by the way and I want one really bad).

“The community makes suggestions and shares hacks. And we don’t try to sue our innovators. We make heroes of them.”

You can view the article here.

This idea of open hardware got me thinking of libraries (of course). The whole concept of an open library… an open work… which I have talked about before, in that a library can be interpreted and reinterpreted, even changed by patrons. Since patrons are our primary service audience shouldn’t we be soliciting their input as to what a library should be from the online catalog, to the furniture, to what we collect?  If a library were open, flexible, able to change, and react (as well as be proactive) to patron needs, would this make libraries more relevant?  Think about such things as LibraryThing which is customizable, or a Kindle where patrons could decide the collections it held, if it were possible wouldn’t it be great to customize your library experience to fit your needs as well as have input into its overall design and function? I wonder what libraries would look like?

The Unshelved comic strip is running a theme that is something similar, check it out here. I particularly like this one.

I don’t know, this is all pie-in-the-sky theorizing.

The Open Work Library blog is on hiatus until the New Year (2008). In the meantime, keep reading and thinking… it will do you good.

Smexting v. Texting while smoking, often outside a bar. The phenomenon is being spurred by smoking bans, most recently in the UK. The British mobile carrier Orange reported a surge in texting when the ban went into effect, but the company claims that people were smexting friends who might help them to quit. What are they smoking? — From Jargon Watch in WIRED

I find it interesting a possible unintended consequence of banning smoking was a rise in text messaging. I wonder what unintended consequences occur in libraries based on library actions, policies, or services.

Possible examples?

• Quiet Study Floors = More patrons sleeping in the library?
• Faster Internet Access = More computer squatting?
• Classrooms in the library= Higher library use in courses which meet in the library?
• Word Processing Software = More citation questions at the reference desk?
• Coffee shops in the library = Louder libraries?

Those are just some possible small things that may (or may not) be occuring. I wonder if there are some bigger relationships which I am not thinking of.

Any thoughts?

WIRED – Jargon Watch Issue 15.11: http://www.wired.com/culture/culturereviews/magazine/15-11/st_jw