Over the past few years a vast range of cloud-based scholarly communication tools have been added to the researcher’s toolkit. How do these personal services align with our duty to curate the scholarly record? How do our professional skills fit into the contemporary research setting?
Read MoreThis post has been published simultaneously on the Digital Library Federation's website.
The title of this post wasn’t simply a lazy grab from IMDb, but a reflection of the wide and stimulating array of presentations, conversations, and networking opportunities available to delegates at CNI Spring 2015. Complete immersion in the program left the participant so full of ideas on the interplay between different facets of information, technology, and libraries, that sleep could readily be foregone.
Read MoreCarnegie Mellon is home to one of the country's finest Schools of Architecture, and I have truly enjoyed opportunities to interact with Faculty and students. It is wonderful to learn more about their understanding of the library as place, and to be inspired by their understanding of design both as users and practitioners. In the past two weeks, I have had opportunities to engage with student groups in some detail, and I wanted to share some of the insights I gathered.
Read MoreA couple of years ago the Education Advisory Board (now known as EAB) released a thoughtful and detailed assessment of the future of libraries. The executive summary read:
Academic libraries are faced with a daunting series of challenges brought on by the digital revolution. In an era when millions of books, articles, images, and videos available instantaneously via the web, libraries across all institutional types are experiencing declining demand for their traditional services, built around the storage and dissemination of physical resources.
What does the report say about the future of libraries and librarians?
Read MoreThe National Science Foundation has issued its long-awaited plans for expanded public access to publications and data emerging from its funded research. I have always argued that open access is, at its heart, about ensuring the widest possible audience for research, much of which has been publicly funded, and for showcasing scholarship at the levels of the individual, the research team, the institution, and the nation. I've never been wholly persuaded that open access is (at least in the short-medium term) going to damage publishers' revenues, nor is it likely to reduce the financial burden on university libraries. But what do publishers think? What do they tell their shareholders?
Read MoreLibraries are remarkable places. They serve as the collective memory of society, indeed of our civilization. They are places of inspiration, of learning, and of opportunity. They offer opportunity for reflection and for interaction - with people, space, and technology. And they offer a destination for knowledge creation - through words on paper and on screen, and through production of digital and physical artifacts in makerspaces.
This blog seeks to explore many of these issues - trying to understand what it means to be a great library in the 21st century. We will consider how libraries find ways of adding value to their parent institution. We will explore how technological, cultural, economic, and policy changes all will impact on the institution of the library, and on the profession of librarianship.
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