Monthly Archives: January 2007

Virtual ALA Washington Office?

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OK, I have to ask, despite some of the amazing “conversation” happening in the biblioblogosphere [as the irony drips from that statement] the past couple of days. Have you all seen this announcement, and what do you think of it?

WASHINGTON – On January 9, 2007, the ALA Washington Office proudly announced the opening of its “virtual office” in the online environment Second Life.

[I will not even begin to try and link to an ALA press announcement. The page display at the ALA site doesn't seem to have proper line breaks and, more importantly, I doubt that link would be good for more than a day or two, if it is even good, period. As a linkable object, that is.]

I first saw the announcement in the weekly email thing that comes from ALA.

I don’t know what I think of it. My initial thoughts are not pleasant ones, though. I don’t have a well-formed opinion of Second Life, to start with. I don’t “get” it. Admittedly, I haven’t experienced it either. I also have no desire to do so. Some year maybe. But my real life is complicated enough, and if I really wanted to pretend to be somebody/something else I’d go back to playing D&D.

On one hand, I am glad that there is a group of librarians who are involved in Second Life. Whether or not many of us ever “get” Second Life, in particular, there is/will be a need for library services to be embedded in many places they are not currently.

But does the ALA Washington Office need to be there? Maybe I don’t know enough about what they do. I see that it was set up in 1945 to serve as a conduit between ALA members and federal legislators on Capitol Hill. Are there that many of our Congress critters hanging out in Second Life? OK, not likely.

I see from this page that there is also an Office for Information Technology Policy (OITP) established in 1995. Sounds more likely. I also see from a blog post of District Dispatch [found from the first page I linked] that it is, in fact, OITP that is involved in this “outreach.”

According to the news releases and the blog post:

At present, you can find the following items in the virtual office:

* An introduction to the Washington Office
* Information on upcoming activities at Midwinter and National Library Legislation Day.
* An interactive computer that will point users to ALA Washington online resources, including the District Dispatch podcast and blog.
* A slideshow of pictures of our office and staff.

OK. I’m still confused. I really do not know what to think. Why?

Is this the kind of thing ALA needed a dues increase for? I really am glad to see some of the things ALA is trying to do. I think they are trying, and that is important. And certainly not everything they do will please everyone. By the way, I voted for the dues increase.

But unless I can figure this one out, or someone can help me understand that this is a good thing I will be thinking long and hard before renewing my membership next year.

Now before some of you come jumping on me, please go read that press announcement or the blog posting and tell me that there is anything at all that explains what they are up to. What is the rationale behind this move? They talk about the things the librarians are doing there, but not word one about why we need to have a “branch” of the ALA Washington Office in Second Life.

I remember some of the debate about the dues increase and one of the main points that people on either side of the issue agreed to was the good work done by the ALA Washington Office. OK. How does this tie-in to that?

My only sensible guess is that there are many prominent techie types from other professions that hang out in Second Life and that this is a way to propagandize them oops, provide outreach to them. Of course, if that is the case then they cannot just come out and say that.

I really would like to see this as a good thing. But I’m fairly certain I don’t.

Any opinions, ideas, etc? By the by, they are asking for feedback on what we would like to see from the Washington Office presence in Second Life. You can leave comments on the blog post [which I hope is a stable, although ugly, link] or at The Shifted Librarian Blog.

Please keep in mind that I am soliciting other opinions to help me form my own. This means that I am actually able to be persuaded one way or the other. That ought to influence your rhetorical style when you provide feedback.

Can something be abstract and not have the property of being abstract?

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First off, people please make sure your blog’s commenting mechanisms actually work. I have been trying to leave a comment on a blog and it keeps telling me that I have to be logged in. There is no login and I have given it every bit of the required info 3 times now!

I just saw a new post at The FRBR Blog about someone else commenting on one of Allan Renear and Yunseon Choi’s presentations at ASIS&T on Inheritance in FRBR [details here at the 1st post on it].

Steve at Circulatable offers some comments on their paper in a post entitled, “Abstractness, FRBR.”

I really should leave it to Allan and Yunseon to reply themselves, and maybe they will. I don’t remember if it is one of their papers or if it only came out in the discussion at ASIS&T, but one of the issues they knew would arise immediately is object-oriented programmers bringing in their idea of inheritance. These two forms of inheritance are not the same. In object-oriented programming it is my understanding that one gets to stipulate inheritance, in philosophy you do not. But those issues are beyond me at the moment.

My question is in relation to this and the other ways you said it above: “A work is an abstract entity” (FRBR document), but that does not mean that Romeo and Julliet the work has the property of abstractness.”

How can something be abstract and not have the property of being abstract? That, to me, seems to be patently wrong.

Anyone else? Can something be abstract and not have the property of being abstract? Or are we all just using different technical languages here? At least in plain English, I think it is an impossibility. It seems to me to be an a priori fact that if something is abstract, then, dangit, it is abstract.

My comments not withstanding, I dropped the Circulatable blog into my aggregator. It is a group blog that looks to be pretty interesting.

A rant and some hopes for the Carnival of the Infosciences

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Note: Talking with one of my wise friends, I was cautioned that maybe some of the complaints from various Carnival hosts about the lack of participation were not “helping the cause,” if you will. Seeing the wisdom in that stance, I took a closer look at what I had already written here. I have decided that it isn’t all that much of a rant and focuses more on what I hope(d) the Carnival can become. If it, in fact, sounds more like a rant to you, then I apologize. My aim is not to shame or belittle. Maybe we as a community are incapable of keeping this going. I, for one, have no choice but to believe differently.

This was my 5th time hosting the Carnival of the Infosciences; four at my previous digs, …the thoughts are broken…, and now one here. I’ve heard people say one should leave a venture when one is on top[, along with other conflicting advice]. Having hosted 5 times puts me on the top (of something, anyway).

Thus, I feel it is time for me to bow out gracefully. At least for a while. I had high hopes for the Carnival from the beginning. At times they were even fulfilled. Greg and Chadwick cannot do this on their own, though. It takes people to write something and then submit it, or for someone to recommend someone else’s content.

Hosting really isn’t very hard at all, except in one case. That case would be when there are no or very few submissions. Submissions are what drive the Carnival; nothing else can. I may have a lot of “library-related” blogs in my feed reader, but there are far more that I do not read.

One of my hopes for the Carnival has always been that it might bring me (and others) good items by librarians of stripes which I (or others) would normally not see. It does this sometimes for me, but not as often as it seems it should. It seems even the fair amount of the biblioblogosphere that I am aware of is highly fragmented from other portions.

Since I am, in a sense, bailing I may have no right (moral or otherwise) to ask others to step up, but I’m going to anyway. Please, folks! Save the Carnival. Only you as individuals can do this. For yourselves and/or for others. As for past hosts (and Greg and Chadwick, of course), I want to give a hearty thank you for your efforts! Feel free to host again if you like and have the time, but maybe you can join me into poking and prodding other folks into hosting for the first time.

All one has to do, hosting or otherwise, is keep this URL for the Carnival wiki handy, and while one is reading whatever blogs you read is to keep a 1/10th (or less) of your perceptual powers [You are a library worker, right? You have perceptual powers!] focused on noticing good writing. Once you decide it is good writing, or good commentary on an important issue, or whatever criteria of good you prefer, check that previous URL and send your recommendation to the next host.

Or, if you said something that you care about for whatever reason, submit it.

We all constitute a smart, intelligent, curious, bunch of library folks with blogs. There are too many of us, and too many areas for any one of us to keep us with all. If a fair number of us, from all walks (and paces) of librarianship, could keep small parts of our perception attuned to the Carnival then we could achieve something approaching a collective collective development for a kind of selective dissemination of information (with the selection being all of the biblioblogosphere). Every two weeks. Now, to me anyway … that is freaking amazing!

Maybe you like that stupid electronic newsletter thing we get from ALA [well, some of us "we"], but I’m pretty certain we can—and do—do better. We could do even better.

Fine. I am an idealist still. Again. Whatever. But no organization could ever do what we as LIS bloggers could do with this Carnival, even if only a handful or two of folks from all the various areas/slices/angles/axes/practices/… hosted and made submissions each week (handfuls from each ‘area,’ that is). But that is the answer, the only answer. Submissions.

If the Carnival is to survive in any form, covering any slice of the biblioblogosphere, then the only answer is submissions. I will certainly keep on the lookout for them.

Submissions for the next Carnival can be made at the contact form at LIS :: Michael Habib.

Carnival of the Infosciences 62

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Wow! It’s been a month since the last Carnival and I am afraid it shows. People seem to have forgotten about this struggling little venture. It also looks like we need hosts for the future. We have one more scheduled after this one, pulling into LIS – Michael Habib in two weeks, but after that there are no hosts scheduled. Please volunteer.

Now, onward to the spectacle that is the 62nd Carnival of the Infosciences

Spinning wheel

Photo is courtesy of my friend, bluebike, and is, I believe, from the Champaign County Fair last year. Thanks for permission. All rights reserved by bluebike.

Our first, and only, submission this week comes from Christina Pikas of Christina’s LIS Rant. Christina wrote “a mini essay on weeding in response to the biblioblogosphere kerfluffle.” She is referring to the assorted responses to one or more articles written about the weeding going on at the Fairfax County Public Library system. So, without further ado, “On Weeding…”

Public libraries, on the other hand, especially branch collections, usually will weed more aggressively. First, the books are handled much more roughly and so can be in much poorer shape. Second, the mission of the library is for the local citizen’s person information needs like health information (should be rigorously and continuously weeded), legal information (should be rigorously and continuously weeded), self-help, hobby related, entertainment, and educational materials for both children and adult learners. Libraries that fail to weed will have out of date and possibly harmful materials. Sections like travel books where there are new copies every year should also be weeded — who wants a restaurant guide from 1999?

Ringmaster’s Picks

Seeing as the only submission is above this line, we will now move into the Ringmaster’s picks. As I said once before:

I’ll consider the chance to construct my own little version of “What did Mark find interesting around the biblioblogosphere …?” as a present from the rest of you all who stop by.

To continue with the theme which Christina is responding to I present two posts, with links to the article(s) that started the issue, or so I believe:

Chadwick Seagraves at InfoSciPhi gives us “Another Uproar over public libraries weeding non-circulating books.”

At these points people like Mr Miller, who actually said some insightful things, step up to pontificate about an issue that they are perhaps not an expert on. It is great to hear these opinions, but they should not drown out the clamour of the librarians who should be explaining and educating his readers that these are the tough choices that libraries face when we lose the financial and adminstrative support of our Boards and governments. They are also a result of our initiatives to adapt to the evolving information seeking and retrieval models so familiar to the average consumer.

Laura Savastinuk at LibraryCrunch on “Serving Your Community.”

As I was taught in library school and as I believe as a practicing librarian, librarians are here to provide information service and access, not to pass judgment on this information or those who seek it. Libraries need to be neutral zones, not a place for librarians to dictate what is worthy information and what is not.

Speaking of serving your community, we’ll move along to the issue of the Maplewood (NJ) Memorial Library closing the doors to their “two buildings on weekdays from 2:45 to 5 p.m., until further notice” due to unruly teenagers. This story has been all around the biblioblogosphere. Feel free to use your favorite engine of search to find more commentary.

Michael Casey at LibraryCrunch gives us “Responding to Teens.” He describes the process at another library which has experienced similar problems, on an even larger scale.

None of this has been easy or inexpensive. Security guards and off-duty police officers cost money, as do extra staff. The time to plan and present teen programs is also not without a cost. But the return on this investment has been remarkable. The numbers of incidents in the branch are down. Customer comments are far more positive and, perhaps most importantly, the community understands and approves of the library’s efforts because the community has been made an integral part of the solution. While it is never possible to please everyone all of the time, the efforts being made in Dacula are showing very real and positive results. I hope other libraries facing such issues can find the resources to address their teen problems without resorting to closing their doors.

He then gives us a follow-up with “Maplewood Continues.”

Another wonderful piece by someone I am doing my utmost to learn from, although I have never met him, comes from T. Scott Plutchak. “What Do you Call “Success”?” comments on a recent Library Journal article by Roy Tennant about the future of academic libraries.

The three challenges that he speaks of are to “reconceptualize the role of the library,” acquire “agile, imaginative staff,” and get our hands on “new tools.” Seems pretty straightforward. But I worry just a bit when he goes on to say that, “In the end, we all came away from this meeting with a profound sense that things must change.” I sure hope that wasn’t new news to any of the participants.

….

We provide the ways and means for people to find entertainment and solace and enlightenment and joy and delight in the intellectual, scientific and creative work of other people. This is what we have always been about. For all those centuries, the way that we could best do that was by creating places and collections — but along the way we lost sight of the fact that those were only tools. We allowed our tools to define us.

For an interesting look at “Euro search” see 3 Quarks Daily on “Countering Google and Anglo-Saxon Cultural Imperialism.” Be sure to click through to the actual Guardian article; the blog post is more of a pointer than real commentary.

Lorcan Dempsey of the eponymously named Lorcan Dempsey’s weblog talks about “Emergent knowledge and intentional data.”

I am prompted to caricature those portentous lines of Eliot from The Rock often raised in library conversation (where is the knowledge we have lost in information, etc). We might well ask ourselves where is the data we have lost in information management, and the knowledge we have forsaken thereby.

Jennifer Macaulay of Life As I Know It asks “Should Tech Support Be An Explicit Library Service?” in response to an earlier post by Laura Cohen. Be sure not to miss the comments.

Ultimately, libraries need to decide whether they will provide technical support to their clientele. I personally think that if we offer technologically-driven services, we should be obligated to provide good, reliable and consistent support for them. Going further, we should not provide any service to patrons that we cannot support. Currently, I don’t think that we are doing a good job of providing technical support – specifically because we are still providing accidental tech support in a rather haphazard and inconsistent manner.

Pegasus Librarian, Iris Jastram, comments on various recent commentary by others on not liking to use their local libraries in “Being a Library User.”

Not all that is old, small, or dark is bad. The trick is figuring out the difference. The challenge is acting on the difference to improve the roles we play in people’s lives.

Christopher Harris at Infomancy has a very interesting post in “Introducing: FISH,” which is about replacing the OPAC.

FISH: Free (as in kittens) Integrated Search Handler.

inkdroid [Ed Summers, thanks to Lorcan Dempsey in the comments] (sorry, I could only find a first name) tells us about OCLC’s Linked Authority file in “identifiers and authority records” and the potential such capabilities could give us.

All in all it’s an impressive mix of technology, standards and practice. It is not entirely clear to me how this work relates to the Virtual International Authority File. Perhaps LAF wasn’t considered a good acronym?

Sebastian Mary at if:book uses “the play’s the thing” to discuss atomization and “the canon.” Be sure to read the comments and go read the post on atomization (and its comments) that prompted it.

So if the canon is this problematic, either adopted or rejected, then what replaces it? Aimless fooling around on messageboards? This atomised culture in which you cannot ever assume that you have any points of reference in common with anyone? Perhaps. Perhaps ’twas ever thus, and the literary canon was a convenient (body of) fiction papering over the cracks.

Well folks, the elephants are getting antsy and are ready to start pulling up the tent stakes. Thank you for visiting the Carnival of the Infosciences #62.

Submissions for the next Carnival can be made at the contact form at LIS :: Michael Habib.

Another successful WordPress upgrade, I think

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I just finished upgrading my blog to WordPress 2.0.6.

I believe that I was fully successful although I had a scary moment when all I got was a blank page for either the blog or the Admin panel. Turns out my FTP client did not upload one of the folders I had told it to. Fixed that and all seems good; or, at least, the blog and Admin panel load now and I am writing this. Hopefully nothing broke elsewhere. Please let me know if it did.

One thing I did not see until after I had upgraded was a small box at the bottom of my Admin panel about broken Feedburner feeds for WP 2.0.6. It seems WP does something to break your Feedburner feed. See this post for details.

This post talks about “resyncing” your feed after applying the fix. I did not see anything at Feedburner about resyncing. What I did, and I hope it’s correct, is click on “Edit Feed Details” (top left of page) and then just click “Save Feed Details.” It responded with “You have successfully updated the feed “Off the Mark”.” So, I am hoping this was correct.

If any of you notice issues with my feed or anything else, please let me know.

Another view of “the naming of things”

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Skilled use of logic, disputation, and the developed ability to name things correctly are some of the instruments philosophy gives us to achieve abiding clear-sightedness and inner tranquility, which is true happiness.

Epictetus. The art of living: the classic manual on virtue, happiness, and effectiveness, a new interpretation by Sharon Lebell. HarperSanFrancisco, 1995, p. 84.

Contra Andrew Bird and Mark. Well, maybe it is more explanatory than contrary to me. Hmmm…. Philosophy, properly applied, is a wonderful thing.

Why, and when, did education become purely instrumental?

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These are, in fact, rhetorical questions. I do have a sketchy answer for them [sketchy in the outlined, sort of questionable sense, not in the highly questionable sense]. But if you want to take a stab at either, or both, feel free; comments are below. My questions are more of the why, as in ought it to be this way?

I have managed to get myself into my usual conundrum. I have found a “topic” that really appeals to me and about which I want to learn as much as I can. Of course, the amount that I want to learn easily eclipses the length of a semester and a seminar paper. My usual course of action is to finally carve out a small portion of my interest, write a paper that only addresses a small part of the subject (after seriously over-researching), and then move on [due to circumstance, not choice]. Well, it seems I am here again.

I was up in one of our departmental libraries getting a book I needed on “meaning in language” the other day when the librarian working (a former classmate) asked me what I needed that book for. When I told them that I was working on a paper that was just too big for a semester because I prefer getting an education versus doing just what’s required, I was told, “But it’s a new year, you could learn to do better.”

Do better? What the heck does that mean? I should change my belief in the value of an education—for its own sake—just to write papers that show I learned … something? Not happening! Do not be mistaken; although I have found myself in this situation, repeatedly, over the last 8+ years, I still manage to get almost all As on my papers. So I seem to be accomplishing the “evaluative” portion of higher ed just fine.

But is higher education, or any education for that matter, only or mostly about the evaluation? Most certainly not! I do agree that evaluation is a necessary evil, in many cases. But evaluation, especially formal, is not the purpose of education.

And for those friends of mine and others who routinely give me crap about getting a PhD, is this just another one of those indicators that you use to tell me that I should be in a PhD program? Of course it is. It’s not like I don’t recognize the things you use about me to make your claims. But before you begin, just stop. PhD students still have to write papers, including one generally very big one. And the PhD is about jumping through even more, often specious hoops, than even a Masters. My problem might not be worse in a PhD program, but it certainly wouldn’t get any better either. I care about learning and using my learning, and not about “proving” it. I will not sacrifice the quality of my education just to learn to write papers for someone else.

This time I may not “just move on,” though. First, I need to get this paper finished for Dr. Palmer—whatever the grade may be. But Wednesday I spoke with my advisor about continuing this work in an independent study this Spring. By doing so, I will certainly not learn everything about this topic; actually several highly complex and interrelated topics. But I hope to learn enough—breadth and depth—to satisfy my “habitually probing generalist” tendencies. Maybe by taking a “big(ger) picture” approach I may even be able to say something useful by bringing together sources and communities that are yet to have the many conversations they need to. [Walt, I swear I am working on my hpg t-shirt design but I need to learn something about text graphics first, and perhaps even find a new program to use. Re: C&I 7 (1), p. 11]

As soon as I get this paper finished (sigh), I will start fleshing out my proposal for my independent study. I have a great start on a reading list, and have already read many of the items at least once. I also have a (for me) fairly detailed vision of what I want to cover.

I have already promised several of you a copy of my paper for Carole and I will (probably) make it available here in full. But let me get it written first. Maybe I’ll only be happy enough with it to give it to those already promised a copy.

What you should really be interested in (if at all), though, is the one I want to write. I hope to get the chance.

Because. I, too, want “lexicographic privileges” (Johnson, 143 and 150). Just kidding. Sort of.

Besides, I already have lexicographic privileges. Directly so at IFSI, and less directly in other areas.

Seriously, what I want is to understand thesauri (and other controlled vocabularies, a bit) both historically and currently, theoretically, experimentally, practically and pragmatically. I want to see a world with embedded controlled vocabularies, most of which would be freely available, and easily accessible via the Web and even when off-line [See Johnson on this. Or JISC Terminology Services. Or OCLC Terminology Services.].

I want to curl up with ANSI/NISO Z39.50-19 2005 Guidelines for the Construction, Format, and Management of Monolingual Controlled Vocabularies. Again. I want to read the multilingual thesaurus standard, along with the British/ISO monolingual and multilingual thesauri standards. I want to read (all of) Lancaster and Aitchison, et. al. I want to put what I’ve seen so far into some sort of coherent whole.

I have no doubt this little offshoot of my interests began long ago and in many ways, but it mainly started in LIS590TC Thesaurus Construction this past summer. My work for our group presentation on interoperability and merging of thesauri really sent me off in this direction. But then I left it (or so I thought) as another semester began. Many of these ideas came up again—directly or indirectly—in LIS590CS Seminar in Classification Systems, and I am now incorporating some of them into my paper for LIS590TR Information Transfer and Collaboration in Science.

Overall, I am highly interested in “classificatory structures,” be they controlled vocabularies, authority control, classification systems, and so on. I am particularly interested in the structures we will use to organize, implement and use these various classificatory structures [See for example: ADL Thesaurus Protocol].

In Spring, I will be taking LIS590ON Ontologies in the Humanities and LIS590RO Representing and Organizing information Resources, along with whatever independent study I work out. Ontologies will give me a foot in the door with other controlled vocabularies, and may go a long way to addressing what I see as the main (theoretical) limitation of thesauri. Representing and Organizing will allow me to continue my work in most any way I desire. Seeing as my advisor is the professor for RO, and that she is big on students being able to integrate coursework into other studies in the same semester or on a continuing basis, and that she seems excited about my desire to do this, I imagine I might well be focusing some of my RO efforts on this topic also.

Will this turn into my CAS project? I don’t know. At the moment, I kind of hope not. As I have said before, and as vastly intriguing as this topic is to me, I am pretty sure this is a lot like looking over the cliff with one leg dangling in space. But if I were to change my mind, I would certainly be well on my way to doing something “useful” and interesting for my project.

Johnson, Eric H., “Distributed Thesaurus Web Services.” In The Thesaurus: Review, Renaissance, and Revision. Sandra K. Roe and Alan R. Thomas, eds. Binghamton, NY: Haworth Information Press, 2004, pp. 121-153. Or: Cataloging & Classification Quarterly, 37 (3/4), 2004, pp. 121-153.

Me, an aristocrat? Or 2

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Found at LibraryTavern

My Peculiar Aristocratic Title is:
The Very Reverend Mark the Profuse of Nether Wombleshire
Get your Peculiar Aristocratic Title

Or:

My Peculiar Aristocratic Title is:
Count-Palatine Mark the Nimble of Greater Sodbury
Get your Peculiar Aristocratic Title

Take your pick!

I kind of like them both. Me a Reverend; now that is funny! But I’ll happily take “the Profuse.” As for “Count-Palatine,” well, I’ve lived in the Palatinate twice now, and my son was born there. I practically deserve to be a Count-Palatinate. Look at all the cool toys one would get to play with. And the dress clothes are far better than any interview suit and tie get-up. One’s kitchen might even come with flowery pots and pans; what more could a nimble knight of the Palatinate desire?

Let the reading of 2007 begin…

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I only have a moment as it’s time to relax before bed. I’ve been studiously busy researching for my paper on the use of multiple conceptual thesauri by interdisciplinary scientists [and yes, I'm being intentionally vague].

I have probably read, or re-read, somewhere around 8-9 articles in the last 2 days. And a dozen more in the last days of 2006. More to go, too. And some books to probe….

I’m going in to see my advisor tomorrow and have emailed Dr. Palmer, too, to see if she is around to help me focus my paper a bit. I just need to catch up with Kathryn, but also talk about an independent study for Spring, which is rapidly approaching. I also want to talk to her about my paper for Dr. Palmer. With what I’m seeing at the moment, I could continue my work on this paper for a few more hours and maybe actually say something, besides learning a massive amount more. But this paper comes first.

Regarding the post title, or motivation therefor, last night I began reading Foucault – The Archaeology of Knowledge & The Discourse on Language. I only got about 15 pages, but it’s a start. I also continued reading Epictetus’ The Art of Living yesterday.

So, I seem to be off to a good start in my reading for 2007. I just hope I’m able to process some of this….

Some caveats to “It’s not just the OPACS that suck” by Meredith

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I want to add a few comments and, perhaps, caveats to Meredith’s use of the bookstore as an analogy in her post, “It’s not just the OPACs that suck.” I want to emphasize that I generally agree with Meredith here. I do not think she crossed any lines that shouldn’t be crossed. But we see this analogy, and others, frequently in our field, and I’d like to add some cautions against them and perhaps start a conversation.

A few days ago I was in Borders trying to spend money when I remembered a book I need for 590RO this Spring. I headed to the computer section and browsed around. No luck. I found one of those kiosks and looked it up. Yep, it was in Computers, in fact, Computers–History and blah, blah and it was in stock. So I head back to Computers and look all over for –History and blah, blah; finally finding the section. [The arrangement of the subdivisions of Computers makes absolutely no apparent sense, to me, nor most of the rest of the store(s).] The book is not there.

So what book was I looking for? Ambient Findability. These sorts of little ironies amuse me to absolutely no end.

As a counter possibility to Meredith’s use of bookstores as example, [fn1] …

I find browsing in a library, at least as good, and probably better than browsing in a bookstore. I can suss out a fair amount of Dewey or LC, but not, it seems, Bookstore. I rarely am able to find anything I am looking for in a bookstore (talking big chain stores here). Their categories are practically meaningless to me; ever had the misfortune of looking for philosophy in a modern, mega-bookstore? Better be prepared to wade through New Age and “Eastern” philosophy crap. [For any Islamists, or otherwise out there, I do not mean to in any way to disparage non-Western philosophy, only the big bookstore's categorizations of these topics. Kind of like placing rap music in R&B.]

I almost always just browse in a bookstore. If I must find something specific then I’ll try looking in the places I think it belongs, then I’ll find one of those kiosks to look it up and verify if it is in stock (because just like if it is checked out at the library, if not in stock it can’t be found via browsing) and in which section. After that, if I’m still having troubles (and still want the book) I’ll ask a salesperson. I forewent the salesperson in looking for Ambient Findability because the price looked to be quite a bit higher than Amazon (and I was right).

So, while we have a lot to learn from bookstores and their arrangements of items and space, they are in a completely different business than us. The bookstore is one example that is often used in analogies to libraries, and it does have its place as such. But, often completely glossed over is the vast differences between libraries and bookstores, especially in the context of the 21st century consumer.

Bookstores are in the business of selling products, and some services, but those services are all primarily geared towards selling more products. Libraries sell nothing. I know, I know. Many of you, especially the more market-based among you, will argue that libraries are selling something(s). To the extent that image and tax-supported services are selling, then fine. But there are vast, and often quite subtle, differences between what and how libraries and bookstores fulfill their respective roles in society. Honestly, there is very little overlap.

And for anyone who wants to argue that we should go with “Bookstore Classification” for arranging our materials, please, please, please go have a look at the BISAC Subject Headings. [I am not implying that Meredith said this. She didn't.]

Sure. They are fairly intuitive. And they also have absolutely no depth. Here, for instance, is the Philosophy “schedule.” Now, I would love to see this much differentiation in philosophy at a bookstore. But is it going to be good enough for a library with anything over, say, 500 books on philosophy? Not at all, especially if most are from only one or two sub-categories.

I am not saying we shouldn’t use the ONIX metadata with either the BIC or BISAC subject headings, but we certainly cannot (currently) rely on it to do much for us. See the final report from the CC:DA Task Force on ONIX International.

As for interior space in bookstores: “Those bookstores have done serious research on user behavior, browsing behavior, etc. and have designed their spaces accordingly” (Meredith). Maybe they have paid a fortune for these things, but one point from above and a caveat from below.

The layout of bookstores may comport to some idea of consumer behavior and browsing in that situation. But I would maintain that those behaviors are different in bookstores and libraries. And yes, empirical data could prove me right or wrong. They may only be slightly different or the behaviors themselves may not be different, but the underlying motivations and decision-making are. I would also argue that it is a difference that in the end makes a difference. Or at least, should.

If the behavior and decision-making by the user in a public library and the behavior and decision-making of (the same) consumer in a bookstore are exactly the same, please let me know folks so I can leave our discipline now. If our society is to the point where these two vastly different processes are exactly the same transactions in the mind of most of the public, then there is little good I can do for anyone in this profession. Or, it becomes even more elite than it ever has been. And while I can easily drift into a form of elitism, my more democratic tendencies rail against it.

My shopping experiences seem to often be vastly different than those of many folks who turn to other product/service suppliers as shining examples of how to do things better in our libraries. While there often are analogies to be made, I think they need to be far better qualified and some actual analysis provided before they are used to support what we in libraries should do, except as a point of departure and something to consider. But as soon as we seriously start considering them as examples for emulation then we need some serious, and subtle, questions answered. This then is my caveat, how well do I provide any sort of counterexample to these ways of thinking? Am I that much of an outlier in my society? How many other people experience these things in the same way as I do? Or in some way different than the expensive studies show and different from me? How big are the differences? What about the differences between users and non-users? Ad infinitum.

I do like bookstores. Mostly because I like books. But, for me, shopping in a brick-and-mortar big box bookstore is not a pleasant shopping experience. Those tables of new paperbacks, etc. are generally just in my way. There is, to me, very little order except of the most general sort. Maybe I’m lucky that I am rarely looking for something that would be on one of those tables; I’d never find it. Now I do, in fact, browse these tables sometimes. But at best it is a sort of scanning process that picks out an interesting looking cover or perhaps title, if I am even processing words.

On another note, and again I do not mean to argue with Meredith but only add some nuance to the discussion, not all bookstore employees are kind, have smiles on their face, are easy to locate, etc. There are a lot of people in customer-service oriented jobs who have no business being in them. But, again, Meredith’s point about libraries being personally welcoming is well taken. I have worked with some of those folks, and they can have a massive impact on our users. Many are actually great people, but do not radiate warmth and, in fact, radiate the opposite. Some just are not nice people. They do need to be dealt with in some manner. But these people are pretty much everywhere in society, and my consumer activities are filled with them.

So, while I do think Meredith’s use of the bookstore analogy is warranted in her use, I also caution that it is limited in its application and generalizability. I also want to caution that this analogy, which is so easy to fall into, is a very seductive one, but one that is dangerous and far more subtle that most seem to appreciate.

And when Ambient Findability is ambiently unfindable, well, I find that darkly humorous to no end.

[fn1] Meredith made a proper use of her analogy, one which I support. I have no argument or disagreement with her use. I merely want to point out the model being used as a comparison is not flawless either. At least, not for everyone. Of which I have no doubt that Meredith would fully agree. Also. To hold myself up as some sort of counterexample is silly in my opinion. I consider myself to be an outlier, in so many ways, but generally not a counterexample. To hold me up as an example of a norm of human behavior is quite possibly a waste of time and effort. But then none of us want to be a complete outsider all of the time, either.