“The BookMatch program launched quietly about two weeks ago. [This quote is from August 2014 – Ed.] It’s completely free: just fill out the online form telling the nice librarians what you like to read, and they’ll come back to you in about a week with a list of five or six recommendations. You can even specify what type of format you prefer (book, ebook, audiobook, or large print)” (Merlan, Village Voice 2014). In addition to filling the requests, the lists are also anonymously posted on the library’s website, allowing other patrons to browse at their own convenience. Among the topics that already exist are:

• Drama/Suspense
• Historical romance
• Great Gatsby read-alikes
• Father and sons
• All kinds of books/no mushy stuff
• SciFi-Fantasy with strong females and diversity

Since the beginning of this program, the 35 librarians who maintain the website have been inundated with patron requests. This has been a successful launch of a new program, and it may actually prove to be too much for just the 35 librarians to complete each list in under a week if it keeps growing in popularity. This watershed moment of customer service shall work as a tableau for public libraries at large.

I began to think of how this may grow while researching this topic. Many public libraries have more items than books. I’m thinking about music, movies, and even periodicals. This program could increase its scope and therefore its ability to accommodate more patrons. It’s an amazing idea that truly comes from the basics of librarianship and adapting to the current times. Haven’t all librarians at one time or another given recommendations based on one book or movie? This is just taking that customer service to a new and more convenient level for patrons who may be living a hectic lifestyle and don’t have the time to browse the stacks.

This is definitely a program that can work in public libraries all over the world. Thanks, New York; you managed to inspire us once again with your indefatigable efforts at cultural programming!

Works Cited

Merlan, Anna. “A Brooklyn Librarian Will Now Make You a Personalized Reading List, and You Don’t Even Have to Put on Pants.” Village Voice. August 26, 2014.  (accessed September 20, 2014)

The post I’ll Tell You What to Read: Online BookMatch Program Connects Readers to New Books first appeared on Public Libraries Online.

Don’t get me wrong, I like technology. I am not advocating we throw our e-readers out the window! What I am advocating is that we start calling this trend for what it is: merely another new format that has its place, not the be all and end all for the future.

We all know the advantages e-readers have. Sellers have assured this. Mass market advertisers have done their part, now it is time for librarians to share the facts. This has been our role throughout history.

Recently on a national librarian list a discussion arose as to how to incorporate e-readers into story time. Schools are purchasing tablets for all students. I have heard endlessly that students will be doing all their work on electronic devices and, of course, that print is obsolete.

As librarians we know this is not true. We know that this trend is not good for education and literacy. We know that this is not simply ‘our biased opinion,’ but that this is backed by scientific research. We know that print still flies off our shelves. We know that never mind that ‘not everything on the Internet is true,’ not everything IS on the internet, or should be.

And yet, what I hear so often from all parties— librarians included— is that we must embrace the electronics. We must introduce them to our patrons at the earliest age and encourage and support their use. Why? I’m told because it is the future. Join up or get left behind.

To this I say that as long as we follow this false trail, we will make it our future. But what future are we actually making? I would much rather explain to a young mother why I am NOT using an e-reader at story time and don’t encourage her to do so, then try to assure my popularity or function by jumping on a media created bandwagon.

E-readers are great devices. They serve a purpose in our busy world. So do hammers and screwdrivers and instant coffee. We do not abandon screw drivers because we have hammers. We do not stop drinking ground coffee because we now have instant. There is a time and a place for all things. As librarians, it’s time we start to explain the time and place for electronics and that their time and place is not everywhere at all times.

The post A Time and A Place For Everything first appeared on Public Libraries Online.

Spun on the surface as harmless ,the promotional announcement is delicately peppered with subtly positive adjectival poetics like “empower,” “crafted,” “unique,” “opportunity.” What first reads like a pat-on-the-back concession made by Amazon (“you won little guys – we can’t compete with your local touch”) sub-textually can’t help but suggest a more sinister scheme to assert its foot into the door of previously impenetrable outposts. Not least of which is to reach a niche (but loyal) audience who has typically avoided the proprietary megalith in favor of supporting local stores (the “little guy”). The proposal’s eventual goal seems to be to angle that partnership to incrementally steal the customer base and potentially sound the death knell for the store.

Stripped of this subtext, the arrangement sounds simple, and even innocuous, enough. “Amazon’s program offers U.S. retailers two options. As “Booksellers,” an option available to retailers in twenty-four states, they receive Kindles from Amazon at a six-per-cent discount off the suggested retail price and earn a commission of ten per cent on e-book sales in the two years following the sale of a Kindle. As “General Retailers,” available to stores in any state, they profit only from the sale of the device, but obtain it from Amazon at a discount of nine per cent.”

But the thousand sins of Fortunado must not be forgotten. Remember Amazon offering a 5% discount to shoppers who served as price-shopping moles by visiting brick-and-mortar competitors, sending the price to Amazon, then bought it from them instead? Or their cloak-and-dagger supposed attempt at online/offline symbiosis with Borders? Or even the Amazonification of OverDrive—and how it allowed them to get a piece of the library-money pie they might otherwise miss out? Or better yet, maybe OverDrive builds themselves up, Amazon buys them, and inherits their nationwide client base. Stanger hyperboles have come true, and with Amazon there’s a laundry list to be sure. The point is not to confuse simpatico opportunity with aggressively angled risk vs. reward cut-throat business tactics.

Amazon is simply reevaluating the landscape and the food-chain ecosystem minus some of its more recently demised large chain and big box competitors. The bee in their bonnet has always been the independent book stores—those privately owned coffee and curiosity shops that comingle neighborhood niche and artisanal fare with books and electronics. Here, by removing their biggest threat, Amazon realizes they’ve done the little guys a favor. And now that the bigger fish have been fried, they’ve cross haired the indy’s.

Don’t get me wrong, Amazon doesn’t view them as a sling-shot wielding David, or even portend they fear an Indy store invoked “I heard a Fly buzz – when I died” rise-of-the-little-guy scenario.But the effort behind Amazon Source does indicate a humbling admittance (and jealousy) of sorts. Firstly, independents—and community focused organizations in general—offer something that Amazon cannot; a truly personalized and individualized voice, product, and service—reflecting that, in cinematic melodrama parlance, the “rebel alliance” resistance is working. Secondly, the unique, made-from-scratch services translate to Amazon as a financial threat. For a company centered on growth and influence, this serves as a glaring constituency that has proved difficult to obtain. So, in a way, Amazon Source IS a concession or an olive branch, but they stand far more to gain (in terms of ear-bending influence, marketing opportunities, and eventual customer segment severance and acquisition) than indy’s could ever hope.

But if I’ve learned anything from a seeming lifetime of Lifetime movies and definite lifespan of rom-com jiltings, it’s that your best friend was there all the time. (Meet cute take one: enter the Library as Mr. Darcy to independent bookstores’ Bridget Jones—Wait! No he’s dead. Meet cute take two: enter the Library as any role played by Colin Firth, previously played by Bill Pullman. . . ) In this case, a further extrapolation of this subtext spins Amazon’s admission of what they aren’t and why they care so much about sticking their nose into library or local business’ affairs into the real empowerment effected by Amazon Source—the inverse revelation of what we are and WHY it’s so valuable and important. And it should serve, if libraries haven’t already, as an opportunity for libraries and local indy stores to partner and stop looking at each other as competition. Our patrons and customers see us as coexisting and so should we. Book borrowers also tend to be book buyers and vice versa. Accepting this nourishes a true symbiotic relationship where ideas/instances to collaborate—such as providing book sales at a library author event—are mutually beneficial opportunities to strengthen and support community institutions and businesses at the same time.

(Photo by MorBCN on Flickr, Creative Commons license).

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First, I am not in collection development.  Many will probably argue that I do not understand collection development.  They would be correct.  Second, I promise not to write another blog post about e-books until such time as I am involved or at least more knowledgeable with collection development.  Third, my voice matters, because many of our users and funders do not have a great deal of collection development knowledge, and they would likely have strong opinions on the costs associated with e-books if they were widely publicized outside of the library walls.

The Fabian Strategy

An idea based upon the Roman general who was opposed to direct conflict and instead fought battles of attrition, and allowed the opposition to defeat itself rather than a more conventional road to victory.  The term generally has a negative connotation despite its relative success.  The reason for this is the high value of perception.  Believing an individual or entity is defeatist or insufficiently motivated to engage an opponent directly can prove more fatal than even powerful opposition.

E-Books and Libraries’ Fabian Flaw

The wait and see decision by many librarians has not only placed us in an awkward situation with publishers, but it also damages our credibility with our communities.  How will they translate our actions?  That we are no longer gaining a net benefit, but merely redistributing wealth from one segment of the community to the other?  That we can be swayed to meet the needs of for-profit entities?  We will economically support entities that we are not philosophically aligned with?  We are willing to spend more on less content (some of which we do not even own) while espousing that we are not merely repositories?  We have no other way to exist in the current marketplace?

Possible Courses of Action

Promoting efforts such as Unglue.it and Kobo may be important means of supporting library convictions.  ALA’s open letter to the APA was an important step, but does it go far enough?  Sarah Houghton writes poignantly and metaphorically on her blog about the betrayal of e-books.   We cannot inspire our communities if we allow our core principles to be compromised in an attempt to bring them content.  I do not have the answer to the e-book dilemna, but I believe that if we do not have a frank conversation about this content, both internally and with our communities, the power to make any decision on this matter will be wrested from our hands.  I hope you will use this space to build on this conversation, and please feel free to refute what I have said! I look forward to hearing what you have to say.

The post The E-Book Dilemma first appeared on Public Libraries Online.

Mr. Piper talks about hands, how important they are, how reading a regular book allows your mind to wander and real learning to begin.  These things still happen even with electronic books.  Reading isn’t just about the physical experience, about reading the words on a page or feeling the paper underneath your fingers, reading is about mentally and emotionally engaging with an author’s work.  There are many different kinds of reading; reading a comic book or a blog is completely different than reading a novel.  I think what Mr. Piper is forgetting is that reading is an individual experience, and different people will relate to books in different ways.  Would Mr. Piper also say that listening to an audiobook isn’t reading?  While it may not fit the technical definition of reading that most people have, I’d argue that listening to an audiobook is still engaging in the author’s work, so yes, it is reading.

One part of Mr. Piper’s argument talks about how a print book fits in your hand, while an e-reader isn’t as natural.  Well, I actually have found the opposite to be true.  My Kindle has a 7 inch display screen and fits in my hands better than most hardcover books.  I can hold the Kindle with one hand, and maneuver around the cats who like to jump on and off my lap.  Reading on the Kindle is intuitive; swiping my hand across the screen to turn the page reminds me of traditional print books.  I find reading on the Kindle kind of exciting, and a little more accessible then reading a print book.  I can see how children would be especially drawn to using e-readers, and I think that these are a way that we can reach reluctant readers of all ages.  If we as book lovers treat e-book readers as though they are not really reading, how many potential readers are we going to discourage?

Another argument Mr. Piper makes is that it’s easier to tell how much of a print book you’ve read because you can physically see how much is left behind your bookmark.  My Kindle tells me what percentage of the book I’ve finished just by pressing the screen once, so I can easily see how much I have left to read.  Again, it is different than seeing the pages left before me, but the process bar at the bottom still gives me a sense of how much I have left.

I’ve only read a few books on my Kindle, but I am about 36% of the way done with a new one, and I can’t wait to get back on the Kindle and keep reading.

The post Who is really out of touch? first appeared on Public Libraries Online.