Public libraries were the original cloud resource, where generations of kids went for books they could not afford to store locally (i.e. buy), and even more than that, for books they would never have known existed if it weren’t for the library shelves. In spite of dire warnings that public libraries would go the way of the giant auroch, if my local branch is anything to go by they are very much alive.
The public library world, says Zeth Lietzau, was an early adopter of the Web 2.0 idea, starting back in 2004. In U.S. Public Libraries and Web 2.0 – What’s Really Happening? (alas, not available free online), he looks at how well they are doing.
The picture is mixed. This should be no surprise. Big public libraries have done a pretty good job of putting their catalogs online (Open Public Access Catalogs, OPACSs, in the jargon of the trade), and some are experimenting with nifty Amazon style user recommendations and reviews. The thousands of small public libraries are lagging. The one Web 2.0 area where they are more competitive is blogs – though too many public library blogs, says the author, have a single entry dated 2006.
In the same issue of Computers in Libraries, Paula Webb and Muriel Nero examine OPACS in the Clouds. Their focus is academic libraries, but the catalog access services they cover, such as LibraryThing, will find a place in public libraries as well. Complete with those nifty bells and whistles, which can do more than just entertain. Especially intriguing is the role of tags in forming ‘folksonomies,’ linkages among topics that grow up from users, connecting ideas in different ways from standard cataloging taxonomies.
As someone who grew up around libraries, and pays a weekly visit to my local branch, it’s good to see public libraries staying on top of the information world.