Eric Lease Morgan wrote:
|Despite some of the following comments, I still believe we need to
|think harder about collections when it comes to this "'next
|generation' library thing":
|
| * Why "collect"? Don't you mean "provide access to" or
| "provide records that link to"? --Dan Lester
|
| * To me the question is not "what's in it?" but "what does it
| connect to?" and "what are it's services?" --Karen Coyle
I think there's always a "collection" involved. The real question, I
think, is who owns it? Does the local library own all or some of it, or
do one or more remote sites own part or all of it (e.g., the fully
digital library)? The "services" attitude is, I think, directly
influenced by the "rental" attitude of today's consumers. For example,
I *own* my personal DVD collection; many/most other people *rent* their
DVDs. Either way, you pay, and there is the ability to view the DVDs.
However, down the road, as "older" and less-used content is removed from
the market, the renters can no longer view some DVDs that they used to
because they are no longer available; on the other hand, since I
personally own them, I *can* still view them. Thus, the renters "pay"
again in that access is no longer available to particular content. This
is the part related to collections and services that I have not yet
heard here: there is increasing risk related to access as we become more
and more dependent on online digital content. Conservation and
preservation of digital content for the future becomes virtually
impossible because the content is owned and controlled by others (mostly
with commercial interests) and is governed by the DMCA. If content is
withdrawn or available only at exhorbitant costs, where do libraries
stand and what have we gained with an emphasis on electronic access,
which is tenuous at best because it is out of our control. Anyway, just
some more food for thought...
Harvey
--
===========================================
Harvey E. Hahn, Manager, Technical Services Department
Arlington Heights (Illinois) Memorial Library
847/506-2644 - FX: 847/506-2650 - Email: hhahn(at)ahml(dot)info
OML & Scripts web pages: http://www.ahml.info/oml/
Personal web pages: http://users.anet.com/~packrat
Received on Mon Mar 19 2007 - 11:20:53 EDT