So many times we hear that library catalogs fail in the imagined popularity contest against Google or Amazon.com. We are encouraged to believe that is explained by their greater comprehensiveness or superiority as discovery tools.
Please take a moment to question those assumptions. What obvious differences exist between library catalogs and those systems some would have us emulate? One significant difference may lie in the outcomes of searches in those tools. Searchers in Google are usually rewarded by being able to get what they find immediately with a click of the mouse. Searchers in Amazon.com are able to order online immediately and sit back and wait for the book to arrive. Searchers in catalogs in some cases are able to get what they find immediately online, but more often they have to get up out of their chairs and go to a shelf somewhere and take down a book. Users, unlike some librarians, may not be so obsessed with discovery but want to actually get the information resource they need as easily as possible.
Could it be that we would satisfy users better with easy services to deliver the book to the user? I suspect that might greatly increase the popularity of a library's catalog. I think some libraries may offer such services, probably fee-based. Has anyone yet compared user assessments of their catalogs with similar ones not doing so?
Even with online resources, libraries often require repeated logins by users before actual access. As a user I have found this quite frustrating and discouraging and admit sometimes I have just given up.
Some comments from Karen Calhoun at ALA Midwinter about OCLC's user studies led me to greater awareness of the importance of obtaining resources to users. "Obtain" is, after all, one of the four FRBR user tasks that have been clearly identified along with find, select and identify. I understand that publication of that research should occur in the near future.
Better catalogs will be great, and I encourage everyone to keep working on them. Can we also improve the situation of helping users "Get It" more easily?
Thanks and have a great day,
Jimmie
Received on Tue Feb 17 2009 - 09:10:56 EST