Library user behaviour and co-operative differences across state borders

As ever, opinions expressed here are entirely my own. This goes for anything in this blog, but it's worth reiterating today.

Once upon a time, a reference inquiry was a rarity in my library life. And when I went on a road trip, I could stop over for another CD just about anywhere without consideration of whether I'd stop in that town again.

Adelaide and Melbourne have very different public library behaviours and internal environments - from the little things all the way up. I've had a lot of time to observe and think on these and write down scraps of what I might say. Instead of writing a tome of minutiae I've decided to focus on two observations - customer usage patterns and inter-library co-operation. The implications of different funding models, particularly the long-term influences, are a third topic that might be worthy of future investigation but I don't feel that I am well enough informed to tackle that subject at present.

But first, some context

My public library experience has been in three library services, and these shape my observations. The first was a large suburban Adelaide library service with five branches (currently four), a range from wealthy to extreme economic disadvantage and incredible cultural diversity. The second was just outside of Adelaide, a town with two library branches, one of which was full-time, which also served a lot of visitors from nearby regional areas. The third, in Melbourne, is a large five-branch service in an area that's predominantly very wealthy.

As a serial visitor-of-many-libraries, I believe these two observations hold at least broadly true, if not universally.

On reference inquiry frequency

In Melbourne, library users understand that the staff are there to help navigate and pinpoint resources and make use of this opportunity.

Freshly arrived in Melbourne, during my first week in training, I was amazed how many reference inquiries I responded to. In Adelaide I did respond to reference inquiries, mostly local history and family history, but they were far fewer in number. Readers' advisory questions had been even rarer and I had begun to question the relevance of training in this, but now I receive several each day. Having always loved this part of the job, I am very happy! The only noticeable downturn I've observed since moving is in providing general purpose support in computer and device use outside of supporting library-specific systems and resources. In both services I worked in during my time in Adelaide libraries these were common, general website, email and word processing inquiries being particularly frequent - now inquires rarely stray outside of e-books, WiFi login and printing.

The reasons for this aren't immediately obvious, I can see the effects of differing user attitudes but the core eludes me yet. I have inklings, but nothing I can make a statement about.

Whilst I continue to observe and try to understand what makes library users in Melbourne more aware of the professional service capacity of libraries I'd be grateful to anyone who can share their own insights.

Strength in numbers

Adelaide's - and indeed all of South Australia's - libraries are recognised for their co-operation by way of the achievements of One Card / OneLMS / PLSA consortium, something I'm asked about often. Their co-operation, however, is much older and deeper. The systems providing public Internet and WiFi are shared rather than operated by each individual service and have been for years. I could visit any public library with my SA library card and log in to WiFi with the same login and no re-registration even before One Card, though that has substantially streamlined the experience. A system less visible to the public, P2, whilst no longer doing everything it was once built for, still offers state-wide consortium buying of collection materials so that even the smallest libraries are able to leverage some of the opportunities of a large buyer. Cross-promotion between library services at both staff and customer levels is quite commonplace.

Melbourne is different - the library services have a powerful individualist streak - there's the capacity to search across all public library catalogues and for customers to initiate inter library loans thorough Library Link Victoria  but asides this the co-operation I see is with other types of organisations - community centres, interest groups and other council or government bodies. Whilst there is interest and talk between library services about doing things differently, they don't seem to have gone terribly far with a myriad of reasons given - though I must add a caveat there, I'm further from such things than I once was so might be missing a lot. It will be interesting to see how co-operative efforts change over the next few years as other examples from around the country continue to appear.

Both Melbourne and Adelaide have very strong professional interactions (though in Melbourne this is more structured with many more events and the number of people involved vastly higher) - librarians talk to each other, share ideas and values but in Adelaide this has led to more joint efforts.

I believe that the difference in past and present funding models for the libraries in each city have played a substantial role in shaping the co-operative differences, however as previously stated, I don't currently feel well enough informed to analyse this with any confidence.

Lastly

There is greater difference between the libraries in Adelaide and Melbourne than I expected - I knew before I arrived that differences of scale would be substantial, in the city-wide sense if not in every branch I visit. Through Twitter I had become well acquainted with several librarians in Melbourne and noticed professional attitudes were similar in each cities and so expected it to continue into the working reality.

The various environments - particularly the historical environment - are what I presume to be the driver of difference. I suspect that funding challenges of the past are especially significant to co-operative differences. The user behaviour differences are harder to understand - it appears more fundamental than a short-term publicity effect.

Most of all I see that each city's librarians have a great deal to learn from each other yet, and that moving from an area of familiarity to another geographically removed from my roots has been a professionally valuable decision

If you'd like to discuss these differences, or others, I'd welcome it either in the comments or via Twitter.

Letters of Note,Copyfight and cultural heritage

One book at a time has never been my style. I feel as if it should be, that it'd be good for focus and so on, but recently I had the good fortune to be reading Letters of note and Copyfight whilst the #cooking forcopyright campaign was in full swing. They complimented each other beautifully.

A quick aside, as I'm discussing matters of law here, I want to point out that I have not studied law and am not a copyright subject expert. Except where stated, opinions here are my own, derived from earlier experiences, reading Copyfight and materials connected to the Cooking for Copyright campaign.

Letters of Note is a collection of correspondence compiled by Shaun Usher, based on the blog of the same name. It's a wonderful book full of insights to popular and historically significant people and times, giving them the human touch a brief encyclopedic article can't. Among my many favourites are the letter from 11-year-old girl who wrote to Abraham Lincoln to suggest that he grow a beard, Tim Schafer's text adventure covering letter to a job application and Kurt Vonnegut's letter to the head of a school board that consigned a class set of his books to their furnace. The letters can be beautiful, funny, shocking and emotional. Presenting primary sources with brief explanations and transcriptions or translations as needed is powerful. It also contains a double page of tiny type with acknowledgements, permissions and copyright statements, a fact I'll return to later. I will also come back to the wonderful Australian inclusion, To a Top Scientist which can also be found on the Letters of Note blog. As I write this a second volume is currently available for pre-order and I am keen to discover what it contains.

Copyfight, edited by Phillipa McGuinness, is a collection of various discussions and arguments around Australian copyright as it stands in mid-2015, a far more interesting and convoluted topic than might be expected. It doesn't look good for copyright now - and I'm unconvinced copyright in Australia has a "good old days". Copyright is perpetually lagging behind developments in technology and culture. The possibilities brought on by the Internet are among the latest of many rounds, once it was music recordings in wax that caused a shake-up.  Unsurprisingly, quite a few of the articles in Copyfight focus on the elephant in the room, copyright owners vs. piracy, which I have no intention of discussing here. Many avoid that headline-grabbing political football of a topic and look at other issues. These make it clear that copyright reform is needed for many reasons beyond the aforementioned elephant. Copyright should encourage creation and balance the interests of creators, investors, consumers (individually) and the general public. I'm not convinced it does that nearly as well as it should.

A number of problems stood out as I read Copyfight. One was lack of fair use provisions, fair dealing does not cut it and probably never did. Several articles in this book explain some of the reasons for this, especially those by Angela Bowne and Dan Ilic. It's likely I've technically breached this many times without doing anything the reasonable person would consider unfair, I might even have done it in this post.  There's another problem in copyright length  - while authors and investors need the right to profit from their work, I see the extension from 50 to 70 years after death of the creator as stinking of protection of multinational corporate interests that are disconnected from original creators and encouragement of new creative works. Justin Heazlewood and Lindy Morrison show  that performers' copyright offers poor protection to individual artists and smaller copyright owners, especially when crossing national borders. Felicity Fenner shows that copyright for visual arts is ambiguous and inadequate. The public inaccessibility of data and reports from publicly funded research in publicly funded institutions is another issue that is explained in detail by Hannah Forsyth. This is just a sampling of the issues.

Copyfight unearths some of the complications reforms must deal with -  our laws exist in an international environment which is affected by treaties, trade agreements and international relations in a world where not all sizeable markets apply the principles of the Berne Convention. Any such reforms would then have to survive meeting the courts.

It's the copyright status of unpublished works that draws this all together. Tim Sherratt's article in Copyfight explores some of the ways that TROVE has been used to explore and understand Australia's cultural heritage through digitisation of newspapers and magazines and the impact this has had - and why most of it stops in 1954 and how even that is in risky copyright territory. Alongside these newspapers, Australian libraries and archives contain a wealth of unpublished resources - letters, photographs, diaries and more that could expand our cultural understanding if made available digitally. The Australian National Library alone contains over two million unpublished works (source, p. 50). At present, under Australian law the copyright on unpublished works never expires. ALIA's FAIR initiative provides an explanation, references and resources. Ownership of this never-ending copyright may be unclear or spectacularly difficult to determine - and there is no exception for orphan works. The holding institution may have some ability to use them, but it is unclear as to whether mass digitisation is covered (source).

Once I found several old annotated photographs in a donation to a library I was working in. The donor did not want them returned or destroyed, and the photographs, while insightful, were not of local relevance. As an alternative, I looked into donating them to the local or state library whose collection parameters they fit. The state library was interested, but wanted a donation form filled out which, amongst other things, requested that I assign copyright to them - it was not mine to give. There is no way to know whose copyright it was as the donor was not the photographer and the items did not give clues. Consequently, if the receiving library chose to keep those items their usefulness would be severely limited.

The pages acknowledging sources and copyright in Letters of Note may be sufficient for that publication, but determining and finding the copyright owners of works in Australian collections would be a greater barrier. Taking the risk that TROVE has in releasing material of uncertain copyright status might not be acceptable to a smaller institution, commercial publisher or private individual. Where copyright owners are living, such as To a Top Scientist in Letters of Note, permission might be reasonably achievable. Some copyright owners would be easy to trace. Many would not, an example given by FAIR is of a letter and recipe sent to a radio presenter where there is a theory as to the author's identity, but no certainty.

So whilst I found the reading of Letters of Note enlightening and wondered what an Australian version of this might teach, I am not likely to find out while our copyright laws remain as they are. Bring on the change.

2013 photo challenge week 4

Some memories, some gardening and some catching up with this project...

19 - A photo for the 19th didn't really work out, so instead I have this comic from Brother Sebastian by Chon Day. It was published in the 1950s, and one of the books on my Nanna's bookshelf in the alcove under the stairs. We grandkids could freely choose from this bookshelf whatever we wanted to read when visiting. There were few children's books, though I do recall one of those books that will put in custom names done with Nanna and her friends - a particularly gruesome Readers Digest book of dangerous animals was one of the favourites, as was this one. While the books from that shelf have now gone many different ways I still have this one and the memories.

20 - Chilis, growing in my garden. Back in November the bush was a tiny seedling in a jam-jar on the trading table at The Breakfast Rave. Now it's closing in on half a metre in height and covered in chilis, the longest of which has reached 12cm-ish in length. I have no idea what the variety, how firey they will be or how long they'll take to ripen so this will be a bit of an adventure. This isn't the photo I took on the 20th, when viewed on a better screen it proved to be horribly fuzzed. If you're desperate to see that it's on my Instagram account. Many of the photos for this project go up there on the day.

21 - Rose variety - Hannah Gordon (a floribunda variety). Before Christmas both of my rose bushes were in a bad way - signs of spider mites, black spot and general stress. They weren't flowering. This one was far worse than the other, and I was afraid I'd lose it - they are special to me as they remind me of several family members living and gone who have an amazing way with roses. Thankfully with treatment, movement to a different spot with less heat bouncing off the wall, pruning and fertiliser they both recovered and are now thriving. This one's covered with flowers, and such pretty flowers they are. I'll no doubt tell you about the other later.

22 - Most weeks I drop by the library to pick up holds, browse and say hello. It's usually the library in Gawler, as it was this week, but sometimes I go further afield. I particularly like the Adelaide City branch in Rundle Mall. I am so glad I have this opportunity. It brightens a day and I would not be able to read so much without libraries.

23 - I go walking in Dead Man's Pass quite often. I'm Fortunate to have such a wonderful park nearby. It's full of birds, peaceful and has plenty space for walking and cycling. Clicking on the photo should display it full size.

 

24 - Amazing day. I had my first ever ride in a limo and went to the Doctor Who Symphonic Spectacular. The entire evening (a Christmas gift) was wonderful, great experiences throughout and immersion in wonderful live music (with added monsters). I couldn't stop smiling, the weeping angel told me off for it, but I'm not apologising for having a good time! The third photo (taken while people were still arriving) was the one I planned to use for the day but I just had to put the other two in... 

25 - A morning spending quality time with a kitten, but there were errands to run so despite the sleeping kitten in my lap I headed into town. The final stage of the Tour Down Under was on - I hadn't realised but managed to catch the first few laps and have my errands done in time to see the last few and the presentation. Another great day!

P.S. I'm a shade behind because of reasons. Catching up ASAP!

Learning to Sketchnote

I've been seeing people's sketchnotes and hand-drawn infographics around the Internet for a while - I'd pretty much discounted doing this myself as my drawing ability is, if charitably spoken about, under-developed. Recently I've seen a few people developing their own skills in graphic note taking, one example being Kim Tairi, this being one of her more recent sketchnotes

Tx @kerrirusnak loved your talk #leadership #resonated #darefest filling my cup with #mojo #sketchnote #mystory pic.twitter.com/TYhdo1c72Y
— girl with fox tattoo (@kimtairi) October 27, 2014

While I'm between jobs I want to learn some new skills and keep on learning so this seemed like a good thing to try. I've had some small art sketch books about my house for quite a while and a lovely set of coloured fineliner pens so I picked them up and had a go.

I was surprised at how well they came out even if they're very, very basic. I didn't start by noting speeches, I started by making graphic notes and diagrams as a thought process to get me through a couple of situations that I was finding stressful. I found it a very good way of getting my mind through the situations.

Since then I've borrowed, on recommendation, The Sketchnote Handbook which I'll have to revisit from time to time. I've been using TED talks as practice and so far the notes below for Brewster Kahle's speech a free digital library is the one I'm most pleased with. Several others have had elements I've liked - headers or specific sections - but this one came together well with just the right amount of space to note the whole thing without leaving large blank areas.

There us space for improvement - the structured could use work, I'd like more typographical variation and I am not sure the emphasis always falls where I want it to but on the whole I'm pleased. I'm going to practice this more, both specific elements and actually producing finished pages - I'm gaining a skill and along the way learning quite a bit from the talks.

I might not be producing some of the wonders visible on Sketchnote Army but I'm very pleased with my progress.

Night Vale Public Library Card - DIY

I was working on a creative idea... but another distracted me.

If you were to use the image with a barcode generator and the graphics program of your choice - Paint is enough - you could make a functional card. Laminating it would be a plus. Whether or not your library would accept it is an entirely separate matter...

I might mess around and make a fancier one at some point but this isn't a bad start.

The Six Challenges of Census Data

Recently I have been interpreting census data as part of the preparation for a presentation I will be giving later in the year surrounding Library New Grads and the future of the library workforce. As I am sufficiently familiar with TableBuilder, a tool for extracting customised information from the census, it seemed like a straightforward enough task to analyse information on professional level library staff.

How little I knew.

The first warning came in the data breaking Librarians up into five year age categories. In the 2006 census 98 people aged 15-19 had their occupation categorised as 'Librarian'. Should you not be familiar with the library world, this is a professional occupation that almost invariably requires a degree or postgraduate qualification recognised by a professional body, ALIA, much as is the case for accountants and other professionals.

I don't think it's unreasonable to be slightly sceptical of the accuracy of this particular number. In a group of 10068 it's not huge, but it was the first sign that this data might not be quite as straightforward as I initially thought.

Things got more interesting when I discovered that the Teacher Librarians had gone MIA.

For reasons I will explain below, I broadened the scope of my analysis. The problems multiplied roughly in proportion to this. Initially this was very frustrating but it rapidly became fascinating in its own, potentially relevance-challenging way.

The Six Challenges of Census Data (So Far)

1. Free-text Census Questions

Most of the work I have done relates to the question of occupation. The 2006 census paper's question on this looks like so:

Whilst the sheer range of occupations in existence make the necessity of asking the question in this way clear a free text field that ultimately produces categorised numerical data has a significant risk of error even before points 2 and 3 are introduced.

2. User error

What exactly goes into that occupation box when a particular person fills it in? The accuracy is very difficult to control. 'Occupation' is also a term that can be interpreted in a considerably different way to 'Job'. I could argue that I have been a professionally recognised Librarian and in that career path for considerably longer than my title has contained the word 'Librarian'. This might have been stretching the truth and rather optimistic but not all that difficult to justify even if it misses the spirit of the question. (Just in case anyone from the ABS stumbles across this, I didn't. It would have been easy though, and virtually undetectable.)

3. Re-categorisation to a standard classification

Collecting statistics for each variant answer in the 'occupation' box would be messy and produce fairly meaningless data. Consequently a classification system is used - ANZSCO in both 2006 and 2011.

Widely varied responses must be fitted into the classification based on the listed occupation, here take note of the question's first explanatory point 'give full title'. In 2004 an ALA survey found 37 common job titles for library support staff and numerous less common titles, it is more than likely that Australia has a similar range. Many are not obviously library jobs. These could be categorised all over the occupational spectrum.

It's not too much of a stretch to think that job titles in other industries might create inbound interference on top of this.

I strongly suspect that aspects of points 2 and 3 are responsible for the large number of teenage Librarians.

4. Clumped professions or; Night of the Vanishing Teacher Librarians

One night while crunching some numbers I discovered that the Teacher Librarians had gone AWOL.

When using a guide to ANZSCO to work out where Librarians might be in TableBuilder (harder than you might expect) I found a page explaining 'Unit Group 2246 Librarians' where, partway down, it explains 'Teacher-Librarians are included in Minor Group 241 School Teachers' which, on investigation, is only further divided by the category of school. I know there are Teacher Librarians in there. Somewhere.

5. Classification system modifications

By this point in my analysis these issues and several other data issues and points raised in discussion led me to broaden my analysis to include other library occupations. Two were available.

Library Assistants were nice and straightforward.

Library Technicians were another matter entirely. In 2006 there was a category titled 'Library Technicians' but in 2011 the census used a new edition of ANZSCO and the category becomes 'Gallery, Library and Museum Technicians'. Unsurprisingly while a decline of around 3% is observed in the Librarian and Library Assistant categories this one has grown, acquiring two more industries worth of technicians. The trends between 2006 and 2011 behave in a way that is consistent with the other categories however an interesting anomaly from the national figures observed in Library Technician data for South Australia in 2006 has disappeared. I am totally unable to determine if this disappearance is real or a result of the classification changing.

6. Data availability

The last issue is the availability of census data. I am unable to find the information I need in standard ABS releases so must use TableBuilder. At present only 2006 and 2011 data is available. While I believe I see a trend that is consistent across all levels of library staff I cannot see if this is the continuation of a long-term trend, a new development or perhaps even the repetition of a cycle within the workforce.

Another census will be held in 2016, at some point after this I should be able to add another set of figures and start to answer this question. Until then I must, with the aid of prior studies and related papers and reports, make an educated guess.

In Conclusion

Teacher Librarians have gone MIA, Gallery and Museum Technicians invaded in 2011 and the most personally valuable lessons and insights from this exercise might be from the process rather than the outcome.

What appeared like a fairly straightforward interpretation of data from a large and respected source tested not only my ability to retrieve, analyse and interpret data but also my ability to spot the potential for errors and work out which errors were significant, which could be adjusted for and which.

This has reinforced that even the most authoritative, objective and thorough sources of information are fallible. While I believe I will still be able to complete a useful analysis with the scale of data I wished to work with factoring in these issues is going to be a challenge in itself.

P.S. Reviews and crafts will return one day, right now this analysis is taking up the time I might spend on those.

Statistical Analysis - Library Assistants

I attended PLSA Quarterly a while ago and while there saw a presentation of some information gathered as part of a survey on the future of the workforce in SA public libraries.

I remember one particular conversation after that presentation with another Librarian who was, possibly significantly in the case of this conversation, older than I am - for reference, I'm 30. We were discussing information that suggested many of the younger staff in public libraries do not intend on staying in libraries for very long. My own interpretation of 2011 Australian Census data shows an interesting trend that might well support this.

There are three library related ANZSCO occupations - Librarian, Gallery, Library and Museum Technician and Library Assistant. There is no Library Officer occupation listed, my best guess based on raw numbers is that these are included with Library Assistants.

The patterns for Librarians and Technicians are very similar, generally speaking the older age brackets have increasingly high percentages of the jobs until a drop-off around the expected retirement age. Library Assistants are a different story - they peak twice. The number of very young Library Assistants 15-24 seems quite reasonable, however beyond this numbers drop and don't start to climb again until age 40, from here on in they stay quite high until retirement age arrives.

But what happens over time? Unfortunately there are only two data sets, 2006 and 2011, available to me. Between the two censuses the Library Assistant population dropped by nearly 400.

Please note that the x axis scale has changed for this table - while not consistent with the rest of my analysis (both what you have seen and not) I wanted to emphasise the trends to make them clearer.

In my last post relating to this analysis I noted a sideways shift in this chart for Librarians between 2006 and 2011 suggesting that these might be predominantly the same people five years later. Library Assistants show this same trend - except for that early career peak. While the numbers there have dropped, especially at either end, that peak is still in the same place it was last time. Young Library Assistants numbers are quite good into the early twenties but they drop away sharply before thirty. This takes us back to the conversation I opened with, and from here on my opinions are based on anecdotal and observational evidence.

In the conversation that I mentioned at the head of the post I was discussing the number of young library staff indicating they intend on leaving the industry with another Librarian. They suggested that it might be largely explained as those wishing to start families. Based entirely on observation, most young female library staff I have known who have started to work in libraries have not left - they have taken maternity leave and returned quickly. There are exceptions and a small part of this drop may be accounted for this way but I don't believe it explains much of it. My experience working in libraries and talking to other young people working in libraries throughout Australia suggests something else is responsible for much of this drop.

Several young library staff I have spoken to enjoy working in libraries and see them as immensely worthwhile but they are often ambitious and see little prospect for advancement or even, in the case of trainees and those on graduate programs, retention. Looking at the trend in the rest of the graph, who can blame them? As time passes I've seen many of these young people move on to areas which they believe have better prospects. Of those who have stayed, the prevailing opinion remains that opportunities to advance are severely limited.

Prospects are not hopeless, and a little over half of these staff do stay. All the same we have a concerning trend here. If we want to change this trend and retain more young staff - through analysis we can see the rest of the Library Assistant (and Technician. And Librarian) population isn't getting younger and will eventually retire - we must act.

There's more to this that I'm still teasing out and I will eventually share what I find. Much of this analysis is for a presentation at the Intelligent Information Pop-up Symposium.

Should you have any opinions stories of your own I'd love to hear them - feel free to comment here or, if you prefer to share your story confidentially, contact me via a direct message on Twitter.

Librarianship - the statistical analysis begins!

I'm going to try to revive this blog... it's been a while. Hopefully more crafts and more books and library musings. I'll start with that one as I'm working on some things that are taking up a lot of my out-of-work time.

I'm doing some information-gathering to put together a presentation that I'll be giving later in the year - my topic centres around new library graduates and the future of the professional workforce. It's a huge topic so I won't be able to cover all aspects but I'm finding some things that I really want to talk about that I haven't heard presented before. Mostly thus far I'm analysing census data and talking to people who've graduated in the last five (or so) years. Some of the output, should it be of interest to you... it's appeared on Twitter but I haven't been able to talk about it much due to the whole character limitation thing. Here 'librarians' are defined as people who have had their profession from the census put into the 'librarians' unit group in ANZSCO.

The average age of librarians is roughly consistent across the country and it doesn't surprise me at all to see that many are at the older end of the workforce, that's consistent with the experiences of people I've talked to. Tasmania, ACT and the Northern Territory are a bit different but I strongly suspect that the low populations in these three places strongly contribute to this.

This graph I found especially interesting. 'Information and organisation professionals' is the ANZSCO minor group that librarians fit within (used for the census, explanation here). This includes a number of other occupations including archivists, curators, records managers, economists and statisticians. First off, across the minor group there is a much more even age spread with a slight bias towards workers in their twenties and thirties, second, while information and organisation professional age stayed roughly the same between censuses librarians clearly aged with it. A suggestion, perhaps, that we're mostly looking at the same people five years later rather than seeing much movement in and out of the profession.

I plan on extracting more census data over the next couple of weeks. Firstly I want to extract data on the Librarianship and Information Management qualification field to see how that compares. Secondly, although my focus is on professional librarians I want to chart information on the other two library occupations in ANZSCO - Library Assistant and Gallery, Library and Museum Technicians. The latter is a little broad as although there is a Library Technician listing in ANZSCO the tool I'm using to extract data, Australian Bureau of Statistics' TableBuilder Basic, doesn't have listings to that level.

I'll share that information and some thoughts when I have it - and if you're not the library type or the data type, don't worry, there will be blog posts on other topics soon.

Edit: updated the first chart as the scale on the horizontal axis labelling was out of whack.

Heritage to innovation in one great new library

I was very excited some months ago when I heard we'd get a new library in the city centre - having visited a few in other states and countries I was eager to see what my home city would come up with. I wasn't able to visit on opening day - too busy working in another library - but I've made it in on day two.

My first impression of the new City Library was great - the design is modern, adaptable, full of natural light and really interesting. Some of the photos I'd seen looked a little sterile but once in the building it is anything but. Design features and displays of local artists and work produced using the facilities available make the space warm, inviting and seriously interesting.

I'm really impressed by this library. It seems to have everything - so many things that I'd love to see many more libraries offer. The spectrum is covered from the History Hub to the Innovation Lab with an artist in residence (though not while I was visiting) and a media lab ensuring there are opportunities to create and explore whatever art or subject inspires you. It is so much more than just a place to read books and use a computer and it is already being well used.

I had a good opportunity to browse the shelves and as I did I found lots of places to sit and take a closer look before borrowing in spaces that were being used for study, small get-togethers, wireless Internet browsing, quiet reading and more. Though there are many people here - a wonderful thing to see - the building has been designed in such a way that there is still a sense of calm and focus.

According to the greeter at the door there have been a lot of library staff from all over visiting - I don't find this at all hard to believe as while I waited for a PC to write this very entry there was an impromptu meeting of staff from a library that I used to work in. All of them have had really positive things to say about this facility.

I highly recommend coming and having a look if you haven't already. This is a brilliant new community asset. I'll be back in future for sure - if nothing else I'm really eager to try out the 3D printing. I don't want to simply print something that I download so I'll have to get designing....

Library Shelving Entropy

If asked to give a layman's definition of the second law of thermodynamics I'd likely explain that in a closed system the level of disorder tends to increase over time. The common misuses of this theory asides, I offer libraries as a proof.

It starts innocuously enough. Two books are reversed on the shelf. Or one's lying down at the end of a row of books. A few days later six books have hopped to other bays of shelving and large gaps in the fiction collection have the whole thing looking dishevelled. When you go to put one of the bay-hoppers back where they belong you find two books that have made an epic journey from a collection on the other side of the building. Others have disappeared into the blackness behind other books and under furnishings where they can hide for weeks.

Before you know it: 

This, thankfully, is from Wikimedia Commons, not from my own camera.

The library I work in offers significantly lower levels of entropy (phew).

Any member of staff who has been handed the routine but sometimes mildly terrifying task of searching the notorious missing report or any of the other lists for materials that aren't where they were expected to be can confirm this to you.

Shelvers, shelf tidiers and shelf readers might fight the forces of entropy with great enthusiasm and persistence but the laws of physics can never be truly overcome.

Ebooks may offer a sort of salvation - but to look wider to the world of digital resources the work of entropy is plain to see.

Public Libraries SA Con Report - Day 1, afternoon session

Contiuing from the previous post on the same topic, more of my personal highlights and things-to-think-on from Public Libraries SA Conference 2013. I'll update it with links to the presentation files when they're made available and post to let you know it's happened. In the meantime I want to capture as much of this as I can while it's still relatively fresh in my mind.

Patti Manolis, CEO of Geelong Regional Library, was the first speaker for the afternoon. Her library is in an area going through rapid transformational change - they are planning ahead for this. Previously the library service was significantly underfunded according to national standards, now it is much improved. Their new library is designed to be the cultural centrepiece of the region. It will aim for about 1/3 collection space, 2/3 people space to help them engage with information and each other in a variety of ways - the new central library will have more space, not less. It will also have a café - these are part of every major cultural instituation. I think I'll have to schedule a trip when this library is completed. It looks amazing.
Patti explained that culture eats strategy for breakfast - strategy without a culture of change is difficult to enact - you must utilise champions and minimise the effects of blockers. Internal and external customer service and communication are critical. To do this a strong business case for return on investment to funding bodies is critical.
This talk had some thoughts on collection development too - thoughts I noted were that libraries are looking for bang for buck (especially as circulation and circulation per item are statistics used) so frequently focus on popularity vs. breadth and depth in the collection. Usage based funding and acquisitions can be limiting and don't show what your collection is missing.

Mandi Wicks, Director of Audio and Language Content, SBS spoke about cultural change at SBS Radio that allowed the delivery of a better service that matched the changed cultural mix of Australia today.
She observed that change is the only constant - and in deciding change and direction their charter was central. SBS Radio examined how their reason to exist connected with today's world, not just how they applied the charter in the past. Everything they did was examined relative to their purpose.
SBS Radio faced a massive increase in competition and had to make sure they served the community of now, not just the community they had always served in order to reflect modern Australia.
Being where the customer is is important - social media is a resource to find others in a community over a large area.
To sum up it is important to have a clear purpose and face your challenges, be audience driven or risk becoming irrelevant, to embrace technology and create links with those who have a common purpose and serve the same groups.
In this talk I began to get a lot of ideas on forming partnerships rather than attempting to be everything on a limited budget and also makes me want to pin up a statement of purpose somewhere I see it all the time - something to use as a frame of reference.

The final speaker of day one was Ross Duncan (second biography down) from the Sunshine Coast Libraries, his topic was 'How libraries change the world'. If you want to hear him speak you can listen to a radio interview with the ABC. His presentation, interestingly, had quite a few parallels with Mandi Wicks' presentation. I found some really useful practical approaches in this presentation.
Libraries cannot afford to be the next Kodak - who invented the digital camera but then failed to ride the 'digital wave' and were left behind to perish. Playing it safe is no longer an option - that just gives our compeititon the chance to overtake us.
Loans are not necessarily the statistic to show our relevance. Overall loans are down, but visits are not. We are in the business of customer service, not the business of circulation.
We have to work out what business we are in - keywords were education, inclusion, awareness, information and experience. We must also see how this lines up with the vision of our councils.
We should understand the population of our areas and how they compare to library membership. If there are large differences we need to know why. Our existing customers can be our champions to help us reach the rest of the community.
Partnerships are valuable - perhaps Apple would run workshops, or a local gardening centre, perhaps other community experts? There are mutual benefits in these partnerships and they help engage more of the community. In these partnerships and in working with organisations such as Centrelink to give them a stigma-free meeting place we move from being organisers to facilitators and are able to offer more to the community without increasing the load on staff. We can also assist other areas of council - we have high engagement so are an excellent way to share information and seek feedback. This makes us a powerful tool for council to deliver on objectives - and not just those which primarily concern the library.
Staff can be excellent change leaders, we must leverage the ideas of staff at all levels for the benefit of all.

I'll be back with day two soon!

Public Libraries SA Con Report - Day 1, Morning session

I have wanted to attend a professional conference for a long time - this week I had my chance with Public Libraries SA Conference 2013. The speaker line-up was stellar and included Todd Sampson, Michelle Prak and Bernard Salt. If that was not enough the topic 'Libraries: Culture of Change' encompasses many important and interesting topics.

Chloe Fox opened the conference and asked us what our collective noun was as a ssssh of librarians is now outdated. She also reinforced that we are social hubs - something I am sure most of us know, but it is good to know that others are realising we are so much more than our collections

Todd Sampson was the first major speaker. His address, 'The Power of Creativity', was not library industry focused - the points he had to make were far more universal. He believes that creativity is undervalued and critical and that it is the last competitive advantage - fear frequently gets in its way. To overcome this it is not necessary to be braver than others, just to be brave a little longer. Also that if we choose to use social media we should be in constant beta mode - always trying new things. We must find out what the nature of our community's love for libraries is and give it a new face.

This video introduces the presentation. The video below contains an excerpt. Todd's presentation was inspiring - it set the tone for the rest of the conference. If there was a phrase that defined the conference it was 'be brave for five minutes longer'.

The next speaker was Bill Macnaught, National Librarian of the National Library of New Zealand talking about how the libraries of New Zealand, particularly the National Library, are moving into the future. He covered many topics so I am only including a few highlights.

Again creativity came to the front - creativity is the most important skill set for prosperity in the knowledge economy, it is not exclusively the domain of the arts (innovation is just creativity by another name) and it can be taught.

Digital literacy is currently on everyone's mind but it cannot exist without basic literacy. The library has a powerful role to play here - we are well placed to reach young children who school cannot yet reach. Libraries need to question if they are doing enough to serve these customers.

New Zealand is doing really fantastic things with digital preservation - Digital NZ is making New Zealand's documentary heritage available - it collects, connects and allows co-creation. You really should check this out - you can see the connections others have drawn or create your own 'sets' and share them onward. The sets can be serious and historical or whimsical - like this set of historic hula-hoopers.

I'll share more of my conference experiences soon!

Afterlife of books

Creative Commons licenced by anneheathen

Following on from last week's blog - I mentioned that we don't take the books out the back and burn them, so after weeding is done we have to come up with some way of moving on the weeded stock. I've come across many variations on the theme but there are three main methods - sale, donation and disposal. If you know of any others please do let me know - the more knowledge the better!

First, of course, debited books have to be deleted from the catalogue and then defaced - the word has some nasty connotations but for most it means a cancellation mark and a cross through the barcode and spine label. This helps prevent books doing a boomerang impersonation and showing up repeatedly. It happens to some degree regardless. I've worked in a library which owned substantially more valuable stock that embosses a page in weeded books - this prevents people from faking the marks as a custom embosser is an expensive object. In a few rare cases the defacing is more drastic. But I'll get to that later when it's in context and doesn't sound so dire...

Many libraries run book sales - they might be occasional promoted events or a single shelf that's restocked as required. Larger sales, especially those held by more prestigious libraries, can be massive events that draw large crowds. I've been in book sale rooms where the people are packed in like sardines and still coming. Who benefits is an interesting question. Sometimes it's the library or a chosen charity that benefits but it might well go into the revenue stream of the governing body.

Donation of the books is also a popular option and here there are a lot of choices. The type of book might dictate which options suit. Locally child care centres are great for picture books and large print items often go to nursing homes as their high cost make it difficult for these organisations to establish good collections of their own. Other libraries who are establishing a collection from scratch, recovering from disaster or are experiencing tough financial situations might be able to use some items too. Libraries and museums with specialist subject collections might have some interest too. I once sent off a collection of very aged workshop manuals that were no longer of use to the public library I was in to a car museum that was very glad to have them. Prison libraries might appreciate donations, though they can be understandably choosy about subject matter. Charity bookshops can also be quite choosy as they want items that will sell rather than become permanent shelf occupants.

Some international aid groups also take books, especially those supporting schools in developing nations. In more than one library I've worked with there has been a regular representative from one of these charities who comes by to pick up items to send off. When one library had a large sale of books in many languages a charity group came in at the end and packed up every last remaining book to distribute to refugee groups and foreign aid projects.

Some books you cannot give away. Sometimes nobody shows interest in them for sale or donation, sometimes they're the risky items like pharmaceutical reference guides or mouldy books I mentioned in my last library post. These items still have to go somewhere, which is where we come to the least popular option, one which some libraries have to hide because public reaction can be so strong, and that is disposal. I love this quote for just this situation:

"Whether fortunate or unfortunate, many people regard books as sacred objects and have difficulty throwing them away … we need to remember is that it is not books that are sacred, but rather the thoughts, inspiration and accurate information they contain." - Doug Johnson

Libraries I have worked in mostly recycle old books that cannot be re-homed. Some books require the cover to be cut away first, this is the more drastic method of defacing I mentioned before. The first time you do this it feels almost criminal, but if no new home can be found after significant effort a chance to be another book in future might be the best that can be offered.

 The methods above are by no means exhaustive, I'd love to know what other methods you've come across. One of the more unconventional I've seen is shown in this photo that came from a post about the Hutt Street Library Outdoor Reading Room where they used a number of old books to create some really fascinating decorations. Sometimes a craft class held in a library might be able to do something with old books too though the attendee's feelings on this may vary! A quick Google search reveals vast numbers of book craft ideas that might be possible.

Weeding - a necessity, not an evil

Photo by ryan junell from oakland, USA (Providence Pilgrimage '06 Uploaded by mangostar)

[CC-BY-SA-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Librarians do not take piles of books out the back and set them alight - though the reactions from people I discuss weeding with might sometimes suggest otherwise. Today I visited a friend whose reaction was not so severe - but she was surprised.

This inspired me to write about weeding - this post was written considering people without library experience but might well be of interest to those who work in libraries.

Weeding is a commonly used name for deselection, the last, and sometimes neglected, stage of a book's life in the library. Before I worked in libraries I imagine my reaction would have been very much like that of my friend today - but experience has helped me see why this is a necessary part of collection management.

I have worked in school, public and academic libraries who all apply different standards and criteria to suit their purpose. Every library I have worked in thus far has undergone a substantial weed while I was there - none of these have been initiated by me but I have been part of the team, and at times have had to advocate to colleagues and members of the public on behalf of these projects. I am currently in a position where, in many collection areas, I am the one making the calls. Seeing varied reactions has been extremely interesting.

If a library wishes to continue buying books sooner or later it will have to start weeding - a library only has so much capacity and sacrificing other functions or accessibility to more shelving is simply not acceptable. Materials also deteriorate with use - a ten year old book in a public library that is in pristine condition has simply not been read, and in that case, it is probably time to bring in something that will be used. The contents also become irrelevant or inaccurate. Old pharmaceutical texts are downright dangerous. Much of the information is probably right - but nobody but a medical or pharmaceutical professional can accurately pick which bits are not.

The Australian Library and Information Association's standards for public libraries give some guidelines on what age is appropriate (page 24). Some libraries weed to tighter goals because space restrictions require it but most are pretty solidly at that standard. Generally public libraries do not keep items as long as school or academic libraries where financial restrictions or library goals require different approaches.

Selecting items for weeding is something I find challenging (whatever the observer might think...) simple rules about age of items and usage statistics are the most objective way of weeding and are my first indicator of items for assessment but by no means spell the final fate of an item in themselves. Certain areas warrant earlier deselection than others - travel manuals such as lonely planet guides are very quickly inaccurate - new editions are far more appropriate. Some qualitative criteria enter the mix too - items of local, family history or heritage interest are entirely exempt from weeding unless they become a physical danger to the collection and cannot be saved (mouldy, usually). At present my current library is treading softly around the subjects of the two world wars due to the approach of the ANZAC centenary and anticipation of an increase in demand in this area. Premier's Reading Challenge books are also generally exempted due to the large demand for these.

It is very important that I avoid subjective criteria as much as possible. Certain subject areas or authors I find particularly sad to weed, but my interests cannot enter into this process. The reverse is also true - personally, I find certain arguments frustrating but I can't use weeding to exert my prejudices or as a form of censorship so I am careful that I apply the same standards as I do elsewhere.

This is far too big and contentious a topic for me to tackle in one go so I imagine it's not the last you will hear from me on this subject. For a thorough and very well laid out article on weeding and why it matters I suggest the discussion by SCIS under the name secret library business.

I, Librarian

This isn't a review of the comic above (which is excellent and I am sorry to say my copy is in storage), nor is it the photo post that should be here - or rather should have been a week ago. That is coming. First I need to look at a topic I've been neglecting.

Up there in the title of my blog is the word "Librarian". Hardly any of my posts have touched on libraries or librarianship. The word's not just up there to be decorative though - I am a librarian, and at present I'm very fortunate to be a "real" librarian - it's taken six years, a lot of learning and no small number of reality checks.

I'm not going to pretend to be a source of enlightenment for new librarians, especially as I am still very much one of those - I'll leave that to letters to a young librarian. I'm not going to pretend to be an expert on any other topic either. But I'm going to start putting up some of my experiences and interpretations of the library world I live a large part of my life in. One of the reasons you've heard so little in the past has been that I'm careful about what I post. I'm conscious of what I say about my experiences and the people I have met but don't need to avoid the library topic altogether.

I came to Information Studies as a person who hardly went into libraries. In primary school and for the first few years of high school I practically lived in the library. By the time I left school for university that had changed. At first I felt I had no time to spend there, eventually the library-going habit was simply lost. I do not recall ever considering a career in libraries.

I spent four years at university studying marketing and management because I didn't know what I wanted to do and it was the current "thing". My marks were respectable but not good enough for a graduate program. A few months after graduation I did what I thought I was supposed to want and got a job.

My first full time job was with a company with a small office. I served customers; quoted custom work; processed work orders; redesigned the system for handling order paperwork; analysed costs, prices and profit margins; looked at OHS... my job was good, the people I worked with were a good team and I had an opportunity to use my skills. Despite these positives I realised that the path I had put myself on didn't go where I wanted to go. I was looking for a new career within the year.

With a bit of research and reading of university course descriptions I had two options - I could go and teach English in Japan (which sounded like fun and also felt a lot like running away) or I could take the parts of my job I'd liked the most - seeking and working with information - and head back to university to become a librarian. I can't quite put my finger on why I went one way and not the other. I believe I made the right choice.

I took to the studies with great enthusiasm and a year later I had a degree, an academic award and professional recognition. At that point I thought I was there, that I'd made it, I knew how to be a librarian and that a nice secure job was right around the corner. It took a number of reality checks to see just how far I still had to go and how much I had to learn. I still have a lot to learn - and I know that there will always be more to learn.

I've spent the last five years in various voluntary, temporary and contract positions learning from a number of amazing people while progressing from library assistant to library officer and now to librarian. Before I started in my current position a senior librarian told me that with this opportunity to be a librarian I would learn for sure if I was on the right path and if I was not learning that would be a positive outcome in itself. Two months in I can't give you a final answer. That will have to wait until October - but so far I am finding the work challenging but enjoyable.

Despite not having a final answer I'm hopeful that in libraries I've found a direction that challenges me and allows me to work in areas that interest me with the objective of improving the lives of others.

Review: A Confusion of Princes - Garth Nix

I read Garth Nix's A Confusion of Princes as an e-book through Overdrive. I'm loving reading books this way. My library's selection isn't huge - nor is my phone's screen. But it is very convenient. I used to carry books everywhere but a lot of the time I find my bag is already too heavy. Few things can be worse than finding the time and inclination to read without a book in range... I finished reading this book some time ago but it was too good to leave without a review.

A Confusion of Princes is a fantastic sci-fi adventure. Prince Khemri has been raised in a sheltered environment with the belief that he is the best thing to happen to the Empire. In his imagination his future is filled with grand adventure exploring the galaxy making conquests and great discoveries. When he comes of age he rapidly discovers that as one of millions of princes (who all want to kill him) it will be a struggle to survive his first hour and that he will have to abandon his dreams to fight for survival. His journey will challenge everything he believed.

***

I've been waiting for a long time to find another Garth Nix book I really love. I discovered Sabriel when I was about fourteen and read it over and over - and when the sequels came out it just got better. Unfortunately those of Garth Nix's books I've tried to read since, most particularly the Keys to the Kingdom series, disappointed. I wouldn't go so far as to say they were bad, but they were not for me. I generally strongly encourage adults to ignore the age classifications on books but they just felt very...kiddy.

Then along comes A Confusion of Princes and my faith is restored.

Prince Khemri is likeable protagonist who is remarkably relatable - which is a substantial achievement considering Khemri is a complete asshole. When the book begins he is the product of a highly planned high-tech upbringing that has shaped his body, mind and abilities. He has been the centre of everything thus far - most of the people he has known have been mentally programmed to reinforce his superiority. This has made him self-centred and self-important. From his point of view people and the world exist for his amusement. Unsurprisingly, the story is about to arrange him a series of wake-up calls.

The opening intrigued me and grabbed me, then threw me head first into a foreign universe where several chapters dumped an awfully large amount of information to set the scene. This created a fantastic universe for the story to take place in and was enjoyable, but one colleague has told me they found the info-dumping so off-putting they did not continue.

The narrative voice is the book's strongest point. Khemri's first-person viewpoint is funny and engaging and kept me turning pages over, or at least flicking to the next screen, far later than was sensible. I could feel the shock of successive reality checks passing through his mind and his discovery of emotions that were completely foreign to him.

There is one major plot point that felt particularly contrived - concerning one of Khemri's rivals but... spoilers. If you read the book it probably won't take too long to work out. Many aspects of the book are highly original but the foundation of tropes and clichés is noticeable. These common elements and themes are handled well with fresh twists but are hard not to notice.

Please don't take my criticisms as reasons not to read this book. Although it's not flawless (what book is?) it's a seriously fun read in a fantastic world designed with great depth. A Confusion of Princes comes highly recommended to anyone who enjoys science fiction, fantasy or adventure.

***

 Garth Nix also has a new Old Kingdom book, Clariel, due out at an unspecified time this year. I have very high expectations and hope that I will be able to tell you how wonderful it is before the end of the year.

It's not the only series I love that is getting a new installment this year either. A new Sergei Lukyanenko Night Watch book is to be translated and released in May. I can't wait! I have slight reservations with this one - the first three books in the series built on each other and got better and better but I felt quite let down by book four. Hopefully book five will bring a new restoration of faith.

Mini-reviews

The photo project will resume when I have regular internet access again - in the meantime, here are some miniaturised book reviews. I had intended to do more mini-reviews tonight but things did not go to plan - everything is okay, but I had to suddenly leave this and am only back some hours later.

These books are both excellent though unlike some I have reviewed in the past, are not necessarily books I'd recommend for all people.

I read Sandman Slim by Richard Kadrey some weeks ago, it's gritty, bloody and pulls no punches. The man character talks hims toughness up, then proceeds to get the snot kicked out of himself repeatedly. Last time I read a book that did that I was seriously unimpressed as the supposedly super-powerful hero proved to be about the flimsiest thing out. Not so in this case. Stark, our serial-car-thieving anti-hero, gets away with this as he takes a lot of damage but just keeps on going anyhow.

An interesting world and a great (if seriously nasty, angry, revenge obsessed and all-round messed-up) anti-hero. I do have a couple small gripes - notably concerning a fictional weapon that just seems too convenient and the fact that I can't help but relate the name Stark to Iron Man and George R R Martin. But on the balance of things I really enjoyed this book. This is very much at the horror end of the urban fantasy/paranormal spectrum - which suits me just fine as I prefer to avoid the romance end of the genre. If graphic violence in books is a turn-off this is not the book for you as it is frequent and intense. If you can handle it, it's good fun and well written.

I've started on book two, Kill the Dead, and while it's good as well it's failing to catch me as much as the first book. I can't place my finger on why, exactly. I'm hoping it'll pick up as despite loving the genre, at least in principle, there are precious few urban fantasy series out there that I enjoy and this has potential to be added to the list.

Volume one of Saga by Brian Vaughan is probably one of those graphic novels that gathers complaints in libraries. Notably from those who open to a page and gasp in horror, not quite realising that it's okay to read comics after the age of fifteen, and thus okay for comics to be adult in nature. Or is that my cynicism showing too much?

This beautifully illustrated comic holds up a sci-fi mirror to some of the long-term conflicts in our world and does so in an original and interesting universe. The characters are well developed - I particularly liked Izabel, a teenage ghost (or at least the upper half of one). I enjoyed this and recommend it for any adult who enjoys graphic novels. If I were introducing someone to comics I'd probably choose something else. A number of scenes are sexually or violently graphic or just... really unusual. But the worst thing about this book? Volume two is not out yet. I want to know where this story goes next!