About #15 Library 2.0

I love the ideas presented in Discovery Resources "Where Will Web 2.0 Take Libraries?"

It is hard to imagine what the next 10 years will look like. When I started at the library 14 years ago, finding some of the answers to obscure reference questions was hard, and sometimes it was just plain dumb luck when the answer was found, even though I'd like to say it was my amazing reference skills! Now if an answer isn't easily found in one of our basic reference sources, there is always the internet.

A couple of points of interest in the articles in Discovery Resources for me: reliance on user education--we have so many online databases, and I always wonder how many of our customers really know about these great resources. How can we teach and promote the use of these sources? The other point was that the "come to us" approach would change because of the many online sources. It is interesting that we still seem to place a heavy emphasis on physical customers coming in to the library at the same time we are making it easy for them to not come in to the building by having lots of resources that they can use at home. (and making it harder for them to get to the library because of lack of parking) He also mentioned circulation being down by 55% (?) and I think our circ numbers continue to go up.

It will be fun to see what happens with Worldcat, too. Sounds like they are going to be adding new features.