American Libraries Magazine: On My Mind

My Year of RDA

Laurie Borman — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 15:24:56 +0000

By Patricia Frade

I’ve been a librarian for 30 years and have seen a lot of changes during that time. I’ve welcomed them as new challenges, even as I’ve seen many of my older colleagues become very negative—whining, complaining, and vowing to retire before they have to alter their ways.

But in the past couple of years, the tables had turned when I found myself rolling my eyes and wishing I could retire after the introduction of Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records (FRBR) and Resource Description and Access (RDA).

Now, two years later, I’m a convert. And I would encourage all catalogers to jump in and start learning it as soon as you can. In my experience, RDA was not something that came easily to me after one training session or reading the manual (Toolkit). It is a whole different way of cataloging.

My library is fortunate to have Special Collections and Formats Catalog Department Chair Robert L. Maxwell on staff. Maxwell has been actively involved with FRBR and RDA from the start, and he was determined to have our cataloging employees become RDA experts. Here’s how he did it.

Between 2008–2010, Maxwell led at least one training session every year in which we began to explore FRBR and RDA. At the time, basic FRBR terms such as “work,” “expression,” and “manifestation” were as clear as mud. I would roll my eyes and pray that the Library of Congress would throw the whole concept in the circular file so I could happily retire with AACR2.

Around September 2010, my library was asked to participate in the RDA test (November–December 2010), and much to my dismay, Maxwell asked me to be one of the testers. I now had to put into practice the RDA concepts I had learned over the past few years. The test was difficult; participants were asked to catalog all the different formats, not just their specialties.

After the RDA test, we were asked as a department to continue cataloging in RDA. If there was an AACR2 record in OCLC, we created an RDA record for the OCLC institution record, which included any necessary RDA authority records. If we did an original record, it was created as an RDA record.

I cataloged a few books each month in the RDA format. The bibliographic record wasn’t too hard to do in RDA—I mostly just added the content type (336), media type (337), and carrier type (338) fields, avoiding the use of abbreviations, and then added the name relationship designator terms.

For me, the most difficult part was working on the authority records. Much information could be added to an authority record, such as dates, associated places, field of activity, affiliation, occupation, gender, and language. About 90% of my authority records were sent back to me for correcting before being sent to OCLC because I (a) didn’t have the correct terminology for the field of activity, (b) failed to use the authorized geographic name, or (c) didn’t capitalize the occupation. It also took more time to find additional information. Because of the steep learning curve and the time it took me, I cataloged only a few RDA institutional records per month.

In August 2011, I was asked to catalog manuscripts and use the RDA format for all the institutional records. Not only was the RDA format totally new for me, so was manuscripts cataloging. I had to jump in with both feet instead of dipping in my little toe. And I’m here to tell you that after several months of consistently cataloging in RDA, I finally have a better understanding of it. More importantly, I actually see the benefits of the RDA format.

From a scholarly point of view, associating the relationship designator terms with personal, family, or corporate names is of great value. Librarians and patrons will more clearly know what the relationships are between a resource and the persons, families, or corporate bodies associated with that resource.

For librarians, the additional information in the authority records will be useful because it reduces the need to decipher whether the authority record is appropriate for the item in hand. In the past few months I have had to play detective to search for additional information to add to an authority record. And I have been extremely satisfied after including additional information to a new or existing authority record, making that name more distinctive.

So, all of you catalogers, jump in and give yourselves plenty of time to attend trainings, ask questions, create records, practice, and practice some more. Put together a cheat sheet with all the additional information you could add to the RDA authority record, and keep it in front of you.

Start learning about RDA and be prepared to spend more time with every record you create. The additional information that RDA provides will benefit all of us—catalogers, reference personnel, and patrons.

I never thought I’d say it, but RDA has been a good thing after all.

PATRICIA FRADE is manuscripts cataloger at Brigham Young University’s Harold B. Lee Library in Provo, Utah.

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Let’s Put an End to Socialized Intellectual Property

Beverly Goldberg — Sun, 01 Apr 2012 17:45:33 +0000

By Donald A. Barclay

What America needs are the best copyright laws that money can buy

Ed. note: The following is the text of a speech given April 1 by retired United States Rep S. Douglas Maynard before the 4^th Annual Restore Intellectual Property Protection for Economic Recovery Summit and Retreat.

First of all, to the members of Restore Intellectual Property Protection for Economic Recovery, I wish to extend my sincere thanks at being invited to speak here today before such a distinguished group. RIPPER is among my very favorite political action committees. I would also like to take a moment to extend an extra-special aloha to all of the distinguished Members of Congress who have taken time out of their busy schedules to join us here at the beautiful ’Alunu Beach Resort. Hopefully each and every one of our friends from inside the Beltway will find the time for at least one round on the resort’s breathtaking course. I myself played a round yesterday, and all I will say for the record is that my score over eighteen was lower than the national debt.

And now to get down to matter for which I was invited to speak here today.

Property. Specifically, intellectual property.

Webster defines property as, “something to which a person or business has a legal title.” As the members of RIPPER are well aware, within the economy of our beloved nation there exists vast amounts of intellectual property to which no person nor business nor, amazingly enough, government, holds any legal title whatsoever. “How can it be the case,” any intelligent person might ask, “that property can exist without ownership?” It is the case because all of this valuable intellectual property has been permanently exiled to the ignominy of a vast economic wasteland. I speak, of course, of the so-called “public domain.”

If the average American citizen has even heard of the so-called public domain, that citizen very likely labors under the mistaken impression that it consists of a few antique curiosities about which nobody much cares any more. A smattering of old books. A few faded black-and-white photographs. A dusty heap of classical compositions of the sort routinely heard (at taxpayer expense) on National Public Radio. Fortunately, my good friends from RIPPER are gearing up to launch an informational campaign that will set our mistaken average American citizen straight about the true facts of the so-called public domain. This campaign will inform the great American public that:

the so-called public domain is swollen with millions of abandoned books, photographs, musical compositions, art works, and other examples of creative output;
these works have—if ever unlocked—huge economic value;
many of these lost works embody the very essence of our precious American freedoms and the foundations of our great American civilization.

So what, exactly, makes up this so-called public domain?

When you were a child, did your mother ever read you the wholesome, morally enriching stories of Mother Goose? These beloved stories, I regret to inform you, are locked away in the so-called public domain.
Ever hear of The Declaration of Independence? The document that, unless I am very much mistaken, guarantees Americans the right to life, liberty, property, and the pursuit of happiness? You guessed it. Locked away in the so-called public domain.
I will hazard a guess that you have heard of a little book called The Bible? The self-same Holy Bible that, thank God and our wonderful brave veterans, you will find in the bedside table of every American hotel room? My friends, believe it or not, even The Holy Bible is a prisoner of the so-called public domain.

Yes, as shocking as it may be, millions of our cultural treasures, among them the greatest, most inspiring works of human genius and ingenuity ever created, sit moldering in the void, as ownerless and economically unproductive as the fallow collective farms cooked up by Josef Stalin during the darkest days of the late, unlamented Soviet Union. Maybe there are people in this country who don’t care about “The Old Lady Who Lived in a Shoe,” The Book of Genesis, or The Emancipation Proclamation. But you my RIPPER friends, are proud Americans who care deeply about each of these national treasures, who care very deeply about all the millions of pieces of intellectual property presently condemned to economic limbo.

“How,” the average American citizen might ask, “was all this precious intellectual property stolen from its rightful owners in the first place?” The answer lies in our copyright law—our unjust, misguided, antiquated copyright law, which reads as if it could have been penned by Karl Marx himself.

You see, when you create intellectual property in the United States, the law says that you own the rights to your intellectual property, and I quote, “For limited times.” Yes, you heard me right.

For.
Limited.
Times.

The copyright law of the United States of America—not of Iran or North Korea or the People’s Republic of Berkeley—says that you may keep the rights to your own intellectual property for only “limited times.”

Imagine if the copyright law were extended to all property.

“Congratulations Mr. Jones, you’ve paid off the mortgage on your house. However, I must inform you that you may retain ownership of your house for only a limited time.”
“Yes little Suzy, I realize your mommy and daddy bought you that teddy bear, but the law says that a limited time has passed and now you must hand your beloved toy over to a bunch of strangers.”

Although this is only the Fourth Annual RIPPER Summit and Retreat, opposition to the socialistic “limited time” copyright law is nothing new. The great American author Mark Twain once said, “Only one thing is impossible for God: To find any sense in any copyright law on the planet.” Mr. Twain, in his folksy, common-sense wisdom, was strongly of the opinion that a creator’s rights to his own copyright should never expire.

More recently, Rep. Mary Bono Mack (R-Calif.) stated on the floor of the House that, optimally, copyright should last “forever less one day” (PDF file). And I am proud to tell you that not only was I serving as Congresswoman Bono Mack’s House colleague when she uttered those memorable words, I leapt to my feet to lead the cheering.

All this is not to say that some progress has not been made already. In the dark ages of 18th-century America, copyright lasted, at most, a mere 28 years. In our more enlightened era, personal copyright now extends to the life of the author plus 70 years, while corporate copyright lasts up to 120 years. Not forever. Not forever minus a day. Yet certainly a step in the right direction.

But what about all that potentially valuable intellectual property for which today’s more enlightened legislation came too late? Do you realize that every piece of intellectual property created before 1923 languishes in the economic black hole that is the so-called public domain? Do you realize that virtually every document published by the government of the United States of America—regardless of when it was published—lies trapped in the abyss? Yes, you heard me right. Every document created by the government of the greatest nation in the history of the world goes automatically into the public domain where it can be freely read, copied, usurped, and twisted by the enemies of freedom. Seen in this light, the so-called public domain is positively treasonous.

Only Washington can solve this problem. Solve it quickly, simply, decisively, and permanently by taking a single bold step: Eliminate the so-called public domain.

Reaping the profits of privatization

Certainly, eliminating the so-called public domain is the right thing to do if you believe in America; if you believe in the right of free individuals to reap the fruits of their labors; if you believe that the tentacles of socialism must be hacked off at the root before they strangle our precious and proven free-market economy. But, my friends, there is something else you need to know. Eliminating the so-called public domain would not only right a great injustice; done wisely, it will also provide the American public with some badly needed relief from the crushing burden of federal taxes.

For RIPPER proposes that Congress not merely end the so-called public domain by fiat; rather, RIPPER’s market-driven proposal is that the government of the United States auction off the public domain item by item and use the proceeds to extend tax breaks to the American people.

Is there enough value in the public domain to make auctioning it off worthwhile?

Absolutely.

Consider the well-known fairy tale Cinderella, a story that is currently imprisoned in the so-called public domain. Were the permanent rights to this story to be auctioned off, the high bidder would control, and be in a position to profit from, any future works derived from the story of Cinderella regardless of format. He would also control all previously existing derivative works.

Say a well-known entertainment corporation had at some time in the past made a highly successful animated film derived from the story of Cinderella. That corporation would have to negotiate with the new owner of the story in order to continue profiting from the film itself as well as from any spin-off works or merchandise. Given the potential profit, how much would you be willing to bid for the rights to Cinderella? Or Snow White. Or Alice in Wonderland? At the same time, consider how much the creator of an animated version of Cinderella would be willing to spend to prevent someone else from ending up as the owner of the source story and, in the same stroke, obtain control over all other derivative versions of that story.

Children’s tales are just the tip of the potential income iceberg. Imagine how much an individual or organization might pay for the exclusive, permanent rights to, say, William Shakespeare’s Hamlet? Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony? The Gospels of the New Testament? To the millions of documents produced by the government of the United States of America?

How much would the National Rifle Association pay to own the exclusive, permanent rights to the Second Amendment? Imagine the bidding between, say, the ACLU and the League of Decency for the rights to the First Amendment. Between Planned Parenthood and pro-life supporters for ownership of the text of Roe v. Wade. And speaking of bidding wars, just imagine the competition between Major League Baseball and the National Football League for ownership of the words and music of “The Star Spangled Banner.” And don’t overlook product placement as an incentive:

The Federal Express Gettysburg Address.
McDonald’s FDA Dietary Guidelines for Americans.
Arrowhead Spring’s Water Music Suite.

Of course not every piece of intellectual property in the so-called public domain will fetch millions; even so, there are still economic possibilities to be found among the lesser denizens of that blighted landscape. It is easy to imagine ordinary Americans bidding on the “penny stocks” of the public domain—forgotten 19th-century poems and novels, insignificant government documents, random tintypes—in the hopes of taking ownership of a piece of intellectual property that will someday appreciate in value. Indeed, the selling and trading of low-dollar intellectual property would be the biggest boon to the home-based entrepreneur since eBay and day trading. I can also imagine corporations buying up large parcels of the so-called public domain and then selling shares in what would be, in effect, intellectual property mutual funds.

I mentioned the story Cinderella earlier. Our Congressional guests from the great state of California are thinking that executives of a certain corporation headquartered in Orange County would not be pleased at the thought of spending millions of dollars to purchase the rights to Cinderella and certain other public-domain stories from which they have derived extraordinarily valuable films and related properties. My response is that these executive will, in fact, be quite pleased to make such expenditures when they learn of the three additional points of RIPPER’s plan to restore fairness and economic common sense to intellectual-property law:

The fairest uses of them all

Point 1. In conjunction with the auctioning off of the public domain, RIPPER proposes that Congress do away with the fair use provision of the copyright law.

Fair use. It sounds so benign. So even-handed. So, well, fair. The fact is, however, that fair use is nothing more than a license to steal the property of others. Let’s say the principle of fair use were expanded to include bank accounts: The terms of fair use would allow anyone to steal from your bank account so long as they didn’t steal too much. Making matters worse, the law gives no clear guidelines as to how much is too much. It would depend on how much was in the account to begin with, who stole it, and what they used the stolen money for. Hardly something to set your watch by.

Eliminating fair use would finally give owners of intellectual property the same degree of control that owners of every other type of property known to mankind have enjoyed for centuries. When someone trespasses in an apple orchard, stealing one apple is as much an act of theft as stealing a bushel, so why should intellectual property be treated any differently? Relieved of the burden of fair use, an owner of intellectual property could at last control not only who used his property, but also when, how often, for how long, and for what purpose. The elimination of fair use would, most of all, prevent the incremental theft of intellectual property that today goes on unchecked by the law.

Point 2. Congress should also eliminate fair use’s ugly stepsister: the first-sale doctrine.

A bat straight out of socialist hell, the first-sale doctrine is yet another license to steal intellectual property from its rightful owner. Now you may hear people say that getting rid of the first-sale doctrine will hurt libraries, but that is a red (as in socialist) herring. Libraries could still lend without the first-sale doctrine; they would simply be required to pay the owner of an intellectual property a negotiated sum each time they made a loan, which is only fair. After all, if I pay my mechanic one time to fix my car, it doesn’t obligate him to continuing fixing it for free for as long as I own the car. Just as the mechanic is paid for each job, the owner of an intellectual property should be paid for each use.

Would this added cost hurt libraries? You can argue that laws banning murder hurt the manufacturers of coffins, but if stomping out a major wrong comes at the cost of sacrificing a marginal good, that’s a price any reasonable American is willing to pay. Besides, “Ye Olde Publik Library” may have been a quaint idea in the day of the village green and the town crier, but today people live in the age of the Information Superhighway. With the internet as nearby as our home computers, we no more need public libraries toady than we need public television when, at the touch of our remotes, we can get the History Channel and dozens of cable news networks. Time has left the library behind, and it is time for the law to catch up.

Point 3. The way the law now stands, most theft of intellectual property is considered a civil, not a criminal, matter. This makes no sense. So long as the theft of intellectual property remains decriminalized, an intellectual property owner must assume all the trouble and expense of defending his rightful property against the depredations of thieves. First, he must assume the role of detective in uncovering any theft of his property and, second, the role of prosecuting attorney in order to get justice from the courts. Indeed, the cost of taking an intellectual property thief to civil court is so high that average Americans without the financial resources of a large corporation are rendered nearly defenseless.

What Congress must do to right this wrong is to, first, criminalize all theft of intellectual property and, second, establish a federal intellectual property police force so that theft of intellectual property can be professionally detected, investigated, prosecuted, and punished on an equal footing with all other forms of theft.

Imagine an America with no so-called public domain, no legalized theft via fair use or first-sale doctrine, and full criminal prosecution of intellectual property thieves. In this fairer, more just America, an intellectual property pirate who, say, posts a clip of the animated version of Cinderella to a website would soon find himself under arrest by the federal intellectual property police. Prosecutors would try the case in federal court, and, upon conviction, the thief would be subject to fines and imprisonment. Meanwhile, the owner of the intellectual property—notified by federal authorities of the theft—could bring suit in civil court against both the thief and the internet service provider who permitted the posting of the clip. I guarantee it would not take many such cases before theft of intellectual property becomes all but unknown.

I also guarantee that, given the three-part protections proposed by RIPPER, the executives of every corporation holding intellectual property derived from works currently in the so-called public domain will have no objections to bidding on the true, full, just, and permanent rights to those seminal works.

Yes, I said permanent. For the end of the public domain will mean the realization of the dream of Mr. Mark Twain, Congresswoman Mary Bono Mack, and tens of thousands of other owners and creators of intellectual property. For without a public domain, copyright would, at last, last forever.

I and the good people of RIPPER say that it is time for Congress to put aside its ideological differences, stand up for justice, and finally say, “Limited times, your time is limited.” For the time has come to end the so-called public domain, unlock the treasures of our culture from the deadly grasp of misguided social engineering, and, in the process, pump up the beleaguered American economy with a badly needed tax break.

Thank you for your attention on April Fool's Day and, as always, God bless America.

DONALD A. BARCLAY is interim university librarian at the University of California in Merced.

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Just Whom Do We Serve?

Beverly Goldberg — Wed, 28 Mar 2012 14:31:27 +0000

By Anthony Molaro

Patrons? Users? Clients? The name foreshadows the interaction

Chances are, your library is chock-full of people. Some are staff and there may be the occasional vendor. But the vast majority—those who visit libraries—are part of a group that library workers have had significant trouble defining.

How library workers view library patrons reflects our philosophical worldview. Much has been written on how patrons perceive libraries and librarians, and maybe now is a good time to turn the tables. How do we, as librarians, view our patrons? How we perceive them is reflected in what we call them, and judging by the variety of terminology, we have significant trouble pinpointing that perception.

“You Must Focus on Connection Management Instead of Collection Management” R. David Lankes posted in his Work In Progress blog a while ago. He details a strategic planning session in which library consultant Joan Frye Williams decided to end the eternal debate about what we should call library patrons by asking them directly. Unexpectedly, those surveyed responded that instead of being called a library “patron,” or “customer,” or “user,” more than half preferred the term “member.”

Consider what comes to mind when you think of a:

library patron
library customer
library user
library member

In my opinion, a worldview that sees library users as patrons is one in which the patron (benefactor) is above libraries. According to this worldview, we should feel lucky that they support our work, and we are forever indebted to them. Some call the term “patron” archaic, while others have no idea what a library patron even is. In the end, the perception is that the patron is superior to us.

For those with a worldview that encompasses the term library customer, the individuals served at the library are people who have something that we want (usually money). They are just a number. We don’t owe them anything; on the contrary, they owe us. In contrast to the patron worldview, the perception associated with the term library customers is that they are beneath us. The customer needs what we have, but we don’t need them.

Users are people who consume without creating. This worldview does not acknowledge all they create because of libraries. As Lankes stated in October 2010, computer scientists and drug dealers have users; libraries do not. This term does not really reflect how we view patrons. The perception associated with a library user is one in which the user is beholden to the library—she or he has to have something the library offers, but we don’t need them.

What does a worldview that sees library users as “members” entail? Membership implies ownership and an active role; it is truly an interdependent relationship with library staff. Some argue that members in particular deserve excellent customer service. Moreover, a member’s privileges can be revoked, which is common for someone who has excessive late fines. Most importantly, people served by libraries view themselves as members because they carry a library card.

Dictionary.com defines member as “one of the persons who composes a social group (especially individuals who have joined in a group organization).” Referring to a patron as a member acknowledges the social role of libraries in the community. Moreover, membership requires action and activity. The library member needs to come into the library, or visit virtually. Whether they become social or active in the library is not a major factor; the important thing is that the library has created an environment in which they can do so.

This worldview fully demonstrates that library members are co-equals with library staff. Many people proudly join organizations as card-carrying members. They flash their cards, and take pride in their membership. This sociological phenomenon is just waiting for us to tap into.

Preferred Member card

What would libraries look like if we carried this member idea even further? Much like other organizations, institutions, and businesses, libraries should consider implementing a preferred member card program. This preferred member card could be purchased through an annual fee and would have perks and privileges. For example, hot new bestsellers are purchased for regular library members and extra copies purchased for preferred members. Perhaps preferred members would not be subject to late fines, or entitled to extended loan periods, being cited on an honor roll, or invited to a special party? The preferred member card could be a part of a larger membership and fundraising drive. Much like NPR or PBS, libraries can incorporate preferred membership drives into their National Library Week or National Library Card Month promotions.

Really, the sky is the limit. The advantages are numerous. Libraries would receive an additional shot of funding, and in this day and age, who doesn’t need a few extra bucks? But the benefits don’t stop there. Both preferred and regular members receive benefits as well. The regular patrons get more materials and services through funding provided by preferred members, while the preferred members get rewards for being frequent library users and acknowledgment for being library supporters. I would be proud to mention that I am a preferred member of my library, and others would too.

Whether you decide to run with the membership drive or not, it is important to remember that how we view “patrons” impacts how they view us. Your best bet is to ask what they prefer to be called, but keep the term in line with your philosophical outlook. For me, this means a partnership—equals or co-members on the same team. I like the idea that membership is social and active. So I proclaim boldly: Those people in the library are library members with all the rights and privileges appertaining thereto.

ANTHONY MOLARO is associate dean of library and instructional services at Prairie State College in Chicago Heights, Illinois, as well as a PhD candidate at Dominican University in River Forest, Illinois.

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The Conversation Continues @ your library

Beverly Goldberg — Wed, 07 Mar 2012 02:10:21 +0000

March/April 2012

By Nancy Kranich and Carlton Sears

“Today, the most important conversation is with our community and learning what makes it better,” David Lankes, professor at the Syracuse (N.Y.) University School of Information, told participants of ALA’s 2012 Midwinter Meeting program, “The Conversation Starts Here.” The weekend of programming prompted hundreds of librarians to envision new ways to engage their communities.

Many librarians are already exploring new ways to engage, embed, and integrate libraries into the life of their communities. Academic librarians are eager to deepen their engagement on campus—embedding services in the teaching, learning, and research processes. School librarians strive to collaborate more closely with teachers and integrate their programs directly into the curriculum. Public librarians are seeking new methods to align their missions with community needs and craft effective services.

However, few have answered the call to move beyond talk to action.

Community conversations can transform libraries. For example, consider efforts underway at Rutgers University Libraries where librarians have launched a series of conversations to recalibrate their interactions with others on campus. These conversations are bringing people with common concerns together, unleashing new possibilities to occupy a more visible and valued role, building partnerships, and getting in the flow of users.

As one librarian commented, “How do we realign existing relationships? How do we become partners who are catalysts in the knowledge-building process?”

Several years ago, the Public Library of Youngstown and Mahoning County, Ohio, began a planning process by examining why the library, while deeply respected, seemed somehow disconnected from people’s day-to-day lives. They discovered a 1999 report by the Harwood Institute for Public Innovation, Waiting for the Future, which described Youngstown as a typical community struggling to recover from the wrenching disruptions experienced with the loss of major industries. The report explained what it takes to move communities forward, including the need for organizations, like libraries, to address specific issues in ways that also builds the community’s capacity for change. “Waiting for the Future was a revelation,” said trustee Kathryn Bennett. “We saw that the library could do better than hoping people liked the services we pushed out. Harwood helped us to envision a greater sense of possibility. We could be relevant in ways that never occurred to us.”

Proof that this public commitment was durable came when the library led an unprecedented two-step referendum that asked voters to approve a 200% increase in library support after a sudden loss of state funding. Despite a highly stressed local economy, citizens passed both tax levies, validating the library’s efforts to engage authentically. Library board President David Ritchie concluded: “The library had become so important to people’s lives that they were willing to go to bat for it.”

In Dallas, Richard Harwood of the Harwood Institute told attendees of Molly Raphael’s President’s Program, “I believe libraries are needed today perhaps more than any other time in my lifetime, and I want to talk about what it will take for each of you to lead in this environment.” By making community aspirations the reference point for taking action, we open new opportunities to align our strategies.

NANCY KRANICH is special projects librarian at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey. CARLTON SEARS, former executive director of the Public Library of Youngstown and Mahoning County in Ohio, now serves at the Harwood Institute.

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Returning the Love

Beverly Goldberg — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 14:30:54 +0000

March/April 2012

By Sarah Prielipp

Isn’t it about time for librarians to reciprocate?

Can’t you just see a group of librarians gathering around the proverbial water cooler each morning to profess their love for their patrons? “We love our patrons. Yes, we do. We love our patrons. How about you?”

Okay, maybe not, but the sentiment remains. Librarians love their patrons; it’s why we do everything we do. But do our patrons really know that our efforts to save libraries, to maintain (and increase) funding, and to reevaluate our role in society as a common good do not stem from a purely selfish desire to save our jobs and paychecks, but from honestly wanting to continue providing them with these services, programs, and classes?

Recent marketing campaigns show how libraries boost their community’s economy. You’ve seen banners on the web and in your email; maybe you’ve even put a return-on-investment calculator on your library’s website. For those who prefer numbers, such a tool is great: It quantifies the library as a viable, fiscally responsible, and valuable asset. But do hard figures really reach patrons who just need a little library love?

I propose a new marketing campaign for libraries: We Love Our Patrons! We already have campaigns for patrons to express their love of libraries and librarians, yet how often do we demonstrate that the love is returned? For-profit businesses do it all the time; they call it “customer appreciation.” Libraries need to get the message out that we do all of our work out of devotion to those we serve.

Tokens of affection

A common interview question for library jobs asks the prospective employee what he or she likes about library work. Maybe you have even been asked some variation of the question for library or nonlibrary jobs. What is your answer? Why do you choose to follow a somewhat underappreciated, underpaid (at least for comparable master’s-level careers), and increasingly overworked profession? The ALA Code of Ethics explains it well; we choose our field to protect our patrons’ right to intellectual freedom and to serve people. Librarians have a good feeling when they help other people—even if those people don’t ever know they are being “helped.”

Think about the last time a friend or family member had a question about a health problem, needed a job, or was concerned about some issue. At some point, I would hazard a guess that you sought more information on that person’s behalf and offered it because you cared. That’s what librarians do every day for perfect strangers, people we may never see again. We gift them with information, however it is packaged, as a token of our appreciation and our love for their needs. Some of us even become slightly offended when our patrons turn to Google over us, even as we acknowledge that our libraries need to reimagine our services in order to meet the needs of this technological, rapidly changing society.

So how do we go about letting our patrons know we love them? We’ve already let them know how we are adding value to their lives. Now we need to let them feel the library love. It could be as simple as creating a button, hanging a banner, or adding a slogan to your email signatures that says, “We love our patrons.” Or it could be a full-blown customer appreciation event. It doesn’t matter how, but let’s make sure our patrons—any library’s most valuable asset—never question why libraries still exist. Remember: Even though we show them our love every day by providing materials, services, programs, classes, or free Wi-Fi, the message doesn’t seem to be getting through that we love our patrons at least as much as we like to think they love us.

Maybe if they valued their library as more than a service that saves them money, but also an intangible civic display of love for the community and the intellectual rights of the individuals living there, we wouldn’t have to fight so hard to preserve, protect, and defend our libraries. Because we love our patrons. Yes, yes, we do.

SARAH PRIELIPP is the tribal librarian for the Saginaw Chippewa Indian Tribe in Mount Pleasant, Michigan.

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We Need Copyright 2.0

Sanhita SinhaRoy — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 16:37:19 +0000

January/February 2012

By Neal Starkey

It’s time to put the “fair” back in “fair use”

I applaud the hard work of everyone who has tackled the thorny issues confronting libraries in the increasingly hostile ebook environment in which we find ourselves. However, I believe we are missing an essential component in any solution: copyright law reform.

At last summer’s ALA Annual Conference in New Orleans, I listened to an impassioned speech by Michael Porter, founder of libraryrenewal.org and an AL columnist, who highlighted some of the great things we are doing to try to keep up with shifting circumstances. There has been an ALA Council resolution on the issue, as well as recommendations from a presidential task force and the creation of the Digital Content in Libraries Working Group—all actions that are increasing awareness of the major issues, such as digital rights management (DRM), restrictive licensing, ebook-lending expiration dates, and the unexplained disappearance of titles from e-readers.

Don’t get me wrong: Having good relationships with publishers, authors, and everyone else in the supply chain is important. But the only way to guarantee lasting public access to the increasingly digitized intellectual wealth of the world is through the reform of copyright law. We need the creation of solid legal exemptions for libraries to break DRM and to own, circulate, and archive digital copies.

This is a radical view, I’m well aware. The Digital Millennium Copyright Act has done a lot to frame the DRM issue as an artists vs. pirates debate. Some might well try to lump librarians with the pirates if we took a collective stand in favor of DRM jailbreaking. But thanks to the positive public image libraries still enjoy, such labeling would backfire.

Most patrons do not believe they hurt an author’s profits by borrowing a book from the library. As long as we try to ensure patrons’ continued access to the digitized materials they seek, they won’t change their minds on this point.

There is little incentive for rights holders to negotiate with us in a future in which ownership, fair use, and first-sale doctrines have been replaced with rentals and licensing. In that future, rights holders get to make all the rules, which will benefit them instead of the public interest. Whether they do or don’t realize the marketing advantages of having their products in libraries, any decisions they make will be completely up to them. The recent lawsuits against Google Books Project libraries and HathiTrust may be only the start.

If we can no longer provide information to the public because of rules and fees dictated to us by the rights holders, what purpose would we serve?

A call for a new paradigm

For many years, our collective refrain has been “Not everything can be found on the internet.” While still applicable to a vast quantity of information, it is becoming less and less true every year. Perhaps our new defense should be “Not everything on the internet is free and accessible for all.” Does anything speak more to the core of our profession?

I am not a lawyer or a lobbyist, and I do not know how exactly we would reform copyright law. Maybe no one is talking about this option because it seems too daunting, but I see no other option. If we cannot secure these rights, it is not only libraries that lose but also our patrons. They will lose access to the depth and breadth of human knowledge. Without this kind of fundamental change in strategy, libraries will continue to fight a losing battle.

NEAL STARKEY is head technology director at the Tippecanoe County (Ind.) Public Library.

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RDA: Food for a Cataloger’s Soul

Beverly Goldberg — Wed, 07 Dec 2011 18:41:39 +0000

By Gabi Kupitz

How coding feeds my inner gourmand

Like many catalogers, I have been dragged to RDA. But, the other day, I had an epiphany. My mind drew a connection between RDA—at least in the way I code the beast (|erda)—and goat cheese.

Just bear with me while I explain.

I first tasted goat cheese in the ’90s, while I was the guest of some fellow bibliophiles I met at a literary conference held on the campus of Trinity College Dublin in Ireland. My colleagues wanted to skip the pubs and eat dinner in a Dublin restaurant. As I scanned the menu, the goat cheese salad (a bed of lettuce greens topped with fried goat cheese and drizzled with a viniagrette) intrigued my foodie sensibilities. I loved to try (within reason) something no one else was interested in, and my bibliophile friends were sticking to lamb, veal, Chicken Kiev (Dinner guest: “Chicken Kiev—that’s not very Irish.” Waiter: “No, but the chicken is.”), and salmon. At first, the goat cheese was a strange new flavor: strong, but not overpowering; a creamy whiteness enrobed by the crunchy outer fried fresh breadcrumb shell; little orbs of tanginess on super fresh greens. It was new and strange and earthy and delicious!

I just knew I had to track down goat cheese when I returned home—to Utah. But where in Utah was I going to find goat cheese that would remind me of what I savored in Dublin, Ireland? I searched high and low. By way of a French colleague, I found Bucheron cheese at the Liberty Heights Fresh Market in Salt Lake City, but while Bucheron is wonderful, it wasn’t the goat cheese I had experienced in Dublin, and so I continued the search.

It wasn’t until the beginning of 2000 that I found goat cheese (from Utah!) in one of my favorite grocery stores right here in Provo. I couldn’t believe my eyes! The package said the cheese was from Erda, Utah. Where in the heck (we say “heck” a lot here in Utah) is Erda? A little bit of research (I do work in an academic library) and I confirmed that Erda, Utah, indeed exists. It’s not exactly Switzerland (although Utah is a high mountain state, but with desert thrown in) and it doesn’t evoke Heidi and Grandfather and Peter and the goats. Still, Erda is home to Shepherds Dairy Products and even has a little road named Heidi Way.

Now to RDA. The other day, when I was coding a record as an RDA record, I typed in the delimiter “e” and “rda” and voila! It looked like erda (|erda), as in Erda!

From now on, whenever I have to create an RDA record, I smile and think back to Dublin and how my goat-cheese thing all got started—and I thank my lucky stars that I had that foodie (and literary) experience. But most of all, through all the drama of whether or not to implement RDA, I can anticipate picking up my favorite plain shepherds chevre (all-natural artisanal goat cheese) because my work fortuitously places a grocery-list reminder before me daily (|erda).

Thank you for helping me make that delicious connection, RDA!

GABI KUPITZ is a librarian at Brigham Young University in Provo.

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An Unplugged Space

Beverly Goldberg — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 19:32:21 +0000

November / December 2011

By Amanda Wakaruk and Marc Truitt

Would your patrons value a gadget-free quiet zone in your library?

The physical library was once a place of refuge, an escape from distraction. But today, the constant need to connect and communicate has largely rendered this role obsolete. The power of coupling networking tools with instant access to vast amounts of information is now an essential feature of library programs, services, and facilities. A library without internet and Wi-Fi access is, thankfully, an anomaly.

The traditional role of the library as a physical place where individuals find information has been largely supplanted by its function as a space where information can be interrogated in a communal environment. This is also a good thing. However, as more people use the library as a social third place (after home and work), the reality of the library as a place of intellectual refuge sadly resonates with fewer users.

In addition to being regarded as technology hubs for the public, should libraries reclaim their reputation for solitude by offering communication-free zones where people can easily engage in private, focused reading and reflection?

True, reading rooms are often quiet, but even in these spaces the average library user’s focus is punctuated by the clatter of keystrokes, visual email alerts, and the vibrations of smartphones. The effects of these constant digital distractions—variously labeled as cognition overload, online compulsive disorder, data smog, and popcorn brain—have been documented and discussed by psychologists, neuroscientists, and sociologists.¹

A growing awareness of the negative effects of digital overload (and withdrawal from it, as documented by a 2010 study conducted by the University of Maryland’s International Center for Media and the Public Agenda) has led some institutions to offer physical escape from instant-communications technology. For example, in 2009 Stephens College reintroduced a secular form of vespers that requires students to drop their cellphones at the door. In countless other institutions, professors ask students to turn off communication devices when they enter the classroom. Should libraries consider something similar?

Disconnecting, as it turns out, isn’t easy to do. We are constantly surrounded with connective devices, both our own and those belonging to people around us. Even if we can will ourselves to unplug, how do we ask the same of family, friends, or the person sitting next to us on the bus?

Libraries have a long history of utilizing differentiated spaces in their public areas, so it shouldn’t be that much of a stretch for them to incorporate areas free of digital chatter. In Hamlet’s Blackberry: A Practical Philosophy for Building a Good Life in the Digital Age (Harper, 2010), William Powers advocates for “Walden zones” in the home—disconnected spaces inspired by Thoreau’s experiment to withdraw from society while remaining within it. We suggest that this idea would be a perfectly natural one for libraries. These safe harbors would be free of the external distractions of computers, cellphones, and social networking tools, allowing sustained focus and contemplation.

Of course, barring construction of a Faraday cage, there is no way to control patrons’ use of digital communication tools. If users refuse to turn off their gadgets, the spirit of the Walden zone will fail to materialize. The million-dollar question is, of course, will library users welcome a zone of inwardness—a place to read, reflect, and possibly find meaning? (Some studies indicate that it might.) Or will the shock of self-reliant thought prove overwhelming, even for short periods of time?

AMANDA WAKARUK is government information librarian and MARC TRUITT is associate university librarian for bibliographic and information services at the University of Alberta Libraries in Edmonton.

¹ There are many people writing about this issue in both academic and popular literature, including: The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains by Nicholas Carr (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2010); Alone Together: Why We Expect More from Technology and Less from Each Other by Sherry Turkle (New York: Basic Books, 2011); Virtually You: The Dangerous Powers of the e-Personality by Elias Aboujaoude (New York: W. W. Norton, 2011); You Are Not a Gadget: A Manifesto by Jaron Lanier (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2010); and The Tyranny of E-Mail: The Four-Thousand-Year Journey to Your Inbox by John Freeman (New York: Scribner, 2009).

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Librarians and the Threat to Free Political Speech

Beverly Goldberg — Wed, 31 Aug 2011 15:18:40 +0000

September/October 2011

By Jeffrey Beall

Why librarians should back the Citizens United decision

As librarians, we support freedom of speech and freedom of access to information. In early 2010, the U.S. Supreme Court handed down a decision that increased these freedoms. Known as Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, the decision declared unconstitutional some statutory restrictions on political speech—restrictions that carried the threat of fine or imprisonment for merely engaging in political speech.

By removing those unconstitutional limits, the court’s decision brought speech and election law in line with the realities of modern mass communication, including social media and other internet-based speech. The decision overturned aged statutes that were enacted long before the internet, email, and social networking even existed.

Specifically, Citizens United overturned some limits on corporate political speech. Under the old statutes, corporations—which are essentially associations of individuals working together—were regulated as to what they could publish on their websites, in pamphlets, and on broadcast and cable media. Those opposing the decision fear that the quantity of political ads that corporations’ and labor unions’ deep pockets can fund will drown out those with less cash, even though strongly enforced regulations require disclosure of the sponsors of those ads to provide needed context.

By ruling to strike down these restrictions, the Supreme Court created a more open stage for political discourse. As librarians, we should welcome unrestricted political speech and endeavor to help make it accessible to our users.

The threat

Unfortunately, a political movement has emerged that aims to restore those restrictions on political speech. Organizations such as Move to Amend and the cleverly named Citizens United against Citizens United seek to restore statutory restrictions on political speech, including restrictions on the right of groups such as unions and corporations to publish information that explains and promotes the organizations’ points of view. In fact, Move to Amend wants to amend the U.S. Constitution so that laws criminalizing some political speech would once again be allowable.

This anti–free speech movement is the moral equivalent of a book banning by excluding political speech some find objectionable—in this case, corporate political speech. In contrast, librarians fear no speech, value the marketplace of ideas, and want to help patrons access information about all sides of political issues. We should abhor the legitimization of censorship that these groups aim to add to the Constitution.

ALA’s Intellectual Freedom Manual (7th edition) states, “Society makes an equal commitment to the right of unrestricted access to information and ideas regardless of the communication medium used, the content of work, and the viewpoints of both the author and the receiver of information.” These pro-restriction groups seek to achieve the opposite of those free-speech values by limiting access to the information citizens need and deserve in order to make voting decisions. It is akin to removing all books from a library’s collection that support a certain political view. That is censorship.

What we can do

Librarians need to understand the positive impact of Citizens United and how this decision is meritorious for lifting restrictions on political speech and supporting the values expressed in the Intellectual Freedom Manual.

Secondly, librarians need to continue doing what we do best regarding information in general and political speech in particular: Collect it, catalog it, mediate its discovery, and preserve it. Restricting political speech is anathema to the core values of librarianship; if speech from certain entities is restricted, we cannot make it available to our users.

Finally, we must collaboratively oppose the groups seeking to make it constitutional to allow restrictions on political debate in the United States. Regardless of their political values, all librarians should unite to oppose speech restrictions, censorship, and the proposed constitutional amendment that would allow the banning of some political publications, including some internet-based political speech.

JEFFREY BEALL is metadata librarian and assistant professor at the Auraria Library of the University of Colorado in Denver.

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Mentorship from Both Sides

Beverly Goldberg — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 14:05:19 +0000

July/August 2011

By Aniko Halverson Nijhoff

A role reversal makes the relationship a two-way street

Librarianship is a profession with a strong tradition of mentorship. At some point in grad school, every future librarian has the daunting assignment to “find a librarian and interview him or her about his or her job.” You groan, you sigh, you poke around on the internet, you start sending e-mails or making calls, hoping to find someone who has time for you, isn’t a fuddy-duddy old-school librarian, doesn’t look at the clock the whole time you’re sitting in their office, and maybe, just maybe, will even inspire you, just a little bit.

My own mentor is someone I sought out before I decided to go back to school for my MLIS. Maryly is retired now; she held a position for years that for her was really more of a crusade, and anyone who knows her will tell you she defies definition. Throughout the years she sent me inspirational notes that would sound preachy coming from anyone else, but she’s Maryly, considered to be an institution in her own right. I was fortunate to have her around to give me the push at the very beginning and then to have her on my side all along.

Among the handful of library school students who contacted me as a prospective mentee over the last 15 years, Madeleine stands out—not only because of our memorable first meeting and the longstanding friendship that ensued, but also now, because of what she has taught me, as we have in effect traded places in the mentoring relationship.

I can’t remember just when she first contacted me with an “I found your CV on the internet, can I meet you?” sort of message. At the time she was a hip fact-checker for glossy architecture magazines, and I immediately liked her and knew she’d make an enthusiastic, open-minded librarian—just what this profession needs, I thought, imagining her picture on a future ALA READ poster. Maddy became a true friend and later a part-time colleague, and is now a children’s and young adult librarian, as well as a tireless activist for a major urban public library system. I can only hope I played even the tiniest, most miniscule part in any of her successes, even if I simply told her “Do it!” on the day I met her.

Now, years later, I have given up my job to move to the Netherlands, and I’m in need of a professional reinvention because of the dearth of library jobs here. For months I have been looking for a job where I can speak English until I achieve academic-level Dutch—and what should happen to present itself but a librarian position at a private school, with a 90-minute commute. It is not my ideal situation, but it has its merits. The school is interested because of my credentials, but I need to demonstrate how I can handle the students. How will I prepare for the interviews, which involve library lessons for kindergartners and 1st-graders? My simple strategy: Write to my former mentee and ask for her guidance.

Of course as soon as I ask, adroit Maddy sends me links, book lists, copious instructions, go-get-’em pep talks, all off the top of her head. Now she’s the professional in this equation. She is inspired. She inspires me. She convinces me: I can do this. During my interviews, Maddy becomes the voice in my head, allowing me to combine what I already know with her knowledge for this new context. Because of her, I am confident.

This experience—turning to my former mentee for advice—has shown me a new ideal to which mentorship can aspire: that we can learn from, and depend on, each other. In our case there has indeed been a completely circular aspect to the exchange of ideas, and the mentoring relationship has morphed into a total role reversal. This can happen if you’re lucky enough to foster and maintain the relationships you’ve made. Isn’t this great? I’m being coached by the person whom I once had the privilege to coach!

Relationships like this can only come about when we give attention to future generations. “Service to the profession” is a phrase that is tossed about, often in job descriptions or performance reviews, but many of us take it lightly, or as an afterthought to our “real” responsibilities. Ask yourself if you really believe in it. No matter what you do or how busy you are, you were new to the profession once, in need of support. Were you fortunate enough to have someone to welcome and guide you?

I have witnessed the “I don’t have time” mentality from colleagues and professional acquaintances, and it is a truly damaging attitude. Librarians who don’t have time for library school students must not be able to see past next week, nor must they care about whether the profession should someday meet its demise.

This experience has shown me that the “willingness to give to those who have given to us” aspect of librarianship is a critical part of true mentorship and is one of the rewards of our profession. Indeed, each of us has the ability to benefit substantially if we do our part to uphold the foundation of the universe, to paraphrase Maya Angelou. I’m privileged to have participated in the process of mentoring and to have gained surprising and substantial benefits from it, both as a working librarian and as a job-hunter.

And, yes, the school offered me the job.

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