Starbucks in the Library??

Hi there!

I think Barnes & Noble started the whole thing.

Back in the old days, you just couldn’t READ in a bookstore. That was just far too dangerous. If you allow people to read a book, in a place that sells books, then what motivation would you possibly have to actually BUY one? Bookstores weren’t free. In the more dictatorial bibliographic establishments, they’d actually remind people of this:

“Hey! This ain’t a LIE-BERRY, pal!“.

But then B&N did something to change all that.

Coffee shops.

They started to include tasty beverages and sweet confections. Comfy chairs were provided. At first, some patrons were perplexed. “What are the comfy chairs for?” they’d ask. The friendly Barnes & Noble staff would inform people that yes, the chairs were for sitting. The coffee was for drinking. Patrons were allowed, nay encouraged, to sit and enjoy a caffeinated drink while reading a new book. It was a new experience for most of us.

Some people would  go on to actually purchase those books that they had perused while in Barnes & Noble, and some would not. But by cultivating a more welcoming atmosphere, Barnes & Noble began to style itself as a “third space”; A place where people would go to just “hang out”. For years, this was a successful business model for them, and some other large bookselling chains began to follow suit.

So where do libraries fit in to all of this?

Libraries have always been styled as quiet places of contemplative study. Loud social behavior was never something to be tolerated in such austere institutions of self-education as these. How do you think librarians got that whole shushing reputation? But in recent years, librarians have begun to work at the cracks in our mold. We’ve begun to fight the stereotype. If bookstores are beginning to emulate the community center feel of a library, librarians have followed suit by recreating the free, shopping-mall atmosphere of a bookstore. We sell coffee and tasty treats now. We offer free wireless. We host video-game nights, film nights, and other community-driven activities. We host art and culture events that have very little to do with reading or education.  Libraries are transforming right before our eyes, whether we like it or not.

Some people don’t like it. 😦

When the Kean University Library opened it’s full-scale Starbucks, there was opposition. A lot of it. Some people complained about the noise from the espresso machines disrupting the peace of the main lobby. Some complain that by introducing food into a library, we’re endangering our precious tomes with the threat of coffee stains and greasy fingerprints. Others complain that by opening up a Starbucks in our educational facility, we are exposing ourselves to corporate interests. Some librarians (such as myself) see the introduction of a Starbucks as a clear and present danger to the integrity of our waistline.

... and clearly I need to watch my girlish figure ...

From an administrative standpoint, this Starbucks has become a shining jewel in the crown of the campus. The University President rarely hesitates to bring visitors to our coffee bean mecca. The fact that there is a library connected to the Starbucks is very nearly incidental. We seem to have become a footnote to the campus image. Tragic as this is, having a Starbucks in the building has greatly increased our foot traffic. Although some students walk directly into the store and then right out of the building again, many others stay, sip their beverage, and actually find a quiet corner to study. (away from the espresso machines)

But my question is, does this increase in foot traffic come at a price? Are we “corporatizing” our library by letting Starbucks do their business here? Is there a conflict of interests in working so closely with such a business? If someone were to write a book-length scathing expose of cafe chains, (the way that Eric Schlosser did with Fast Food Nation) would we be disinclined to carry this book?

Personally, things like noise and coffee stains don’t bother me. There are plenty of quiet spaces in our library, and after all, we let people take their books home, where they might potentially spill coffee and/or confections on them. But when people begin to wonder if libraries are giving too much corporate control to our beloved institution, I have to sit up and listen. I actually love our new Starbucks, and I have been utterly seduced by the siren song of their venti white chocolate mochas [mochae? mochii??] But has that turned me into little more than corporate shill?

The other side of the argument, of course, is that this is actually the goal. As more and more libraries get nickel-and-dimed from fiscal budgets,  some librarians begin to wonder if corporate sponsorship is the way to go. Do we owe it to our patrons to partner our libraries with corporate interests, if it will help to put books on the shelves and patrons in the building? How long is it before your municipality hosts the “PNC BANK Memorial Library”, or the “Time/Warner Media Center? Is that the goal?

And it’s not like we don’t do business with private companies anyway. We all do free advertising for names like EBSCO, ProQuest, and Innovative any time someone uses a catalog. What’s one more brand name?

I’m not too sure. I’m just going to sit here and eat my red velvet whoopie pie until I figure it out. 😦

That's totally NOT an evil sneer that I see on those delicious little monsters, right? Riiiight ...??

Teacher of the Year Award

Hi there!

So there’s this scene at the end of the 1997 movie In & Out …

For those few of you who haven’t seen the movie, it plays out like this: [spoilers ahead] Kevin Kline plays a small-town high school English teacher. He is an inspiration to his students and a beacon of the community. At the beginning of the movie, the small town is brimming with excitement because one of their native sons has gone on to fame and fortune as a Hollywood Actor (Matt Dillon) and is now up for an Academy Award.  Matt Dillon wins the Oscar for playing a gay soldier, and during his acceptance speech he thanks his old English teacher Kevin Kline for inspiring him to pursue his dreams. After an eloquent speech, Matt Dillon decides to add: “… and he’s GAY!” to the end.

I swear I am going to link this to Library Science.

This causes an uproar in the small town, as Kevin Kline, despite being the most effeminate guy in town, denies being gay. He’s getting MARRIED in a week for cripes’ sake. Turns out, that it was just an honest mistake on the part of Matt Dillon, and that he didn’t mean to out Kevin Kline’s character at all. He just assumed that the guy was gay. Apparently this becomes a correct assumption as Kevin Kline, after a lifetime of denial, finally realizes that he is, in fact, fruitier than a Hawaiian salad. He drops this bomb on his lovely fiancee as they’re standing at the altar. (probably not the best time) This hurts his family and friends, and causes him to get suspended from his job as a high school teacher.

Library comparison, coming up, really, I promise …

So it’s at the graduation, and Kevin Kline is there, despite having lost his teaching job, and there is a “Teacher of the Year Award” being given to this annoying doofus of a colleague. The colleague prepares to give his Teacher of the Year acceptance speech, (something about “Hoosiers”) when Matt Dillon shows up and rallies the community in honoring the teacher who gave so much to their community and is an inspiration to their students.

Okay, here it comes …

“Ahhh … but he didn’t get the Teacher of the Year Award!” Kline’s idiotic colleague says smugly, “I‘ve got the Teacher of the Year Award!!”

Watch the scene here:

I’ve always loved that scene, but I’ll admit that the “Bad Guy” teacher always seems to come off as a little bit of a schmuck. Intentionally, I’m sure. I mean, yeah, he’s got every right to be happy about his “Teacher of the Year Award”, and he’s probably a great instructor if he came in second after: “The teacher who inspired his student to give an Oscar-winning performance in a major motion picture”. But for the purposes of the narrative, he’s just a little bit douchey.

That’s what scares me about the future of Library Science.

(What?! Library Science!? What the Holy Blue @#$% does that have to do with Library Science?!)

It’s just … sometimes when the clueless public brings up the obsolescence of librarians, and they start talking about the efficiency of Google and the growing reliability of Wikipedia and the immediate gratification of the Internet in general; I feel like librarians are saying: “Ahhh … but that doesn’t help patrons get peer-reviewed resources! We’ve got peer-reviewed resources!!”.  Well yeah, Google Scholar has peer-reviewed resources; and it’s getting more every day. “Ahhh but the patrons can’t effectively assess reliable resources from biased and dubious claims! We can evaluate the resources based on our experience and knowledge!”. Well patrons can pretty much do that already. Oh sure, you’ve got dumb patrons who are still using the 1979 World Book for their country study on Russia, but a lot of patrons know how to at least get to the CIA World Factbook online. [pause] There, I just checked, it’s the #2 hit on Google when you type in “Russia”. I’m willing to believe that there are patrons who are clever enough to check the second Google hit when doing a research paper. Doing a book report on “Coraline”? No problem, I’ve got Neil Gaiman friended on Facebook, and now Google+.

Patrons are smarter, more critical, and better at finding information than we give them credit for. Many librarians know this, and aren’t trying to be wizened sages of the stacks, dispensing information from on high like some kind of outdated oracle. We GET it.

But I don’t think we should necessarily dismiss the threat of a smarter caliber of patrons joining forces with the enhanced capabilities of the Internet attempting to push us into obsolescence.

Not even with our Teacher of the Year Awards. 😦

Thoughts??

Video Librarianship for fun and profit.

Hi there!

Very Recently, Google unveiled the newest contender in the great Social Networks Wars. Google+ has broken out on the scene with all the fanfare of the season’s Rookie of the Year, finally breaking out of the Minors with a very promising career ahead of him. Google+ is what you get when you take Facebook out of the dog park and send it to obedience school.  What Google+ will become, however, remains to be seen.

But this post isn’t about Google+, it’s about videoconferencing.

One of Google+’s most interesting features is something called the “hangout”.

The hangout is a videoconferencing feature that you can use to communicate with any of your G+ friends. You can limit your conversation to certain circles, you can videochat with only a certain person, or you can just expose yourself to the world of Google+ at large, like a shameless video exhibitionist.

Would YOU trust a shady character like this?

Google+’s new video communication format, much like Skype and TokBox before it, provides a shining example of exactly The Future^[tm] that we were promised as children. Whenever we would talk to Grandma on the phone as kids, or to our girlfriends/boyfriends as teens, we knew that we were confined to an audio-only format. The very concept of “telephone” was that it was sorely lacking in visual. Being able to see the person on the other end of the line was something for the Future. We just weren’t there yet.  That was something for the The Jetsons, in their far-off 21st century existence, full of rocket-cars and hi-rise glass-covered condos in the stratosphere.

Notice that Jane had a Roomba before they were even invented! 😉

Welcome to the Future!

Now we have several different ways to communicate by video, we can chat on the phone with people anywhere in the world, complete with a video feed. Webcams have become standard issue on most laptops, and it’s pretty simple to set up an account on Ustream, or any number of video chat services. After Google+ demonstrated that “Hangouts” were viable, Facebook initiated its own video chat service accessible to all users. Video chat is all around us. We can have Grandma tuck our kids into bed at night with a reading from Dr. Seuss, we can have a business conference from the privacy of our home, we can videochat with any number of entrepreneurial young women who use their webcam for … er, business purposes. [blush]

So why don’t we have video librarianship yet?

I’m pretty sure that I’m in the minority here. Personally, I would love to be able to chat with patrons over a video feed. As a veteran of virtual reference chat, I enjoy meeting patrons online and sending them links to fulfill their information needs.  But I can’t help but to feel that there’s something missing from text chat.  Without the friendly smiling face of a happy human librarian, the reference interview takes on a different tenor. Oh sure, there are shortcuts and clever IM techniques to use to avoid aliening your patron. (use of smileys, constant flow of information, etc) But I’ve always felt that it might be helpful for a patron to actually SEE the person that they’re chatting with. Yet for some reason, we’re simply not doing this. Why the heck not? I think Miss Felicia Day might have a clue …

”]There seems to be a prevalent fear of one’s own image when seen in an online format. People who think nothing of walking up to the local fast food joint in a ratty old t-shirt, gym shorts and [shudder] Crocs; suddenly become very self-conscious and image-aware when faced with the judgmental eye of the webcam.  It’s as if “being seen” takes on a whole new level of scrutiny when it’s a camera’s gaze. Of course, “camera-shyness” is nothing new. The eyes of the general public are not nearly as frightening as the unflinching eye of “The Camera”.

But a webcam isn’t at all like a “spy camera”. Unless you subscribe to some bizarre conspiracy theories, it is the user who controls exactly what the camera sees. It isn’t a patron cornering you in your kitchen unawares. A video librarian would most likely use the webcam at his or desk, while dressed for work, with hair and makeup presentable. Even a videolibrarian working from home could take steps to set his or her workspace up so that it would be presentable to the most casual viewer.  You could even set up stage lighting.

The benefit to this would be a human face presented to the patron. No need to worry about the vocal cues and inflections that are lost in text chat. The ability to use gestures and facial expressions to the patron would enable you to convey a greater range of information to the hapless user on the other side of the monitor. Additionally, the use of visual aids would assist communication in other ways. Sometimes the only way to explain something to someone is to draw them a picture. This works both ways of course. If a patron needs to show you something to illustrate what they are looking for, they can do that with video chat.

And yet video reference just hasn’t caught on. Perhaps it’s just something that the patrons haven’t been receptive to. Maybe I’m just an attention whore and most librarians prefer the anonymity of their own little corner of the reference area. Perhaps some communities just have more stalkery patrons that don’t need the encouragement. What do you all think? Have any of you TRIED videoreference with less-than-optimal results? Or is it just not worth the time and energy? Let me know! Maybe we can discuss it on a Google+ hangout! 😉

Or maybe it's just bad memories from Back to the Future 2?? 😦

I will update this blog and keep up with it, damn it!

… just not today. [sleeps]

“… for want of a 20oz. soda, the kingdom was lost …”

Hi there!

This is one of those things that bothers me and only me.  It involves giving people free crap.

The year was 1994, or possibly 1993.  I was working in a small but distinguished movie theater in Eatontown, NJ.  I’m not going to mention the company that I worked for, but many of you know this particular theater chain. It had an awesome little jingle at the beginning of each film they showed, exhorting you to recline in your seat, and to relish your theater-going experience.  You can probably guess the theater chain of which I speak.

So … in the early 90s, this particular theater chain instituted a new policy to handle any grievances that might occur to spoil the theater-goers potential enjoyment of the film.  It was called the “Reel Sorry” policy. Maybe this theater still does this. I don’t know.  If any of you have received a “reel sorry” ticket in the past 1o years, please let me know, I’m curious.  The procedure went like this:  If at any time, a customer felt like they were being inconvenienced, the employees of this theater chain were empowered to give the patron a ticket that said:

“We’re ‘REEL’ sorry that you had a negative experience. Please enjoy a free 20 oz. drink courtesy of [theater chain]”.

If the popcorn machine broke down? “Reel sorry” ticket.  The audio on the film was woogy? “Reel sorry” ticket.  Forced to stand in line for Twizzlers for five minutes because we’re just too damn slow? “Reel sorry” ticket. Screaming child sitting next to you because some brilliant candidate for the Parent of the Year award decided to bring their toddler to see Pulp Fiction? “Reel sorry” ticket.  It was actually a brilliant strategy.

By now some of you have seen the flaw in this policy. Believe me, so did we. When the High and Mighty District Manager came down to associate with the plebes, and to explain this policy to us, a few of us didn’t think it would work.  We were given absolute power to issue a free soda ANY time a customer got whiny.  It didn’t even matter if it was a legitimate reason.  We were each given an entire pad of these coupons and could rip them off indiscriminately and give them away.  We could paper the town with “Reel Sorry” tickets.

“Okay, so let me get this straight”, I asked the High and Mighty District Manager, (oooh what a rebel I was!) ” … so what if some guy is standing at the back of the lobby like this: [I stood and folded my arms] And let’s say he’s watching all the other customers order popcorn and soda and stuff … And then five minutes later, he walks up to the counter, and says: ‘ Yo, I been waitin’ here fer over FIVE minutes, where’s my free goddamn soda?’; what do we do THEN?”.

And as the High and Mighty District Manager looked like he was trying to formulate an answer for me, our Store Manager, a crotchety old badass by the name of Mervyn LaParr, said to me: “If that happens, you look that guy right in the face, and you say to him: “I am REEL SORRY that you had to wait so long, sir. Here, have a free 20 oz. drink on us.  We’ll try not to let it happen again …”

And it was genius.

It acknowledged the fact that YES, some people are going to try to rook the system. And YES, it’s not fair. But YES, you treat those people exactly like you would any other customer.  Because if you stop being kind and considerate to the customers who were genuinely inconvenienced just because a few assholes try to ruin it for everyone, then the jerkfaces have WON.  By giving one knucklehead a free soda, and by letting THEM know, that YOU know that they’re being a big old poopiehead, you are now free to give out free beverages to the people who actually deserve it.

This policy actually informs much of my adult beliefs.  I am willing to let someone get away with something for free if it lets me give free stuff to the people that appreciate it.  I don’t care if a library patron isn’t technically a student.  If I can help someone, I will, as long as it doesn’t interfere with my assistance of the people who pay to come here.  If I give money to a homeless person, I don’t care if he or she is going to spend it on booze, as long as it gives me the freedom to also give money to actual hungry people.

But I think that humans as a species have this terrible tendency to let the jerkfaces and assholes of the world prevent them from doing good.  People think: “I can’t be nice to any ONE person, because then some jackass is going to take advantage of my kindness”,  “If I offer a free service to patrons, it’s going to be used by NON-patrons”, “If we let illegals into this country, they’re going to take services from American citizens”.  I’m just not bothered by these things.  It’s probably just my childlike naivete, but I don’t want to let the fear that someone’s going to be “getting away with something” prevent me from being nice to people.

And if you think I’m wrong, and you disagree with me, and think that I’m just being a naive Liberal airhead? … Then, please, accept this free 20 oz. drink as an apology for disrupting your day. I’m … real sorry. 😦

Acting Normal …

So …

Has anyone here ever been to Old Man Rafferty’s in New Brunswick? If you’ve been to Rutgers, you’re probably familiar with the place.  It’s a nice little place with good meals and awesome desserts.  There’s another one that just opened up in Asbury Park.  Great place.

The best thing about O.M.R.?  They place great value upon the concept of “dessert”.  Their desserts are amazing.  Crafted by some of the finest pastry chefs in New Jersey.  When you open the menu, it says right up top: “Life is Uncertain, Eat Dessert First!”.  To encourage you to take this Carpe Diem approach to your meal, the desserts are listed FIRST on the menu, then the appetizers, then the entrees.

When most people read this suggestion, they think: “Ha! That’s awesome!”. They turn to their dining companions and say: “Hey did you check out the menu? Life is Uncertain, Eat Dessert First? Isn’t that awesome?”.  Their dining companions will laugh and agree.  What a great philosophy.  Maybe we SHOULD take a more proactive approach to our own lives.  Maybe we should all live with the passion, the very élan vital , that this simple menu endorses?  Maybe this is the right idea?  The diner companions all nod and laugh and agree that life really is uncertain, and that the world would be a better place if we all just ate dessert first.

But then the waiter/tress comes around, and the first person says that they’d like to start with an order of mozzarella sticks, followed by a turkey club, and a Sam Adams to drink.  The waiter/tress proceeds to the next person, and before long, everyone has enjoyed a good meal, and is looking forward to dessert.  The dessert that they’re having last.

Why are they having dessert last? Well, because you’re supposed to have dessert last.  As the Teacher says: “How can you have your pudding if you haven’t eaten any meat?“.  We are raised to believe that if you have your dessert first, well then you really haven’t EARNED it.  You’re not worthy of that dessert. You just want to have your cake, and eat it too.  What would actually happen if you tried to order dessert first?

“Bob, what the Hell are you doing?”
“I’m … ordering the red velvet cheesecake …”
“Look … Bob, don’t be a douche. Just order your food like a normal person”.
“But … it said that we could order dessert first, so I’m ordering dess–“.
“Yeah, we know what the menu says, Bob. Just order your food, you’re gonna screw up our whole order”.
“But …”
[to waiter/tresss]: “He’ll have the Chicken Cordon Bleu and a Guinness. Don’t listen to him, he’s … special”.

Crisis will have been averted, and Bob will eat his food like a normal person. He’ll probably be wondering: “How would that have screwed anybody up?  Why would the presence of a dessert on the table spoil anyone else’s dinner? Maybe it would throw off the schedule of the meal? But if that was the case, they could just make sure to ask the waitress until everyone was done with their entree before bringing out Bob’s entree. (but after he finished his dessert)

The next time they went out to dinner, Bob would make sure to order his food like a normal person.  Someone might facetiously blurt out:  “Oh no, BOB’s here, I guess we all order dessert FIRST this time, right!?”.  Group laughter, everybody looks at Bob sympathetically, and they go back to their ordinary lives of eating meals in the proper order as God intended.

Sometimes, I know exactly how Bob feels. 😦

OHAI!

Hi there!

Yes I know. I haven’t updated this site since last May, so sue me. But I think that part of the reason for that; is that when I originally conceived this blog, it was intended to be a blog of LIBRARY stuffs.  I didn’t want to sully the integrity of this blog by including political views, naughty words, and shameless self-promotion.

Well that ends now.

I’m going to revive this blog, and continue to post stuff here, but it’s not going to be all library stuff.  Oh sure, if I notice something weird and wonderful in the ever-changing field of Library Science, I’ll be sure to mention it here, but I want to be a little more candid in this blog.  Don’t worry, I’m not going to post nekkid pictures of myself, or give anyone detailed descriptions of a dream I had involving Gretchen Mol, a garden hose, and a five-tiered wedding cake.  I’m just going to use this space to talk more about … stuff.

Naturally, it’s still going to be called “Librarian in Real Life”, since I am a Librarian, and this is Real Life.  I’m just going to start focusing more on the latter than the former. Okee?

Cheers! 🙂

Future of the English Language

Hi there!

This post isn’t really about libraries, but it DOES involve language and linguistics, so I feel that it relates somewhat.  Recently, I was grousing like a crotchety old man about the decline of the English Language in modern American society.  The truth is, I honestly don’t think that the English language is declining. In fact, I think it’s never been stronger.  Before I get into any of this, bear in mind that I have NEVER taken a formal Linguistics class. I’ve taken classes in the History of the English Language, but never the kind of intense Linguistics where we study things like glottal stops and bi-labial fricatives.  So I might be completely off base here. Linguists in the audience? Please let me know!

First, a little history …

A few years ago, I was flummoxed by a library patron who politely asked me if we had any translations of King Lear. Because, she informed me:  “These books are all in Old English“.

You could probably hear the tendons snapping in my neck as I struggled to keep my jaw shut.

Those of you who have studied Beowulf in its original language doubtlessly know what I’m talking about.  Old English is not about “prithee”s and “Thou”s, and “yea verily”s.  Real Old English looks like this:

“ac hine se modega  mæg Hygelaces
hæfde be honda;  wæs gehwæþer oðrum
lifigende lað.  Licsar gebad
atol æglæca;  him on eaxle wearð
syndolh sweotol,  seonowe onsprungon,
burston banlocan.  Beowulfe wearð
guðhreð gyfeþe;  scolde Grendel þonan
feorhseoc fleon  under fenhleoðu,
secean wynleas wic;  wiste þe geornor
þæt his aldres wæs  ende gegongen”.

… and with that, Beowulf didst dispatch the creature Grendel liketh last week’s coffee grounds.  Mmmm, good stuff.

Old English, or Anglo-Saxon if you please, is much closer to its Germanic roots, and therefore looks much more … German.  In the Middle ages, as the Christian Church gained prominence, elements of Latin began to seep into Middle English.  The reason for this was that many schools and universities were run by the clergy.  Since Latin was the language of the Church, English morphed into something resembling German with Latin rules of Grammar.  This is where we start to see a split between the English of the “common folk”, and the English of the nobility.  The low-born people would use words such as: “smart”, “moon” or “water”, which are Germanic.  The educated, high-born folk would use words like: “intelligent”, “lunar”, or “aqua”.  As a result, the Latin-derived words just sound “smarter” than the Germanic, to modern ears.  This is also from where we derrive our “curse-words”.  When discussing such impolite topics such as “excrement”, or “fornication”, we use the Latinate words, which sound much more polite and clinical. You most likely already know the Germanic forms of those words.

Middle English is a little easier to grok.  For the most part, it uses words with which we’re all familiar.  Following is my favorite scene from The Miller’s Tale:  (because I am apparently 12 years old)

This Nicholas / was ri{s}en for to pi{ss}e
And thoghte / he wolde amenden al the Iape
He sholde ki{ss}e his ers / er |þt|/ he scape
And vp the wyndow / dide he ha{s}tely
And out his ers / he putteth pryuely
Ouer the buttok / to the haunche bon
And ther with / spak/ this clerk/ this Ab{s}olon
Spek swete herte / I noot noght wher thow art/
This Nicholas / anoon leet fle a fart/
As greet/ as it hadde been a thonder dent/
That with the strook/ he was almoo{s}t yblent/

This bit of text comes to us courtesy of the late 1300s.  Old, Middle, and Early Modern English were very flexible forms of communication, and therefore constantly in flux.  The language doubtlessly went through many transitions between Gardena in Geardagum and that Aprill with his shoures soote.  But what will happen to our English of today?

Common wisdom holds that in a few hundred years hence, people will no longer be able to understand the English of today.  Likewise, Future English will most likely be unrecognizable to speakers of Modern English.  Since language is constantly changing, our great-great-great-great-great-grandchildren will form their own twisted version of the English of our forebears.

Really?

I understand why the English language changed so much between 700 c.e. and 1380 c.e.  Speakers of English would simply change the language as they went along.  It was like a game of telephone.  Each generation would speak a little differently from the previous generation.  Regional accents probably figured into this.  A Medieval villein from Cornwall might not even have been able to understand someone of equal rank speaking in Northumberland.  Small towns and shires would be crucibles of local dialect.  As long as Bob the Baker could understand Bill the Farmer in your local town, it wasn’t important to obey strict rules of grammar.

But in our enlightened modern age, communication isn’t limited to localities.  We have global communication networks now.  A suburban librarian in New Jersey might have every reason to communicate with a teacher in California.  That person might use the word: “Dude” a few more times than I, and complain that I jam my words together quickly in a sentence, but the basic English is the same.  When children learn English for the first time, of course they will be modeling their speech on the English used by mummy and daddy.  But they’ll also be mirroring the speech of Anakin Skywalker, Clark Kent, and even SpongeBob.   The cultural tongue is defined by mass media, every bit as much as it is by our peers.  Yes, we will still have slang in the future, but slang is always used alongside proper speech.  When my peers used the phrase: “Totally Radical” in high school in the 80s, it never replaced the word “great” in common parlance.  Even well-used words like “cool” have assimilated their way into English without ever replacing proper English grammar.

As for “new words for new things”, I do understand that we’ll need those too.  No one used the word: “Internet” 25 years ago, because it didn’t exist as we know it today.  Words like “telephone”, “computer”, and “fiber-optic” are newer words, but they describe new things.   Words like “chair”, “sugar”, and “esophagus” are not likely to change in the future, for the simple reason that we’re not going to have an army of Normans simultaneously conquer all of the English speaking peoples of the world.

Are we finally seeing the solidification of the English Language? Has our mother tongue reached an equilibrium, where our 29th Century ancestors will speak something close to the same English that we do today? Yes I realize that they’ll be watching SpongeBob on a 3D neural virtual interface projector thingy, but will the language itself have changed much?

and will teenagers still write the contraction for “you are” as y-o-u-r? [fumes]

NJ Library Dungeonmaster seeks gaming group!

Hi there!

I’m back! Did you miss me? 😀

…

Um, okay, I’ll get to the content. (Wow, tough crowd)

So my latest crazy idea involves gaming in the library. You’ve probably guessed that already.  I’ve been blogging over at 8-bit Library in my spare time, and that allows me to talk about gaming in the library. Video gaming, specifically.

But I’m actually interested in the Old School gaming of my youth.  Over at the Wizards of the Coast website, (the fine people who bring us Dungeons & Dragons) they have an entire page dedicated to playing Dungeons & Dragons in your library.  They provide links and resources that inform librarians how to start a full-fledged D&D campaign right in their library.   This actually makes a lot of sense.  Hell, playing tabletop role-playing games was one of the things that got me IN to my library in the first place!  It was immersive, it had adventure, it used historical facts and figures.   If I’m storming the castle of the Dread Lord Garamond, and I need to know how close I have to be to destroy the ghost tower on the NorthWest corner, I need to know how far a medium-sized trebuchet can hurl a boulder.  If I’m creating an adventure for my players, and I want it to have some genuine medieval intrigue and mystery, I might look to the history of the Borgias for inspiration.  Libraries and role-playing games just go together.  Libraries even have conference rooms where a group of players can meet weekly for some good old-fashioned adventuring.

Unfortunately, my own library isn’t interested in having a regular gaming group. So I thought I’d put the call out there. I’m limited to middle New Jersey, and my work hours aren’t very amenable to gaming most of the time. But hey, I have a blog, so I thought I’d give it a shot.  Anybody interested?

I promise that if you invite me to your library for a hosted gaming session, that I’m not a weirdo psycho crazy person that will bring shame and misfortune upon your library. I’m actually quite civil. [nods]

Fetishizing the Library (Part 2 of 2)

Hi there!

So yesterday I spoke about the old school library, and how Google threatens to destroy us all. Today, I’ve got a few ideas about how to remedy this situation.  I don’t know if I have any NEW ideas, but I certainly hope to start a conversation.

As we all know, we as librarians are under no threat from the likes of Google (or other search engines).   Google has a very clever algorithm for sorting through results, but it honestly can’t compete with a good old-fashioned librarian when it comes to getting the kinds of information that people need.   A librarian is a consultant, someone who can guide the user step-by-step, eliminating false positives, and fine-tuning the search until all that’s left are the patron’s perfect results.    This is the type of interaction that librarians strive for.  When we complete a search, and the patron is looking up at us with glowing adoration in their eyes because we’ve just shown the mastery of our research skills, when the patron thanks us, and shakes our hand and promises to send us cookies every Christmas from now until their dying day, it kinda makes us feel warm and fuzzy inside.  That’s the reference interaction that makes it all worth it.  We feel validated.  It makes all those years of slogging through our MLIS degree worth it.  In these moments, we know deep in our hearts that the world NEEDS us.  That there will always be a place for librarians, no matter what the cynics say.

Yet I fear that these types of reference interactions are slowly becoming fewer and farther between.   With the rise of the Internet, people are simply becoming more savvy.

I remember in the old days, when I was the only person at my workplace who understood the concept of e-mail.  I remember the questions that I used to get when I would explain to someone that they could write to anyone on the planet, as long as that other person had an e-mail address.

“Okay, how much is this gonna cost me?”
“Huh?”
“[sigh] I’m sending them a letter, right?”
“Well … yes! Yes you are”.
“So who pays for it?”
“Well, it’s … free”.*
“You mean to tell me that I’m writing a letter, that this letter is going across PHONE lines, and no one’s making money off of this?”
“Well, I guess someone is, but you don’t have to pay any–“.
“Yeah, I don’t buy that. You must be getting scammed somewheres.  I’m just gonna type this out the normal way and use a stamp”.

But in these days, no one even questions e-mail.  No one thinks twice about the fact that they can read newspaper and magzine articles online, free of charge.  No one questions that they can look at family photos online without going to a photo-mat.  We all just take it for granted now.

So what happens when doing online research becomes second nature to people?

Will this ever happen? You tell me.  Maybe I’m giving the user too much credit.  But I feel that most people know how to page through Google results until they find what they’re looking for.  I feel that a lot of people can tell the difference between a reliable, well-researched web site, and something thrown together to promote a specific agenda.   I mean sure, we all know that facts  are facts, and once you’ve determined the reliability of a source, you know that it’s the TRUTH, right? So what are the facts about climate change?  About abortion? Are human being descended from apes, or were they designed by a creator? Is marijuana a harmless drug, or can it irrevocably destroy your brain functions?  The answers to all of these questions depend on which side of the political fence you stand, don’t they?  In this day and age, it’s gotten to the point where people almost have to carefully pick through every single news item they read to determine its reliability.  Is Barack Obama a secret Communist sleeper agent bent on destroying the America we all know and love, or is he the savior of the American dream?  You probably don’t believe either of these things, but they might certainly affect the way you read a news article about him.

This dichotomy in our country is probably a terrible thing, but I feel like it’s creating a new type of library patron.  People are more skeptical now.  We analyze information carefully.  The popularity of websites like Snopes, and of TV shows like Mythbusters, demonstrates that people crave this kind of truth-seeking information.  Our field seems to have boomed in recent years, with MLIS programs churning out more graduates than we know what to do with.  Everybody wants to be a librarian these days, because everybody knows how to find information!

I could be totally wrong about this.  It’s possible that people are as dense as ever when it comes to information-seeking, and that we as librarians still need to serve as guides through the perilous jungles of modern library research.  I hope I’m right about people, simply because I like to think that we’re evolving as a species.  But I could be over-estimating people, right?  Even though it would conceivably put me out of a job. 😦

So what should librarians do instead?  I’m glad you asked. [grin]

In our last installment, I spoke about the most idealized concept of library research.  I invoked the image of an avuncular old wizard delving through dungeons in search of information.   I thought about stacks of books piled high, and Gandalf the Grey sitting there amongst ancient tomes, with a churchwarden pipe and cup of warm tea.  This is what I think a library should be.

Now, I’m not saying that your small local library should allow pipe-smoking, and I don’t want any of you piling books in a scattered, byzantine fashion.  But what if a library were more about the space than the books? What if a library were a place where people could go to … escape?   I would love to open a privately-owned library, where people could pay a membership to just hang out.   I’m imagining a library as created by the imagineers at DisneyWorld.  Where it would be okay to sit for hours with a cup of tea and recline in full-backed antique chairs.  The kind of place where you’d expect to see a wizard rummaging through old steamer trunks stocked with maps and charts.  I want a Victorian library with great glass windows and a bust of Pallas over the door frame.   I want there to be a coffee bar with a leviathan Steampunk cappuccino machine.  Alternatively, I could imagine a library going the exact opposite way, with giant LCD screens and space-age ergonomic chairs.  A cyber-library with alien architecture and leading edge computer systems with virtual reality banks and holographic projectors wired into the ceiling. I want going to a library to be an adventure, with marvels and mysteries around every turn.

Or … is that just a ridiculous adolescent fantasy with no possibility in the real world? 😦

Again, if there are always going to be libraries, (and really, I hope there are) there should always be a public library where someone can just go to use a computer or check out a book.  But I feel that libraries should also be free to explore other options.  I don’t want a library to look like every other public building I’ve ever seen, with the same chairs on the same carpet in front of the same computers.  I want a library that makes me feel like I’m in a fantasy novel.  The kind of library that isn’t competing with modern online search engines, because it’s an experience, rather than a resource.  If every restaurant looked like a college cafeteria, most people would just stay home.  But restaurants today invoke a mood. Modern restaurants have themes.  I just want to apply that kind of spectacle to libraries as well.

Is that so wrong? 😦

So tell me what you think. That’s my latest in a long ling of completely hare-brained ideas.  A library space that instills a sense of wonder and mystery, completely separate from the local library.  Obviously there are problems with this concept, and I don’t personally have the kind of money to open up this kind of business, but I’m willing to hear criticism.**  Some of you might feel that this kind of thing would cheapen our profession, but I don’t think it would.  I’m thinking more EPCOT than Magic Kingdom here. 😉 It’s the kind of place that I’d love to spend my time. 🙂

What do you people think?

*Yes, I know it’s not technically FREE, but for the most part most people can send and receive e-mail without paying any kind of postage.
** Or, if any of you happen to know anyone that could finance this sort of thing … 😉