Libraries Through the Looking-Glass

1. Libraries Through the Looking-Glass Roy Tennant California Digital Library

2. “But I don’t want to go among mad people,” Alice remarked. “Oh, but you can’t help that,” said the Cat: “we’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad.” “How do you know I’m mad?” said Alice. “You must be,” said the Cat, “or you wouldn’t have come here.” My Perspective • Academic public service • No sacred cows • Optimism tinged with reality • Humor helps

3. Episodes • What Most Users Want • Doing More, and Better • The Next Bib Thing • Metasearching • Whatever Can We Do?

4. What Most Users Want* • To find what they want • To find as much or as little as they need • To experience as little pain as possible • To not have their time wasted • To have the option to control their experience and make informed decisions • To be effectively advised and assisted * And what we should be able to give to them

5. Doing More, and Better “Take some more tea,” the March Hare said to Alice, very earnestly. “I've had nothing yet,”' Alice replied in an offended tone, “so I can't take more.’” “You mean you can't take less,” said the Hatter: “it's very easy to take more than nothing.”

6. User Hostile Interfaces

10. The Multiple Record Problem 3 = first edition; 2 = second edition

11. FRBR to the Rescue • FRBR: Functional Requirements of Bibliographic Records, from IFLA • A recasting of bibliographic description into levels: • Work • Expression (eg., translations) • Manifestation (e.g., editions) • Item (e.g., copies) • Provides a method to merge related records into a more reasonable screen display • OCLC, RLG, and others are experimenting with it

15. Going Beyond the Card Catalog

21. The Next Bib Thing “Curioser and curioser!” cried Alice.

22. The MarcRecord 'Twas internet, and the slithy toves Did google and yahoo in the wabe: All mimsy were the catalogers, and the library directors outgrabe. "Beware the MarcRecord, my son! The jaws that bite, the claws that catch! Beware the AACR2, and shun The frumious Vendor! He took his vorpal sword in hand: Long time the metadata foe he sought-- So rested by the bookdrop, And stood awhile in thought.

23. And, as in cataloger thought he stood, The MarcRecord, with eyes of flame, Came whiffling through the tulgey wood, And burbled as it came! One, two! One, two! And through and through The vorpal blade went snicker-snack! He left it dead, and with its head He went galumphing back. "And has thou slain the MarcRecord? Come to my arm, my beamish boy! O frabjous day! On METS! On MODS! He chortled in his joy. 'Twas internet, and the slithy toves Did google and yahoo in the wabe: All mimsy were the catalogers, and the library directors outgrabe. * With profuse and abject apologies to Lewis Carroll

26. Taking a Step Back… • Without preconceptions, what do we really need? • We need more than a format, and rules for using that format • We need an infrastructure that will enable us to do many things we haven’t even imagined yet (see latest issue of Library Hi Tech)

28. Metasearching “Let's fight till six, and then have dinner,” said Tweedledum. “Very well,” the other said, rather sadly: “and she can watch us--only you'd better not come very close,” he added: “I generally hit every thing I can see--when I get really excited.” “And I hit everything within reach,” cried Tweedledum, “whether I can see it or not!”

29. The Problem • Most users do not care where the information they need comes from, or who provides it…nor should they have to • But our systems presently require them to know how to: • Find the appropriate choices • Select one or more • Use the unique search options for each • How can we create systems that minimize what the user needs to know to get what they want?

32. The Promise of Metasearching • The “Holy Grail” of resource discovery: simple to use one-stop shopping • The simplification of a formerly complex activity (put the complexity in the back end, not the front) • Allows the user to focus on evaluating results, not figuring out where to search

33. Principles • Only librarians like to search, everyone else likes to find • All things being equal, one place to search is better than more • “Good enough” is the sum of gain minus pain; users aren’t lazy, they’re human • The size of a result set isn’t as important as how it is presented (“the Google lesson”)

34. Metasearching Today • One-stop shopping • Broad subject categories with many databases each • Many false hits • Poor or non-existent ranking

43. Metasearching Tomorrow • Tailored portals for specific user needs or topic areas • Targets created by libraries for specific purposes (e.g., focused crawling of web sites, harvesting of repositories) • Useful results ranking and/or clustering • Dynamic selection of sources based on user query

46. Whatever Can We Do? “Now here, you see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that!”

47. Whatever Can We Do?: Directors • “The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present.” A. Lincoln • Read out of our profession (e.g., Business 2.0, Fast Company, etc.) • Hire for personality traits (e.g., love of learning) rather than specific skills or experience • Help staff to constantly retool • Use standing committees for communication and decision-making, and project teams for actual work

48. Whatever Can We Do?: Staff • Take responsibility for our own learning • Learn as we breathe • Strive for flexibility; thrive on uncertainty • Make strategic learning decisions • Share ideas; use wireframes and prototypes • Read in and out of the profession • Never move at the speed of the organization!

49. Alice had begun to think that very few things indeed were really impossible.