Keeping up with the Blob

Citation

Holt, G. (2002), "Keeping up with the Blob", The Bottom Line, Vol. 15 No. 2. https://doi.org/10.1108/bl.2002.17015bab.001

Keeping up with the Blob

Keeping up with the BlobKeywords: Technology, New technology, Libraries, Economics, Planning

In the 1950s, a young but later-famous actor named Steve McQueen starred in a very bad invasion-from-space movie called The Blob. The blob started as a little alien rock. In the earth's benevolent atmosphere, the taffy-consistency blob grew ceaselessly, absorbing every living thing in its path – including people. When the Blob hit a severe man-made or natural barrier, it stopped, but tentacles moved outward in every unimpeded direction. Until Steve McQueen and his 'teen friends, demonstrating courage and vision not apparent in the adult world, found a simple solution, the blob reigned supreme. What the kids discovered was that the Blob could not withstand cold. They froze it in place. The blob moved no more.

Like other businesses in the private and public sector, libraries are experiencing a twenty-first century Blob. The new Blob, of course, is networked computing and the all-encompassing cultural shifts that go with it. All libraries have to find ways to adapt to this myriad-tentacle force that grows and changes in all directions at once. Unlike Steve McQueen and his friends, no one can maintain the technology Blob in its current state. Freezing in place is not a policy option in dealing with networked computing.

I was reminded of the Blob when sitting with colleagues at a recent meeting of the Public Library Association's (PLA) Technology in Public Libraries Committee. Nearly half a decade ago, members of this committee conceptualized the ongoing electronic publication now called PLA Tech Notes. The committee members reasoned that no single library could keep up with the technological cutting edge in all directions. However, a series of introductory, summary articles, newly written and/or revised and updated as necessary, could provide a set of compass points to aid library professionals, as they navigated institutional direction in the uncharted technology seas.

With a financial commitment from PLA, the Technology Committee selected the first Tech Notes topics and contracted with well-known library editor and technology writer GraceAnne DeCandido to prepare the initial electronic publications. Candido wrote the first notes in 1999. Because it took time to set up a committee-member review process and the Tech Notes section of the PLA Web site, the first Tech Notes did not get published until Spring 2000. The notes appeared – and continue to appear – at http://www.pla.org/publications/technotes/technotes.html. Here are the Tech Notes topics with their authors and the date of their appearance on the PLA Web site (because PLA does not furnish consistent bibliographic information with each note, some of the dates are approximate):

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  Digital Disaster Planning: When Bad Things Happen to Good Systems (GraceAnne DeCandido, April 2000) recommended regular electronic back-ups and suggested that e-disaster planning had to be set into system-wide and/or building disaster planning.

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  Intranets: The Web Inside (GraceAnne DeCandido, April 2000) defined internal-to-organization Web sites set up for purposes of training, work collaboration and communication. As with all other notes, this one cited a generous number of online and paper publications with far greater detail.

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  Push Technology: Pushed to the Brink (GraceAnne DeCandido, April 2000) pointed out how some libraries were using e-mail to individuals and groups to promote particular services to profiled individuals and to members of niche constituencies.

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  Wireless Networks: Unplugged and Play Some More (GraceAnne DeCandido, April 2000) pointed out the complexity of the field. Each wireless site had a unique set of problems that software and hardware vendors had to handle to get the innovation to work. Since published examples of library wireless were scarce, the author provided the names and e-mails for several individuals who had developed such systems.

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  Electronic Statistics: Counting Crows (GraceAnne DeCandido, April 2000) summarized issues in collecting, comparing and determining the use of electronic statistics. At the time the article was written, an abundance of literature on the topic already existed but no agreement on how or what to count or what it meant.

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  Video Teleconferencing: Here, There and Everywhere (GraceAnne DeCandido, July 1999, published April 2000) appeared as a number of federal and state grants to provide funds to establish teleconferencing centers in libraries. The article concluded that there was more videoconferencing talk than action at library sites.

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  Geographic Information Systems (GIS): Mapping the Territory (GraceAnne DeCandido, May 2000) related how a few public libraries were using GIS to create electronic maps with a wide array of mapped statistics and locations. Both planners and the public showed interest in the innovation, but the article warned about the steep learning curve and the relatively high expense to libraries when they provided GIS information.

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  Unicode: From Chinese to Cherokee; From Kana to Klingon (GraceAnne DeCandido, June 2000) explained how more powerful 16-bit Unicode created a new, more comprehensive coding standard to replace ASCII as the way to deal with the world's languages, current and future (Cyrillic and Klingon to name only two).

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  E-Books: I Sing the Book Electric (GraceAnne DeCandido, June 2000) summarized how a few libraries were circulating e-books successfully, even as a lack of standards created problems for library acquisitions and service. E-books had a library future, the author decided, but that future remained hazy because of a lack of standards on both reading machines and content.

As these issues of Tech Notes appeared, the members of the PLA Technology Committee monitored the content, determined new topics and decided which previous topics needed revisions. Satisfied with the continuing process, PLA leadership continued to fund the project, allocating modest stipends for the authors who wrote the publications and paying the cost of mounting and maintaining the articles on the organization's Web site.

A new round of Tech Notes began to appear in Spring 2001. The new publications reflected both shifts in topicality and the committee's recognition that the Tech Notes format sometimes needed adjustment:

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  E-Reference: Closing in on 24/7 (GraceAnne DeCandido, March 2001) followed the earlier brief format. The author defined e-reference, examined the parameters for setting up an initial e-reference project and provided examples of successful e-reference operations already under way.

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  Plain Facts about Internet Filtering Software was a Tech Note four times longer than any previous one. The committee approved the expanded length because of the policy and public relations complexities that libraries faced when they approached the Internet filtering issue. The author of this article was Karen G. Schneider, who had built respected expertise in intellectual freedom generally and Internet filtering in particular. While providing a good overview of filtering issues and filtering tools, the article advised library professionals to stay in touch with court actions and legislative initiatives, September (2001).

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  Metadata: Always More than You Think, a summary look at data pointers that led to other data and information sets, had been written by GraceAnne DeCandido in June 1999. It was published in April 2000. By early 2001, the link citations in this article needed to be updated. The piece was republished in May 2001.

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  RFID Technology summarized the tagging issues associated with library self-check, self-return and inventory control. The note appeared soon after several libraries adopted the newer tagging technology, but this article's author, Richard Boss, provided numerous reasons why most libraries were staying with older tag forms Fall (2001).

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  Portals (Richard Boss, early 2002) explains the process by which many libraries have followed the lead of private-sector businesses and transformed the character of their Web sites through data aggregation and proactive user services.

At its first 2002 meeting, the PLA Technology Committee, in concert with its writer-consultant, Richard Boss, outlined seven new topics. These follow (the published titles of these works will be different from the working titles presented in this article):

1. 1.

   Materials Handling will be an introduction to mechanical materials systems now appearing in public and academic libraries. This note will be related to the earlier Tech Note on RFID tags, since tag identification is an integral part of library materials sorting.

2. 2.

   Hand-Held Devices will reflect a maturation of wireless, covered in a previous note. Wireless options have grown more numerous, and some public libraries are already using some form of wireless communications.

3. 3.

   Electronic System Disaster Planning and Recovery is a narrowed focus from the earlier more general Tech Note on disaster planning. The examples of company information disasters associated with the destruction of the World Trade Center have made the entire library profession more conscious about e-security. Policy options for backing up and restarting computerized data programs also are available.

4. 4.

   Document Delivery, including Scanning will explore the shifting agreements and technology by which libraries prepare, receive and send digital documents.

5. 5.

   PC Management, including E-Commerce will look at the many new PC machine and content management tools coming quickly to the marketplace. Although automation companies have begun to get more involved in this territory, the main sources of innovation tend to be from private-sector business and small-capital start-up firms.

6. 6.

   Database Assessment, Creation, Access and Measurement of Cost-Effectiveness will look at the myriad issues associated with the new (and almost always expensive) databases that replace or supplement paper materials.

7. 7.

   Different Methods of Data Communication will report on the growing marketplace of hardware and software combinations that libraries have at their disposal when they want to move data.

Was the PLA Technology Committee on target in its selection of these topics in this order for publication as Tech Notes? Should the committee members have viewed the technology universe from a different perspective? Which topics were omitted that should be here? Is there a wholly different set of topics that deserved Tech Notes, attention?

Anyone associated with library-networked computing can ask these and a dozen more questions like them. Networked technology is a blob that moves in many directions at once. Institutions have to respond to the changes within their mission, goals and resources. The work of the PLA Technology Committee, however, does represent an ongoing library-conference and e-mail discussion about technology trends that have occurred since 1998. When technology/software powerhouses like Apple, Microsoft, Intel, HP and IBM miscalculate the marketplace, one group of library professionals is not always going to pick the same topics for introductory treatment as another group. The overall messages in the PLA exercise, however, come through loud and clear.

First, technology choices are becoming more complex and more interrelated. The connection, or the separation, between voice and data communications is a good example. Because of this complexity and interrelationship, the need for informed decision making increases.

Second, no library, no matter how rich, is going to be able to undertake all or even many different technology innovations at the same time. Most will have to choose only a few development areas that seem particularly pertinent to their own service mission.

Third, the most reasonable general technology-development policy is the first rule for medical doctors, "Do no harm!" At my own institution, when we look at the adoption of a new technology initiative, we always ask whether the change will provide more or fewer opportunities, as the technology Blob assumes different forms. The policy responses to these selection choices determine the speed and the character of the organization's technology development.

Fourth, networked technology budgeting is tough. In general, the budget rule is the more initiatives, the greater the expense. Libraries still have non-technology-based constituencies to serve (e.g. youth-group story times and senior outreach) that use technology only peripherally. There are still upkeep issues to be faced. Most institutions have finite budget limits as to how much they can spend annually on computer replacement and software upgrades. Facing into technology innovation therefore requires budget balance.

Fifth, the Blob continues to change its form. The shifts result in risks, but also enormous service opportunities. Who, in 1990, could have calculated the extent to which network computing would change data aggregation and cataloging options? Libraries now (or soon will be able to) provide e-books and e-data sets to e-patrons and, if appropriate, have those persons pay their fees through e-money.

The PLA Technology Committee's Tech Notes, topic development and publication signal one way in which a profession seeks to define its policy options. As readers of this journal recognize, the bottom line in implementing technology choices is the ability and willingness to pay. In the end, managing the technology Blob is, more than any other decision-parameter, a matter of institutional budgeting.

Glen HoltExecutive Director of the St Louis Public Library, St Louis, MO, USA