Library technology in the next 20 years
| Date | 20 March 2017 |
| Pages | 5-10 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/LHT-11-2016-0131 |
| Published date | 20 March 2017 |
| Author | Michael Keeble Buckland |
| Subject Matter | Library & information science,Librarianship/library management,Library technology,Information behaviour & retrieval,Information user studies,Metadata,Information & knowledge management,Information & communications technology,Internet |
Library technology in the
next 20 years
Michael Keeble Buckland
School of Information, University of California Berkeley,
Berkeley, California, USA
Abstract
Purpose –The purpose of this paper is to examine the agenda for library technology for the next
20 years.
Design/methodology/approach –A long-term historically based analysis of the evolving roles of
librarians and library technology, especially the catalog.
Findings –The rise of standardized cataloging codes, communications formats, bibliographical utilities, and
software for online searching constitutes a great triumph in universal bibliographical access for everybody.
But each readeris unique and no-oneis “everybody”so a uniform service is not idealfor all. The ideal librarian
knows both the collection and the readers. The catalog is a guide to the collection and a surrogate for the
librarian. The librarian understands the readers. The development of library technology will remain significantly
incompleteuntil the uniqueness of eachreader is accommodated.Some ways to do that are noted.
Research limitations/implications –Research and development should focus on relating the uniqueness
of individuals to the uniformity of services provided.
Practical implications –Strategic directions are indicated.
Originality/value –Provides a perspective on the development of library service in terms of changing
relationships between technology and librarians.
Keywords Digital documents, Libraries, Librarians, Catalogs, Library technology, Networked resources
Paper type Conceptual paper
Introduction
Our point of departure is the ideal of a friendly, knowledgeable librarian who knows the
collection and is familiar with its readers. We can think of the scholar librarian of general
libraries in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries when collections were so much smaller
than now and the knowledgeable librarian mediated access. “The gap between the primary
museal function of the library and the occasional need of library visitors to actually locate
an individual book was bridged by none other than the librarian, which is to say: by his local
memory (memoria localis) and his polyhistoric knowledge”(Garrett, 1999, p. 111).
There are, however, problems with a human librarian as a service provider. There are
limits to how many topics can be mastered, how large a collection can be known well, and
how many readers can be helped in a day. In engineering terms, a human librarian does not
scale well and, as in other fields, only self-service scales affordably. Worse, a human
librarian is prone to catastrophic failure: the librarian may leave or die or become forgetful.
Library “hi tech”and the origin of library science, by that name, can be seen as a response to
these problems.
Around the end of the seventeenth century many monasteries in Europe were closed and
their libraries confiscated. In Bavaria 200 monastic libraries were sent to Munich to be
added to the royal library. The librarians were unable to cope with this flood of material
until librarian Martin Schrettinger (1772-1851) understood that technical systems were
needed to enable readers (as well as librarians) to find what they needed by themselves
quickly and easily. It was for the technical guidelines that he developed that he coined the
phrase Bibliothek-Wissenschaft (library science) in his textbook Schrettinger (1808, p. 11)
which began “A‘library’is a large collection of books whose organization enables every
knowledge seeker to use every treatise it contains without unnecessary delay according to his
needs”(Transl. Garrett (1999, p. 116), emphasis added).
Library Hi Tech
Vol. 35 No. 1, 2017
pp. 5-10
© Emerald PublishingLimited
0737-8831
DOI 10.1108/LHT-11-2016-0131
Received 15 November 2016
Accepted 26 November 2016
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/0737-8831.htm
5
Library
technology
in the next
20 years
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