Transcript The pattern is new in every moment: observations on issues affecting libraries and archives within the framework of the 2003 OCLC environmental scan Lorcan Dempsey VP.

The pattern is new in every
moment:
observations on issues affecting libraries and archives within the
framework of
the 2003 OCLC environmental scan
Lorcan Dempsey
VP Research and Chief Strategist
Library and Archives Canada, 4 May 2004
• The 2003 OCLC
Environmental Scan
• Customary Board of
Trustees 3 year review
• This year:
– Worldwide scan
– User perspective
– In format for sharing with
membership
Pattern recognition
We have no future because our
present is too volatile.
We have only risk management.
The spinning of the given
moment’s scenarios.
Pattern recognition …
Worldwide Scan
•100 people interviewed
•29 countries selected
•60% of the world’s
population
•85% of world’s gross
domestic product
The words of things
entangle
and confuse
Wallace Stevens
Overview
Scan content
Social
Technical
Economic
I will use this
framework to make
some general
observations …
Research
and learning
Library (memory
organizations)
Social
Trends
• The ‘Amazoogle’ effect
• Generations
• The fabric of collaboration
• Value
The future is here. It's just
not evenly distributed yet
William Gibson
*
*
Internet search & answer
Social
landscape
OCLC – compiled from various sources (May 2004)
Microcontent
Last Minute Addition:
Worldwide Microcontent Market
2003 - $1Billion
Includes: ring tones, logos,
screen savers, micro games,
etc.
Top Ten Tech Searches 2003
1. Ringtones
“By 2007,
Amazon.com’s revenue
from microcontent
sales will exceed
$500million.”
(0.6 probability)
2. Digital Cameras
3. Mobile Phones
4. HDTV
5. MP3 Players
OCLC – compiled from various sources (August 2003)
http://search.yahoo.com/top2003
British Library Sound Archive
‘People like to hear birdsong
because they want to relive
happy moments,' suggests
Ranft, who has compiled and
produced the albums for the
library. 'They can relive a sunny
spring afternoon or the really
joyous moment of listening to a
dawn chorus.’
The Observer
• This week the archive is
releasing two new birdsong
albums, and soaraway sales
are anticipated.
The Amazoogle effect
• Three perceived attributes?
– Comprehensive
– Accessible
– Immediate gratification
The net generation doesn’t love a wall
Eric Childress
The fabric of collaboration: Social
software
The collaboration technology fabric
OCLC – compiled from various sources (August 2003)
Social landscape
Trends
• Net generation
– Self-sufficiency
– Seamlessness
– Abundance
‘Technology is
what has been
invented since you
were born’
Alan Kay
• Service
– Increasingly called to
define value against the
Amazoogle horizon
– Opportunity and
challenge
Economic
Economic
landscape
• Changes in funding of
the public good
– Normal cycles or
permanent changes?
• Sources and uses of
funds
Library spending
U.S., Japan, U.K.,
Italy and France
represent nearly 75% of the
total estimated 2000
worldwide library spending
$29 billion
LibEcon (August 2003)
Uses of library funds
Staff 53%
46%
Other
17%
33%
Materials stock
27%
14%
7%
ARL libraries
2001-02
eContent/subscriptions 3%
Worldwide average for libraries in
sample countries 2000-01
LibEcon (August 2003); ARL (2003)
Trends
• Questioning the value of the public good
– Education
– Public services
• Focus on impact and value
Value
Cultural
heritage
Professional
discourse
Learning
Access to
information
Securing the
historical and
scholarly record
Political
discourse
Technical
Technology landscape
• A generic technology review
Where we looked and who we consulted:
– Technology periodicals / publications
– Leading technology vendors
– Top technology analysts
Trends
• Ambient connectivity
and embedded
computation
• Unplug and play
• Coping with abundance
• Open source
• Convenience vs privacy
A new era – ambient and embedded
Adapted from: Gartner Inc. 2003
Ambient and embedded
• In an electronically nomadicised
world I have become a two-legged
terminal, an ambulatory IP address,
maybe even a wireless router in an
ad hoc mobile network.
• Those who just want a simpler life
may choose to unplug, and to live
off the grid in Idaho. But for this
particular early 21st Century
nodular subject, disconnection
would be amputation. I am part of
the networks and the networks are
part of me. … I am visible to
Google. I link therefore I am.
The technology I most want is …
“a PDA device that
contains all the
information I need to
do my work.”
—High School Student
Unplug and play
• Software
“pieces”
• Web services
• Distributed
The User
Common services
• Google API
• Amazon API
• In 2002, 6.2% of
Amazon revenues,
or $246 million,
came from using
Web services to
become an ecommerce
platform.
Content
services
Presentation
services
Application
services
OCLC Research (August 2003)
How to
organize a new
abundance?
Role of current
approaches?
Oranges &
Apples
Personal
Institutional
Learning
objects
Records
Licensed
E-prints
GIS
Databases
‘Content
packages’
Collection
Digital
photographs
Video
Audio
Software
Abundance
• Structured and
unstructured data
• Manual and automated
practices
• Relevence of
intellectual investment
in controlled
vocabularies
• Complex object
management
• Richer information
models
Research
and learning
Research & learning landscape
• Patterns of formal
research and
learning changing
– Science and data
curation
– Scholarly publishing
in transition
– E-learning
• Learning for life
Learning for work
Learn, adapt, change
• In 2001, US$23 billion
• In Fortune’s 100 fastest
growing companies, 2 of top 10
are e-learning companies
• $400 million in Asia Pacific by
2005
Learning for life
• Equalizing access
• Community,
identity,
memory
• A third place
• Social exchange
and cohesion
scholarly information flow?
Discovery,
harvesting
Discovery,
linking,
embedding
aggregators
Harvesting
data analysis,
transformation,
mining,modeling
Research &
e-science
Deposit,
self archiving
learning object
creation, re-use
Deposit,
self archiving
Learning &
teaching
Repositories
Validation
Publish,
discovery
Data creation, capture and
gathering:
lab experiments, fieldwork,
surveys, grids, media, …
Adapted from Liz Lyon
Discovery,
linking,
embedding
peer-reviewed
journals,
conferences, …
A&I services
Courses, modules,
Learning
management
systems, learning
portals, …
The Australian Research Information
Infrastructure projects … will improve the
infrastructure for managing and accessing
the outputs of Australian research. The
National Library of Australia is an active
participant in these projects. The Library will
contribute its expertise and recent
experience in areas such as digital collection
management, digital preservation, persistent
identifiers, resource discovery services and
standards for descriptions of access policies.
The projects will also strengthen and focus
the Library's collaboration with the higher
education sector.
Warwick Cathro, CNI, April 2004
A recent LJ article reported the results
of a study in which librarians and
scientists were asked to name the top
three most reliable online services
• librarians named:
– ScienceDirect,
– ISI's Web of Science,
– Medline.
Quoted by Carol Tenopir, Infotech, 4/1/2004
• Scientists, on the
other hand, named
– Google,
– Yahoo!, and
– PubMed.
Institution
Interviews
“Libraries should reallocate
positions to newer kinds of
jobs: digital scholarship,
open source projects, etc.”
“Librarians cannot
change user behavior
and so need to meet
the user.”
Collections grid
stewardship
high
Books
Journals
low
high
Special
collections
Archives
Freely-accessible
web resources
uniqueness
•Newspapers
•Gov. docs
•CD, DVD
•Maps
•Scores
low
•Rare books
•Local history materials
•Archives & Manuscripts
•Theses & dissertations
Research and learning
materials
•ePrints/tech reports
•Learning objects
•Courseware
•E-portfolios
•Research data
Untransferred records
Some issues for libraries
Does structure of costs reflect new roles?
Reallocation of resources?
Digital resource management
Skills
Mainstreaming special collections
Engagement with research and learning
Grant funding
An example of content domains in a
University Setting (P. Conway)
e-Research
e-Teaching
Low
Converted
@ Duke
Structural
Integrity
Web Gateway
Managed
Duke Assets
High
Duke
Acquired
Formats
Duke
Licensed
Content
e-Records
Duke
e-Publishing
Other
Rights to Manage Intellectual Property
Picture by Paul Conway, Duke University
Libraries, archives, museums:
similarity and difference
• Digital asset management
– A major R&D agenda
– Digital preservation
• Selective exposure and
repurposing
– Exhibition
– Narrative
– Pedagogy
• Granularity of attention
– Informational/evidential/
educational
– Atomic/transparent
– Provenance and context
– History of use
• Published and unique
– Processing model
– Level of industrialization
• Making common sense
– People, places and things
• Woods and trees
– Hierarchical / item
– Collection level description
Interconnected systems
environment
• More complex systems environment
– Collection management systems, portal, resource sharing,
resolver, ..
– digital asset management, …
• More complex institutional systems environment
– Learning management system, university portal, local
government portal, …
• Growing use of shared services
– Directory, identity management, trust management, …
• Major issue is not integration of resources with each
other, but rather integration of resources with the
working and learning lives of their users
And finally …
The public sphere
• Libraries archives and
museums
– Joining generations
– Informing positions
– Securing the integrity of
evidence
• National institutions
– For everybody and for
nobody
– Values and value
Implications …
• A turning point
• Engagement with research, learning and
living in new ways
• Demonstrate impact and value
• Skills
• Develop practices which will continue to
uphold values
Download and read at:
www.oclc.org/membership/escan
Print copies available
at same URL
$15 to cover print
and postage
The pattern is new …
The knowledge imposes
a pattern and falsifies
For the pattern is new
in every moment