#13 Library 2.0 - O Brave New World!

I have been in libraries since babyhood, when my mother wheeled me to her volunteer job at the local library (which by the way was the first incarnation of Capilano Library!). When I was old enough, I used the card catalogue to find stuff for school projects and my Sunday afternoon by the fire reading. In university it was microfiche (whoever thought that was a good technology!),and near the very start of my career as a librarian came the computer, which changed everything. I remember in those first days of the computer catalogue, and how often patrons came to me looking for the card catalogue and bemoaning its demise. Think if we tried to bring that back now...!

Now it's all changing again, and libraries need to jump on the 2.0 bandwagon with all their traditional values in hand. Spider Robinson once said that librarians rule the world, because they control all the information. We don't need to rule, but we need to lead, we need to keep libraries relevant and places where people want to go. We need to be at the vanguard, using these new technologies to enhance the old ones. We need to be in a position to teach the new stuff to those who are used to the old, and use the fresh ideas and the people who have them to keep pace with a world that because of 2.0 is not getting bigger but is getting smaller as the whole connects in.