I often hear librarians promoting their ‘modern librarian’ credentials by saying “it’s about the information, not the container”. By this they tend to mean that librarians in a world of instantly downloadable ebooks, subscription journal databases and multiple other formats for audio, visual and written works should be format-neutral. That we should not be concerned about in which formats information is available, as long as it is available somehow. But what if it is about the container?

About the container

The reason your library website stinks and it’s all your fault is that you thought the container didn’t matter. How do you expect your members to find things when the container the information sits within resembles a pool of vomit or, at best, a trifle? Because it’s about the container your patrons don’t know what your library provides for them, because when they click on a link to find journal articles it takes them from the Everytown Library to a weird website called Galcentage, or EBOLA, or something. And didn’t I just log in before? What even is this? Because it’s about the container is why Google only has one box. Because it’s about the container is why User Experience experts have jobs, and why they call it ‘UX’. Because it’s about the container is why Myspace has 30 million users and Facebook has 901 million. Because it’s about the container is why there are blog posts called “20 of the world’s most beautiful libraries” and why there are none called “20 of the world's most useful libraries rated in terms of the information they can make available”.

About the container is exactly what it is.

Designed for the job

Thinking that all containers are equal is what has led librarians down the dead ends in which we sometimes find ourselves. Considering an ebook edition and a hardback edition of the same book to be equally useful is all very well, but what happens when the publisher has different ideas? What happens when HarperCollins decides you can only lend the ebook version 26 times? Or when Penguin decides you can’t have any ebooks at all? Or when your members can use any ereader except the one that 80% of your ebook reading members own? What happens when I bought the ebook from Amazon and now i want to transfer it to my Sony reader? Is subscribing to a bunch of journals or licensing ebooks really the same as owning them? Can you really say that you have electronic access to a title when the only way members can get it is to go to the library and ask a librarian for the password to log in?

A failure of imagination

An Open Access journal called Wordpress

Perfect access under imperfect conditions

Do you want to help your community to access ideas worth sharing? Well you’d better make sure your catalogue makes it as easy as TED.com does. Want to make sure your online tools are useful and clear no matter what device is used to access them? Follow the lead of Wikipedia. Want to organise the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful? You’d better have a search tool as user-friendly as Google. Want to give people more power to share and make the world more open and connected? You’d better make a platform as powerful as Facebook. Want to help your community to think different? Make sure your services as intuitively easy to use as Apple’s. Want to provide a platform for your community to create their own content and share ideas with the world? Better make it as reliable and easy to use as Wordpress.

Sound hard? You bet it is. But you didn’t become a librarian so you could sit in the quiet surrounded by books did you?

Discussed by

Literate Owl

The Daily News: 30 May 2012

It's June, which means...

What is more important - content or format?