Future Trends in Libraries

This piece was written by Tim Carmody for Wired magazine, all marketers need to shift their thinking on  how to present content on the go that is compact, valuable and meaningful to reach their audience wherever they are. 

Intro:

Reading is changing, even more than e-readers, tablets, or “readers’ tablets,” smartphones are changing it.

**It’s a mix of what’s going on in the world and what’s going on in your world, fused together. 

Here's what caught my attention: I'm looking at this from a content curator's point of view:

**The flurry of activity around personalized news for smartphones shows that as popular as the iPad has been, and as popular as smaller Android-based devices like the Kindle Fire or Nook Tablet might become,

the sheer number of users on mobile phones are impossible to ignore.

****It also shows that customers are demanding the ability to sync and read their content across as many devices as possible.

Finally, the subtle differences in UI and app design show that developers aren’t just thinking about building for different screen sizes,

****but around a whole range of factors that affect how, where, what and when we read.

For the new mobile reading, context becomes a cluster of these factors.

Flipboard’s Mike McCue highlights a few of these in an interview with the Los Angeles Times‘ David Sarno:

"It’s a mix of what’s going on in the world and what’s going on in your world, fused together. And it might seem weird that I’m looking at a picture of my daughters, and then the next flip I’m reading a story about Iran. But to me as a reader, when I’m standing in line waiting to get my coffee, those things are what I care about."

Curated by Jan Gordon covering "Content Curation, Social Media and Beyond"

Read full article here: [http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2011/12/google-to-flipboard-to-flud/]

Libby Fischer Hellmann:

A discussion about ebooks for patrons with four librarians...

"With all of the discussions, opinions, and analyses of ebooks these days, one of the aspects we don’t hear enough about are libraries and how they’re adapting to the e-verse. An article in PW recently discussed the situation from a library’s point of view and pointed out some issues that are impeding the growth of ebook borrowing. As both an author and an avid user of libraries, I decided to approach it a little differently.

A large percentage of my readers, maybe even a majority, have borrowed my books from the library in the past, so I’m especially interested how and if library patrons are able to download my ebooks easily. So far, the answer is “kinda-sorta.” The only way I know that patrons can download ebooks is through Overdrive, and there seems to be some issues with Overdrive’s inventory, ie some libraries have titles that other libraries don’t. In other words, no consistency. Which is not a good thing for a mid-list author."

The Revolution Isn't Just DigitalAmerican LibrariesFor example, Macmillan and Simon & Schuster won't allow libraries to lend ebooks, and Hachette and Penguin have suspended new titles from their library lending business.

I've been thinking about content creation and libraries lately. Right now, we collect content - hence our shelves of stuff. Some libraries are changing that focus (or at least adding on to it) by enabling customers to create their own content in a variety of ways … and it’s pretty interesting stuff!

I’ll lump what I’m seeing into three loose categories:

- Digital Media Labs

- Hackerspaces

- Coworking spaces

via Beth Kanter -

At the TED offices, Clay Shirky delivers a proper manifesto -- a call to defend our freedom to create, discuss, link and share, rather than passively consume.

This is a compelling story that effects all of us who are creating and sharing on the web. It's 15 minutes that are definitely worthy of your time.

Here is more information Beth uncovered after doing research on this topic today. Good work Beth!

From Beth Kanter:

 Thanks Jan. I spent a lot of time in the last 24 hours watching this Internet protest and finding resources that would explain the bill and why it is important. I also wanted an excuse to play with pinterest - http://pinterest.com/kanter/sopa-resources/ - and this was one of the better presentations.

There are also a few infographics - with this one being one of the better ones I found: http://pinterest.com/pin/186055028325468332/ and this blog post from Global Voices published on the Witness blog: http://blog.witness.org/2012/01/sopa-blackout-strike/ --

I enjoyed watching the creativity ... If you look through examples, you can see the Internet-based companies that rallied behind the free speech protest and those that supported it, but not really with passion: http://pinterest.com/pin/186055028325474953/"

Selected by Beth Kanter and Jan Gordon covering "Content Curation, Social Business and Beyond"

See video here: [http://bit.ly/wlwGmG]