I am way into this program from the Baltimore City Health Department and the Enoch Free Public Library:
On a bright spring morning in Baltimore, retiree Gwen Tates goes over her weekly grocery list — oatmeal, I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter, pea soup. But it’s where she’s shopping that might surprise you: at the public library.Under a new city program, patrons can order groceries online and pay with cash, credit or food stamps. The orders are filled by Santoni’s supermarket, a longtime Baltimore grocer. They deliver the items to the library the next day. Tates says she loves the convenience.
“I pay with my charge card. They swipe it right here. I come back to the library tomorrow and they’ll have it all bagged up and ready to go,” she says.
[via].
Libraries can become so much more than content mausoleums by facilitating a suite of useful community services. I do worry a bit about feature creep, however. More about this in a forthcoming post about the Garage Library in Malmö.
I visited some great places as part of my participation in the Gates Foundation’s 2010 Global Libraries Peer Learning Meeting.
The libraries I saw have overcome their addiction to circulating content. Now they’re all about doing, making, publishing, working, and experiences revolving around content. People are still getting print books and CDs for the library, sure, but other stuff seems more important. Here’s a little report.
Finland has two official languages. Finnish and Swedish.
The first place I visited was the Helsinki CIty Library’s central location: Library 10. Even though it is the central library it is considered a music library and there aren’t many books. Right now about 70% of the space is devoted to people and 30% to materials. Their next design will expand the space for people to 80%.
Instead of books people check out guitars.
Or record music and edit music videos.
There’s a radio station and the library broadcasts a small segment locally every day, and nationally once per week.
The library is certainly nice looking but it isn’t flashy. That’s a pretty accurate description of Helsinki in general so it fits.
The chairs of this area are often moved out and a stage is set up. They host cultural events and record many of them. They’re interested in the library as publisher of content. One great fact about the events held at the library. Over 80% of them are organized by library users. Librarians just facilitate hosting the events.
Modularity is a big part of the library. All of the big furniture is on wheels and can be easily moved. They’re not limited by outlet placement because there are outlets everywhere in the ceiling. While most of the staff furniture stays put, people rearrange the public’s furniture daily. It is straightened up every morning and staff look for patterns to help plan future layouts.
It is impossible for library patrons and staff to sit on opposite side of a desk. They work together answering questions. Staff were resistent at first but quickly came to fully embrace the arrangement and wondered why they didn’t make the switch 10 years earlier.
Speaking of work, chief librarian Kari Lämsä says he prefers the concept of Library as Working Room rather than the more common Library as Living Room because living rooms are too passive.
There are all sorts of other interesting things about the library. They have a group of people working on cool web stuff. I wrote about their country-wide library searching iPhone app in January.
They have a mobile events van that takes gaming equipment to other libraries. It also travels to music events in the Summer, changing out the content to be event specific. Library 10 tries put the same kind of people on both sides of the desk. Staff aren’t your typical library workers. A bunch of them are 20-something guys.
This Helsinki CIty Library location is across the street from Library 10 in a building full of stores and cafes. There are no materials to browse or check out. People bring in their computers to the Laptop Doctor for repair and for lessons. Most of the interactions are one-on-one but there’s a Laptop Club during which many people gather for instruction.
Other services include Citizen Media Computers with multimedia and publishing tools, a new and popular VHS to DVD setup and a few computers dedicated to finding a job.
Their next project is the Urban Office Workspace for people in the city that need a temporary place to conduct business. Two successful business have already been started at Meetingpoint.
A place like Meetingpoint couldn’t work without an enthusiastic staff. Everything I observed indicated that they’re super stoked on doing what they do.
A group of us heard a bit about how Nokia learns from their R&D prototypes and incorporates ideas into their final products. We also got a tour of the Nokia Lounge which is a showcase of their products. They seem most excited about their phones for the developing world and they billed all of their smartphones as being extremely affordable. It almost seemed like they’ve given up on doing anything to combat iPhone-mania.
This was the neatest thing I saw. Wireless charging.
And, just for fun, here’s the first library sign using the Cyrillic alphabet I’ve ever photgraphed!
Kari Lämsä’s presentation about Library 10
A presentation with some info on Meetingpoint
Eli’s Twitter account will probably have updates.
But like I said before, libraries might not provide content in the future & it’s okay. So come on everybody. Create some meaning for your library beyond shuffling books around.
Let’s get to it.
The five library parks in Medellín, Colombia are amazing and not just because of their architecture.
Included in the network are five library parks, known as “hearts of knowledge.” Located throughout the city in some of Medellin’s most marginalized communities, the library parks have become cultural centers, providing broad, community access to information and educational resources. The network’s libraries offer a range of training programs, including how to use the computer and access information online, and English for the Internet.
“Libraries have become spaces to not only access knowledge and learning, but also areas of community action and pride,” said Clara Patricia Restrepo, executive director of the EPM Foundation. “By continuing to bring new information and resources to our users, libraries are now perceived as dynamic centers that offer accessible, relevant learning opportunities.”
The organization behind them, the Fundación Empresas Públicas de Medellín was recently awarded the 2009 Access to Learning Award by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
NPL has shifted people’s perceptions of libraries from traditional “bookshelves” to dynamic centers—places that offer tools for personal development and economic improvement, places that create a sense of local community and provide a connection to the global community.
By bringing citizens together in a communal setting, libraries are encouraging unity and learning. Historian and library coordinator Gabriel Jaime Vanegas said, “We believe that you can learn better if you’re part of a community.” Now, according to Gabriel, the young people of his district have a place where they can interact with the rest of the world, and that place is their library.
I highly recommend looking at more photos of the libraries at Parque Biblioteca León de Grieff / Giancarlo Mazzanti
[thanks, Erica!]
On Wednesday afternoons during the Summer outside of the MLK Jr. Memorial Library in Washington DC you will find a table full of friendly librarians talking to the passersby. The librarians also bring out an assortment of library materials to illustrate what’s available in the library. It is a great program and I’d like to see it go even further.
A compelling picture of comprehensive outreach forms when you combine this physical space effort with digital space efforts:
Last week a very interesting building opened up in Seoul.
The temporary structure, a project from the Office for Metropolitan Architecture/Rem Koolhaas (famous/infamous in the library world as the force behind Seattle Public Library), can be lifted with three cranes and rearranged to rest on different sides for different purposes. Events planned include a fashion show, movie screenings, and art exhibition.
I have been interested in libraries using slightly alternative form factors for a little while (more thoughts on a cafe branch, also see Nate Hill’s library outpost) and I’m increasingly interested in library buildings being as flexible as possible. Clearly the Prada Transformer is more of a thought experiment than the solution to a real problem but I admire the extremes to which this project explores the idea of adaptable space.
Previously, Koolhaas built a transformable house for a wheelchair bound man. Check out some footage from a documentary about the house.
The Roku digitial video player, an AppleTV-like device that allows for easy streaming of NetFlix content to a TV, now supports streaming from Amazon’s Video on Demand. It costs $100.
…
Some people passionately disagreed with me in the comments on last week’s “libraries might not provide content in the future & it’s okay.” I remain unconvinced that it won’t be okay. An ideal future? Maybe not. The way we’d like to envision our future? No way. We’d love to be delivering content to people in convenient ways. A nevertheless viable and perhaps more meaningful future? Could be.
Of the comments questioning a future without digital library content there was only one real articulation of why such a future wouldn’t work.
Why would I want to go to a library to exchange thoughts and ideas about materials that I have found and (using the examples you have cited in the first six paragraphs) paid for outside of the library?… I don’t need a library to do this this kind of thing.
It simply does not make sense to think that people who use the web for materials provision will then travel to the library to “share their experiences about those materials.”
My experiences with the hundreds of people I’ve hosted film discussion groups, book discussions, gaming events and tech training classes for tell a different story. Hearing about playing miniature golf and ninja tag in their library tells a different story. The restaurant on the top of OBA tells a different story.
While it is certainly true that people don’t *need* a library to do the above things, they still chose the library. So it makes perfect sense to me that people will congregate at the library even if there isn’t an eBook to check out. Even increasingly so if libraries concentrate on becoming excellent public spaces that help people navigate their personal content consumption and create stories. (And let’s be a bit real here. Like Nate Hill said in his comment, this isn’t likely going to be an all or nothing situation.)
There’s another take on why people might increasingly use public spaces instead of private ones. They might not have a choice. In a Kunstler-esque future everyone will be forced to go back to using local public spaces because there won’t be a Starbucks on the corner in which to gather. Libraries are sustainable in this sense.
One more thing. In a comment Tony Tallent wrote:
Libraries–in all formats including electronic, can be a place where we ‘do’ not simply talk about what we did from home.
I agree and if it’s okay with him I think one of my new mottos will be: Libraries are places of doing.
I held out from joining Netflix for quite some time because I live down the block from a really great movie rental store and a library that gets DVDs to me in a reasonable amount of time. 
I like supporting these places. When a friend showed me how much content was available on demand through Netflix’s “Watch Instantly,” however, I decided that supporting the local and joining Netflix wasn’t an either/or proposition. I now enjoy using all three of these services and still “Watch Instantly” at least once a week.
Netflix will soon offer “Watch Instantly” streaming only subscription plans. Smart. This is a way for them to not only increase revenue but also it is also a way for them to transition people though the death of physical formats. Netflix seems to have their stuff together. They’re friendly. Their website is easy to use. And with this move they’re trying to ensure that they can deliver content to consumers in the future.
Libraries are having trouble transitioning to this content anywhere/anytime future. You’ve heard the chestnut about publishers not allowing for the creation of libraries if they weren’t already in existence. This is exactly what is happening with purely 1s & 0s content. Libraries are getting squeezed out of the picture because of DRM legislation coming from the content industry. Libraries are left with only some good and popular digital content and we’re left to provide it in less convenient ways.
Meanwhile, other content providers are making their stuff easier to get at. Netflix has partnered with the New York Times and Rotten Tomatoes to include Netflix widgets on movie review pages. Without leaving the NYT website it’s possible to add a movie to your queue or even start watching. This is nothing revolutionary but it does add another level of convenience.
Netflix isn’t the only company making content delivery and purchasing easier. Other data-these-days-is-sure-portable news is the release of the Amazon Kindle application for the iPhone, enabling people to buy and read any Kindle book on Apple’s device. The app is free and books transfers back and forth just like on a Kindle.
Have you taken the time recently to think about your access to content? Holy smokes, the situation is absolutely incredible. The iTunes Music Store is the world’s largest music retailer, newspapers are shuttering and magazines are going web only. I can download 80% of music and movies I want for free? Are you kidding? No? Awesome! I can download Elsevier’s complete Referex Engineering Collection? Don’t mind if I do.
All of this isn’t to say I’m pessimistic about the future of libraries. It really doesn’t matter if we stop providing content in the same way. It might be the best thing to happen to public libraries. Yes, there will be some access equality issues that need sorting, but if we don’t have to concern ourselves with making sure people have access to content we’ll have more time to create excellent programs and experiences based around content and conversation. 
For this reason I’m really pleased with the direction that integrating games into libraries has taken. Some libraries are circulating games and that’s great, but the real emphasis has been on providing shared experiences by gathering people together at hosted events. Connecting people in this way has more of a positive impact than sinmply sending someone home with a disc. It adds value to th content too. So while I’m pleased that public libraries are enjoying increased use because of the current economic situation I hope that we use the attention wisely by talking about more than book and movie circ stats or even computer use.
If anything, we should consider books, movies, music and computers loss leaders and show people what we can really do for them once we’re lucky enough to have them in our buildings.
I have a panel in TweetDeck that displays a search for the terms library OR librarian. I filter the word iTunes out of the search because plenty of people tweet about their iTunes libraries evidently. I check it a few times throughout the day because it is nice to get a little snapshot of what people are doing in libraries throughout the world. I often read about people studying, returning books, sleeping, and hanging out. Since I don’t work in a library anymore it is nice to have a small reassurance that there are indeed people out there frequenting them. On occasion there are some tweets that really show some insight into people’s perceptions and opinions of libraries.
The old train station in Luckenwalde, Germany, about an hour away from Berlin, has been converted into a public library. It is beautiful. Their website is even pretty nice. I can’t make any claims about how it functions as a library but it is sure easy on my eyes.
The furniture for Luckenwalde’s library was designed by Quinze & Milan who also created some of the furniture for Seattle Public Library. Also having their stuff in the Roosendaal, NL public library might make them the goto firm for high end library furniture.
The January 2009 issue of Wallpaper reports that a goal of the Luckenwalde project was to make the library a focal point for the town (much like the former train station was, I assume). The striking design certainly helps meet this goal and I’m interested to know if the services they provide are equally as notable. For more, see the links at de estación a biblioteca – public library in Luckenwalde.
Anyone reading this been there? I’d love to hear a report.
