MySpace and the library

The September 2006 issue of Library Journal has a number of fascinating articles. As I look at the situation at our library regarding the possibility of a sorely needed new library building in the near future as well as the students that I work with on a day to day basis, there is a seeming contradiction in needs. When we recently surveyed a selection of twenty students regarding changes we had made to the physical building as well as changes they would like to see occur, it was interesting to me that although we had the requests for changes and improvements in technology, they did not comprise the entirety of requests: Equally focused upon were more study areas.

So the modern library is in a quandary of how to best serve its users. The physical building and print materials contained within, supplanted in importance by many both by the misleading campaigns from computer and internet companies that "everything" is available online as well as equally misleading and sometimes inaccurate opinion pieces in the Chronicle of Higher Education, are clearly still important. This is also made clear in the number of students, books and laptops in front of them inside the library building itself throughout the quarter.

Libraries need to define what their services are, and while I believe in the importance of the print media - and it is clear these have not been supplanted by computer information (nor do I personally believe they will be) - I truly believe one of the biggest things that libraries can do for their patron is to promote an information community wherever it may occur. This may be in the physical building, it may be on a Social Networking Site.

Social networks, Abram says, everything from MySpace and Facebook to blogs, to creating folksonomies and message boards, or even the simple act of letting users append reviews to the library catalog is the long-term trend. These represent a big opportunity for libraries.

Yet, despite the site’s surging popularity, access to MySpace, often portrayed in the major media as little more than a haven for spammers, identity thieves, and predators, remains blocked in many libraries, schools, and workplaces. Library administrators, burdened by everything from endless task forces and preconceptions of what library service is to federal legislation like the Children’s Internet Protection Act (CIPA) or, potentially, the Deleting Online Predators Act (DOPA) or even just the fear of facing disgruntled parents, have been slow to harness the power of social networks. The Internet, however, waits for no librarian.

“We’ll study things to death until death,” Abram says. Meanwhile, he notes, a generation of users go online, and libraries risk losing virtually uncontested a generation of potential library patrons to commercial ventures.

- From Google is not the Net

Ironically this seems to come at a time when congress, obsessed with "deleting online predators" is trying to create and enforce a wide net that would supposedly "make the world a safer place". But similar to large fishing nets that may catch things other than their intended prey, these acts - supposedly making us safer - also serve to make it extremely difficult for some libraries to use these sites for what would be, without doubt, an extremely useful service. Ironic, that by "deleting" the bad we are also making access to the site easier for those who would use it well, without truly deleting those who mean ill will, something that will effectively restrict the very environment the fear mongers claim they are will help to create by their regulations.

The MySpace Gap editorial has some really interesting things to say about this.

And in the NextGen column, we have Priorities & Professionalism - an article that I can well relate to and seriously appreciate. Americans work a lot longer than many other countries and my generation is beginning to say, look - we want to spend time with our families and we want the flexibility to do so.

I concur.

And perhaps, what all of these are pointing to is the need to really create a MySpace account for our library - if users are there, it might just be worth it.