Library in Transition

This is an in-depth study conducted by the Library of Congress over a period of years to discover and address the issues raised by conversion to digital media. Interestingly, this study is published as an e-book that is freely readable on the web, but must be purchased for download. I just tagged this with each of the main headers because there are chapters in this book that discuss all aspects of our project.

This can be deleted. Again, my annotated and tagged bookmark didn't overlap the existing bookmark.

I have tagged and annotated this article, but apparently it did not save under the same bookmark. This one can be deleted.

This lengthy New York Times Magazine article discusses mass scanning projects and their impacts in many areas: linking, tagging, and accessibility, among others. Ultimately, author Kevin Kelly imagines that all digitized books will be linked together as on universal book. He discusses the impact of copyright law on existing works and the inevitable out of print "orphans," and Google's plan to scan all the orphans and allow snippets to be accessed under the fair use doctrine. This assumption by Google that it can scan first and find copyright owners later results in a lawsuit that the author describes as a "clash of business models." Business models based on copies are obsolete as business models based on value and searchability take their places.

This can deleted, it is just an opinion article with no hard research to support our project.

This is a lengthy 2005 article on Google's digital book preservation initiative. Google has undertaken an ambitious project, and the author details how exactly the books digitally preserved, how they are cataloged, and how ancient handwritten books are transformed into searchable text. At the time this article was written, it was still unknown as to what Google planned on doing with all the books it digitized and various options are discussed. Policy issues are touched on very lightly, other than the books added to the digital collection are largely those which are not protected by copyright law.

print on demand Espresso machine

This is an interesting twist on providing access to books: allowing patrons to print their own copy. This article describes a machine that prints and binds books on demand, allowing students and professors to make their own textbooks or study materials for far less than traditional textbooks. Texts must with within copyright regulations and must be in pdf format. While not technically a print-to-digital issue, the texts must be digitized before printing.

This recent survey completed by 6500 students at over 400 universities shows that digital textbooks are gaining ground on paper. 51% of students often use electronic textbooks over print.

"The academic-library market has been slow to embrace electronic monographs, he said, but lately interest has begun to surge. E-book sales at Blackwell's increased 216 percent in the 2007 fiscal year and 164 percent in the first six months of 2008. That's evidence that the e-book trade "has the potential to rebuild the monograph business," Mr. Nauman said."

This is a summary of the problems presented in the development of digital libraries. it presents some examples of library conversions, and raises some questions that may be relevant to our study.

Each year one of the biggest debates in higher education seems to be: Is this the year that electronic textbooks take off? Many of the barriers are falling. E-reader devices are getting better. The inventory of digital content is expanding. Business models are emerging to support the needs of students, faculty members, and publishers. People are getting more comfortable with new modes of information delivery and the pervasiveness of technology in our lives. Discussions of the future of digital course materials are now more often about "when" than "if."

This can be deleted, there isn't much data, just speculation about what will ultimately bring about the print-to-digital change in college textbooks.

he RIN guide, Ensuring a bright future for research libraries: a guide for vice-chancellors and senior institutional managers which aims to inform this audience on how to ensure library and information services keep pace with the evolving needs of researchers.The guidance was written by the working group set up to consider the findings and conclusions from the RIN and RLUK report on Researchers' use of academic libraries and their services (April 2007).

Copied from the summary: "Digital technologies and online information resources have brought fundamental changes in how research is done, and also in what researchers expect from library and information services. The services that librarians and information professionals provide have also changed fundamentally over the past decade, and they now offer much more in providing leadership that brings improvements in research performance and effectiveness. New resources, services and technologies continue to create new opportunities, new challenges and new expectations. Librarians and information services need the resources and the continuing top-level support within their institutions to ensure that they can fulfil their potential and meet these challenges. " This article looks excellent and will merit a blog entry.

This article is only available for purchase. North Texas does not carry this journal.

This bookmark can be deleted. This article is a broad summary of the issues facing academic libraries.

This article is slightly dated: 2002. It discusses a study of the impact of electronic journals on the staffing needs of academic librarie, specifically, the decreased need of ILL staff. Some other cost issues are touched upon as well.

Resume of Lynn Connaway, Ph.D. Possible interviewee?

This is a 2002 article regarding the gradual transformation of the Princeton library from print to digital. It is interesting to note that this article was published before e-readers became widely available, as he does not predict much for the future of e-books. The article covers which branches of study prefer electronic and which do not, and the adaptation of electronic resources in the library.

This can be deleted. I bookmarked it under the name of the article, "Do Libraries Really Need Books?"

This article describes the planning of new university libraries, and how librarians at Santa Clara, Georgia Tech, Marquette and other decided on the new designs of their libraries.

Drexel University made a switch from mostly print to mostly digital electronic journal collection. A study was conducted to determine whether user patterns changed after the change from print to digital. The outcome of this study was favorable and further studies are planned.