[Web4lib] RE: library automation vendors

[Sue Kamm]

-----Original Message-----
From: Jim Campbell <campbell at virginia.edu>
Sent: Jul 20, 2005 6:03 AM
To: 'Thomas Edelblute' <TEdelblute at anaheim.net>, web4lib at webjunction.org
Subject: RE: [Web4lib] RE: library automation vendors

But why would pulling that information from a big database in Ohio instead
of from a small database in Anaheim keep them from finding that out?  Or
alternatively pulling the author and title information from OCLC and the on
shelf information from a local system and combining them for the user? Your
existing library system probably works that way now, pulling the
bibliographic information from one (or several) dataset(s) and the
circulation information from another and combining them on the fly.

And of course as we eventually move more into e-books the definition of "in
my library" is going to change for books just as it already has for
journals.

>>Mr. Campbell, do you work in a public library?  Your assertions about e-books and online periodicals may be correct in an academic library, but Mr. Edelbute and I work in public libraries.  I don't know about Anaheim PL, but the clientele in my library still prefer hardcopy.  (One of the big complaints in public libraries is controlling printing costs.  Until many of us installed a system requiring prepayment, a lot of Pokemon figures, Magic School Bus licenses, and game code was being printed and not picked up.)  

In contrast to academic libraries, public libraries circulate a lot of fiction.  Who's going to shlep an ebook reader out to poolside when it's so much easier to recline in a deck chair, margarita at hand, and paperback to read? 

Your friendly CyberGoddess and Councilor-at-large,
Sue Kamm
Inglewood/Los Angeles, CA
Truest of the Blue, Los Angeles Dodgers Think Blue Week 2000
Visit my home page:  
http://suekamm.home.mindspring.com/index.htm
email:  suekamm [at] mindspring.com
"What I wonder is, where are all the guys who just like to play baseball?"
--Wes Parker, former Los Angeles Dodgers infielder