How libraries decide which books to keep

https://medium.com/book-excerpts/4ca8405f1e11

by ASquare • 12 years ago

107 48 12 years ago

bostonpete• 12 years ago

Is anyone aware of anything that would corroborate this quote? I've never heard any such controversy, nor could I find anything in a quick search...

"Weeding, even in the garden, has become a remarkably controversial subject."

logfromblammo2• 12 years ago

I see that you have never met your uptight control freak of a homeowners' association president.

In many states, there is a published list of species that qualify as noxious or invasive. In the HOA busybody's mind, a weed is anything that is not the approved cultivar of grass and anything taller than 4 inches high. This disconnect is bound to cause some controversy somewhere.

I would think that with library card catalogs going electronic, a ranking algorithm could automatically establish a culling order for books, picking them off the bottom to be unbound and photographed or digitized, so that there is just enough shelf space made available for both the incoming books and the redundant storage backups.

After all, they were able to put periodicals on microfiche and thus store more of them, weren't they? There's no reason to trash anything if you can make its bits small enough.

KC8ZKF• 12 years ago

"Nature and Ideology: Natural Garden Design in the Twentieth Century"

http://www.doaks.org/resources/publications/doaks-online-pub...

Jun8• 12 years ago

"Many books that existed in no other copies, many books arguably with historic value, had been simply thrown away and buried in landfill."

I understand the need to get rid of unwanted books from a library; books are ming in, so naturally some books have to go out. What I find despicable is destroying those books rather than trying to find ways to people who would use them.

GuiA2• 12 years ago

Libraries frequently have days were they give away/sell at low prices unwanted books. Sadly, it doesn't suffice to get rid of all of them- and then what do you do?

You can always sell those books on Amazon (I've seen libraries do it) but it basically requires a full time team to handle listings, sales, shipping, returns, etc.

ars2• 12 years ago

They are tossed specifically because no one wants them - you can't even give them away.

There's value in preserving things, but some books are really really bad. I call those "Write only" books. You'll find tons of them if you browse the stack of any random library. It always makes me wonder about the author - does he realize no one at all will read his book?

danielweber2• 12 years ago

http://www.cracked.com/article_19453_6-reasons-were-in-anoth...

Libraries aren't museums. They are for use by people who want to read books.

It took me a while to internalize this other rule: the median resale of used books is zero dollars. Once upon a time each physical copy of a book was a very rare item that represented hours of physical labor. These days it costs money to get rid of old books.

No one is waiting to read my old books.[1] They have sentimental value to me, but when I die the best I can hope for is that my kids get them into the recycle bin instead of the landfill.

[1] (Well, I have some of the original Wild Cards novels which are apparently out-of-print.)

GuiA2• 12 years ago

This is super interesting.

It just occurs to me that it could be really fun to work as a technologist for a library. In the light of this article, it sounds like there's room to automate and enhance some stuff: scrape literary review websites for up and coming authors, apply machine learning to the library's records to find out if there are underlying trends in borrowing that can inform acquisitions, events, etc. And of course you could write cool visualizations to highlight the different metrics.

As a kid, the library was my second home - I'd go there after school almost everyday, and Saturdays from opening to closing. The library was a short 5 minute walk from my parents' house, which in retrospect is probably the thing that influenced my intellectual upbringing the most. (programming came right after, in my early teenage years) It remains with me to this day: I have a deep love for books, and dream of the day when I can accommodate a basement with rows and rows of bookshelves.

I kind of want to work for a library now!

chc2• 12 years ago

It would be fun, but on the other hand, to my understanding a library employee's idea of "good money" looks an awful lot like a technologist's idea of "OMG I am going to lose my house."

pessimizer• 12 years ago

It actually can pay pretty well. It's not Silicon Valley money, but it's around Milwaukee bigco CRUD code monkey money. I know a few liberal arts graduates that were working dead-end jobs who went back for the MLIS mainly for the money.

Being a technologist for libraries sounds awful, though. They deal all day w/locked-down journals, proprietary databases, the MARC formats, and various systems from the 60s - and I'd need more than I make now to work with that crap.

abc37• 12 years ago

If you're interested in how libraries are using technology, check out code4lib[0], a community of technologists who work in libraries. Hang out with us on IRC, subscribe to our mailing list (which includes numerous job postings, many of which pay reasonably well[1]), read our peer-reviewed journal, and consider attending our conference. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised.

I also recommend checking out LibTechWomen[2] and Information Technology and Libraries[3].

[0] http://code4lib.org/ [1] http://jobs.code4lib.org/ [2] http://libtechwomen.tumblr.com/ [3] http://www.ala.org/lita/ital/

616c2• 12 years ago

Meh, I knew library technologists. None of them had any marketable skills for automation. It was a med library, so they knew the intersection of library sciences and a lot about medicine, but few of them could even conceive of editing their own HTML.

I have never understood the technologist position in place. In this particular library, I could really impress them with automation ideas I had, but they just wanted cloud services to do stupid garbage for them instead of learning.

I guess they were more of power-cloudists, not technologists.

mantrax5• 12 years ago

I also find the algorithm they're using very interesting, as we have a lot to learn from the systems people have built (systems of any kind).

But making libraries better is not exactly an unsolved problem, the only problem is the solution made libraries themselves mostly obsolete. E-book stores and online publications make libraries "S" - Superseded, and library books "E" - Elsewhere.

WalterBright4• 12 years ago

A weed is something you don’t want growing in your garden—more formally, “a plant that interferes with management objectives for a given area of land at a given point in time.”

My own definition of a weed is "a plant that thrives without assistance." For example, grass refuses to grow on my lawn without intensive assistance, but cannot be eradicated from places I don't want it to grow.

WalterBright4• 12 years ago

Partly this had been done because the new library, while boasting great architectural flourishes and lots of architectural space, did not have enough shelf space.

I find this pretty sad. Seems the architect forgot what a library was for.

ars2• 12 years ago

Book obey Parkinson's law - I'm not sure there ever is enough space.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parkinson%27s_law

logfromblammo2• 12 years ago

That isn't as bad as the architect/structural engineer that allocated plenty of space for stacks, but somehow forgot that books have mass and require additional structural support.

Good thing that has never happened. Snopes: That Sinking Feeling.

Discounting the urban legends about library architecture, there is some merit to giving your local library some uniqueness. I have seen far too many libraries with that "concrete bunker for giants" look to them, and it doesn't make me want to go in and read the books. It probably doesn't do much to support "friends of the library" donations, either.

And in the future, the server racks will take up less space anyway, even with the cooling and the network antennas.

abc37• 12 years ago

It's worth noting that libraries do a lot more than circulate books[0]. For many people, we're the place they use the internet, or where they print things out when they need a printer, or the place where they rent movies, or borrow CDs, or study, or attend programs, or get together with their friends to play videogames or tabletop games. Or even where they learn to use 3D printers: search on libraries and makerspaces.

My point is, libraries need room for a lot more than books. We love books; that's pretty much a prerequisite for becoming a librarian, but we do a lot more for the people in your community, which is why libraries hire architects who understand that libraries fulfill different needs for different people.

[0] http://www.inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/2014/how-well-are...

saraid216• 12 years ago

I don't consider the library to be a housing unit for shelf stacks. That's what warehouses are for.

ChuckMcM2• 12 years ago

I think it would be fabulous that on deciding to get rid of a book the library archived it into their 'digital' collection by scanning it. Access could still be available at the library or on the library web site, but the book would not be taking up volume space in the 'physical' collection. They could then add a 'd' notation to the card catalog entry.

chc2• 12 years ago

Is that uncontroversially legal? Considering that IIRC publishers want libraries to buy special digital rights, I have a feeling they might make some angry noises if they heard about a scheme like this.

makmanalp2• 12 years ago

I feel like it would be a good idea to have a law that says that if you failed to reprint a book for x years then it's okay for a library to digitize it forever, and allow it to be used by its patrons. This happens right now in some libraries, where you digitally "check out" a copy of an ebook, which theoretically limits supply and therefore limits the harm done on publishers.

abc37• 12 years ago

It's controversially legal, at best, and probably isn't legal at all, at least in the US.

Internet Archive's Open Library project[0] was doing something like this, and may still be, though I no longer see information about this program on its website. Participating libraries would ship a book to IA/OL, who would then scan it and pack away the original so no one could have access to it. IA/OL uses Adobe DRM software to make a copy of the work available digitally, either directly or through its partner libraries, though to only one person at a time. I've written about this process within the larger context of ebooks and DRM here: http://www.inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/2012/the-ebook-ca...

As I understand it, one of the precedents for Open Library's process was an allowance made for transitioning from legacy to supported platforms. If a library had an important work on a Betamax tape, and no one had Betamax players, it would be allowed to transfer that information to a VHS tape or a DVD or some other format that people could use, provided the library makes the original unavailable (IIRC, the library may even be expected to destroy the original), and only circulate the newly formatted copy with the restrictions that applied to the previous copy.

If you're interested in this topic and aren't a lawyer, I recommend Complete Copyright[1] by the American Library Association's Carrie Russell, along with anything by Mary Minnow[2].

[0] http://openlibrary.org/ [1] http://www.alastore.ala.org/detail.aspx?ID=2260 (also available at Amazon, etc.) [2] http://blog.librarylaw.com/librarylaw/

ChuckMcM2• 12 years ago

The Sunnyvale Library loans out kindle books.

WalterBright4• 12 years ago

There is another way. Scan the books that are to be tossed, and provide access to them electronically at the library.

The scanning costs can be spread out by each public library sharing the scanned copies amongst themselves.

616c2• 12 years ago

Funny, I saw this myself years ago with a med school library, where the problem was more severe and with like every paper resource they had.

But it was interesting problem. Unlike normal libraries, they are so digital they run into a new problem: they have such little need for any books, they might as well throw all of them away. The medical education industry is so much more onboard with digital publishing and references because hospitals and schools pay top dollar, and often doctors will need research materials super fast when things are serious and they need to perform analysis quick. Digital publishing is not even a question of if, it is a long past when.

So long story aside, they had to be really secretive throwing away books. Someone once discovered these old, useless (no other schools want them, thus) in the garbage. Some alumni or concerned students found them, causing outrage.

Solution, this whole library spent years without an avenue for destruction of the books, because old grads and others would not tolerate the idea. How could we not need the books? Year later, dozens of racks exist with books and magazines not only never checked out, but not even touched for decades collecting significant dust.

omnibrain• 12 years ago

Why throw them away and not offer them for takeaway for free or a nominal fee of 1$ each?

Edit: For clarification: I know a lot of books still won't find anybody wanting them. But I say it's justified to throw them away after a period of time.

WalterBright4• 12 years ago

Most of my books are available used on Amazon for $.01, which makes the real price $4.00 including shipping, plus tax.

Unfortunately, that doesn't make it worthwhile to sell those books.

danielweber2• 12 years ago

I posted this link elsewhere but it's incredibly relevant: http://www.cracked.com/article_19453_6-reasons-were-in-anoth...

Lots of people treat libraries like holy places they supposedly value and the books are the holy artifacts. But these people are trying to overrule those who actually use these places. No one's life is made any better by their interference, but they get to be seen "standing up for the books."

(If I were to take the analogy further, it's like the people who only attend church on Easter and Christmas telling the weekly church-goers how to run the church.)

abc37• 12 years ago

Go ahead and take the analogy further still. It's like people who only attend church on Easter and Christmas actively preventing other people from attending church on Sundays. Even the largest libraries have a limited amount of shelf space. If we can't get rid of some of the books that are using that space, we can't add new, appealing, useful books for the people who want to read them.

pnathan2• 12 years ago

I am almost* entirely of the opinion that no book should ever be thrown away. Digitize if unwanted, but don't throw it away. I know that might require some jiggering of the IP laws, but knowledge has huge value and it really bums me out when books of knowledge are dumped. Even if the knowledge is antique, then the information about how the knowledge was perceived and transmitted becomes valuable to later generations.

* There are some really bad books out there.

akuchling• 12 years ago

http://awfullibrarybooks.net/ is a blog edited by two librarians, showing books weeded by them or their readers. It's hard to argue against their choices: thirty-year-old romance novels? An autobiography by a 1980s football player? "Dress Like Liberace"? There are plenty of books that need to be thrown away.

JasonFruit2• 12 years ago

Now imagine you're in 2140, reading that 1980s football player's autobiography: almost every page would contain something you never realized about the past. An etiquette book from 1832, for example, is far more valuable to us now than it was in 1852.

abc37• 12 years ago

I'm a librarian. I became a librarian because I've always loved libraries and always loved books. I haven't met many librarians who didn't have the same formative experience and who don't feel the same way.

Counter to what the post's author implies, almost all librarians hate destroying books[0]. But we have to do it almost every day, because most libraries accept donations and only a very small fraction of these donated books are appropriate for the collection[1]. Many libraries have book sales, or sell donated or weeded books online, either directly or through partners like Better World Books[2]. We quickly learn that some copies of some books, either because of their poor condition or because no one is interested in reading them, have to be recycled or destroyed. It's no fun, but there are no alternatives[3].

As the post's author mentions in the CREW discussion in her post, librarians make an enormous distinction between the 5,000th copy of a book that is held in some library collection somewhere[4] and the last few copies. It's possible that San Francisco Public Library knowingly destroyed the last copy, or one of the last known copies, of a title, or even multiple titles, but I would be surprised if that was a policy rather than a mistake. In general, libraries either have a place to store such copies or can find another library that will add it to its collection and put it into circulation or storage.

[0] http://www.inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/2013/killing-sir-... [1] By appropriate, I'm talking about the book's physical condition and the likelihood that it will circulate enough to justify processing it and putting it on the shelf, because it is competing for that shelf space with thousands of other donations, plus the ~1M new books per year that we could buy and put on the shelf in its place. [2] http://www.betterworldbooks.com/ [3] Unfortunately, there are only so many places to donate books, and we give away as many as we can, and then some, to places that are interested in receiving donations. [4] https://www.worldcat.org/ is one place we look, though OCLC makes it prohibitively expensive for most small libraries to make their collections available in WorldCat: http://www.inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/2008/a-useful-amp...

pnathan2• 12 years ago

Goodness, I am not saying that you want to. There's a limit on shelf space in the world. I'm just noting that I'd rather see books digitized than dumped.

R_Edward• 12 years ago

I make extensive use of e-books and audio books. I especially like audio books because they make my commute bearable. But some books, which may be great stories in the dead-tree edition, are downright aggravating in the recycled-electrons edition. I'm currently listening to a story that keeps jumping back and forth between the present and the recent past, and whatever visual clues the author might have left for that, the reader is failing to convey.

eBooks have issues of their own. Most of these seem to be due to the interface, though, rather than to the format itself. 3M Cloud, for example, seems dedicated to making it as difficult as possible for me to be able to pick up my eBook and continue reading where I left off. My current book drops me at the beginning of Chapter 2 every time I open in. It has a "bookmark" capability, by which I mean I can create a bookmark--I just can't ever find it later, much less return to the spot in the book that it supposedly marks. Frustrating. But I can download and start reading a book in the middle of the night, far from home, and when my checkout period expires, the local copy automatically disappears without my having to return to the library or pay a fine for failure to return the book.

niels_olson• 12 years ago

There is a library that still has Watson & Crick's paper in their Nature archive. It's in the stacks. Despite my repeated urging that they place it in special collections. The same library has a Galileo, but no one knew, in fact they laughed at me, until I pulled the card and made the special collections "senior librarian" pull it. Something about databases and excessive purchasing (leading to wanton crewing) seems to have removed many a librarian's sense of ownership.

skittles• 12 years ago

I donated about 20 programming books to the local library after seeing that the selection was decades old and almost non-existent. It was very frustrating to find out that they sold all of them in order to buy a few popular titles.

bluenose69• 12 years ago

My library sells books every few years. The last time I went to the sale, I scored one of the Feynman lecture series books for under a buck. When I handed it to the librarian with my money, she said "oh my", realizing that this was really not something they should be chucking away. If not for the fact that they charge annoying fines, I would have let them off the hook, but I said "well, you folks put it on the table for sale" and walked away with a fine prize.

How libraries decide which books to keep

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