RE: One library or many?

["D Anderson" <dh-anderson@corhealth.com>]

Libraries certainly are not irrelevant. And I have the utmost respect for
library professionals and the services they provide. However, information
access *is* moving outside the library walls. For example, see
http://informationr.net/ir/9-4/paper187.html ("Library usage patterns in
the electronic information environment"), which presents an "analysis of
how library usage is changing as a result of the advent of networked
electronic services" in the medical field.

Among the conclusions drawn from the study of medical libraries:

"Remote users outnumbered in-house users of electronic information at all
five medical libraries although the percentage of remote users varied from
51% to 84%."

"The fact that more literature in the medical sciences is available
electronically may help to account for why medical library users, and
especially faculty, staff, and fellows, choose to use electronic services
remotely. They may find that virtually all of their information needs can
now be addressed from outside the library. This may be a trend that will
re-occur in other disciplines as more networked electronic resources
become available in those disciplines."

Our own research has found that this trend doesn't just apply to
periodicals. Growing numbers of physicians are accessing textbooks from
PDAs or other handheld devices. (See September 2004 Medicine on the Net,
http://www.corhealth.com/MOTN/Default.asp.)

For many of these users, the term "library" is just a word on an
authentication or link page. The only thing tying them to the library is
that access to content currently is purchased by and controlled by a
library. That tie will but cut if Open Access becomes dominant. This
doesn't mean that libraries necessarily will become irrelevant. It just
means that they won't look like they do today.

Dean H. Anderson