Libraries Reach Out, Online

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Libraries Reach Out, Online

Libraries Reach Out, Online

http://tech2.nytimes.com/mem/technology/techreview.html?res=9C02E6DA1331F93AA35751C1A9629C8B63

By TIM GNATEK
Published: December 9, 2004

Correction Appended

THE newest books in the New York Public Library don't take up any shelf space.

They are electronic books -- 3,000 titles' worth -- and the library's 1.8 million cardholders can point and click through the collection at www.nypl.org, choosing from among best sellers, nonfiction, romance novels and self-help guides. Patrons borrow them for set periods, downloading them for reading on a computer, a hand-held organizer or other device using free reader software. When they are due, the files are automatically locked out -- no matter what hardware they are on -- and returned to circulation, eliminating late fees.

In the first eight days of operation in early November, and with little fanfare, the library's cardholders -- from New York City and New York state and, increasingly, from elsewhere -- checked out more than 1,000 digital books and put another 400 on waiting lists (the library has a limited number of licenses for each book).

E-books are only one way that libraries are laying claim to a massive online public as their newest service audience. The institutions are breaking free from the limitations of physical location by making many kinds of materials and services available at all times to patrons who are both cardholders and Web surfers, whether they are homebound in the neighborhood or halfway around the world.

For years, library patrons have been able to check card catalogs online and do things like reserve or renew books and pay overdue fines. Now they can not only check out e-books and audiobooks but view movie trailers and soon, the actual movies.

And they can do it without setting foot in the local branch.

''The lending model is identical to what libraries already have,'' said Steve Potash, president of OverDrive, which provides the software behind the e-book programs in New York City, White Plains, Cleveland and elsewhere. ''But lending is 24/7. You can borrow from anywhere and have instant, portable access to the collection.''

At the same time, libraries are leveraging technology -- including wireless networks that are made available at no charge to anyone who wants to use them -- to draw people to their physical premises.

Library e-books are not new -- netLibrary, an online-only e-book collection for libraries, has operated since 1998 -- but the New York Public Library decided to wait for software that would let users read materials on hand-held devices, freeing them from computers.

''The key was portability,'' said Michael Ciccone, who heads acquisitions at the library. ''It needs to be a book-like experience.''

E-books' short history has already begun to yield some lessons. At the Cleveland Public Library, Patricia Lowrey, head of technical services, thought technical manuals and business guides would be in greatest demand.

''We were dead wrong on that,'' Ms. Lowrey said. ''There are a lot of closet romance readers in cyberspace.''

She saw patrons check out the same kinds of materials rotating in the physical collection. The e-books librarians like best, according to Ms. Lowrey, are the digitized guides and workbooks for standardized tests, which in printed form are notorious for deteriorating quickly or disappearing altogether.

Cleveland's success with e-books encouraged librarians there to expand to audiobooks in November, when OverDrive introduced software to allow downloads of audiobooks. ''We had 28 audiobooks checked out in the first six hours, with no publicity at all,'' Ms. Lowrey said.

The OverDrive audiobook software encodes audiobooks from suppliers' source material, such as compact discs or cassettes, packages the stories into parts with Windows Media technology, and manages patrons' downloads. Borrowers can listen using a computer while online or offline; the books can also be stored on portable players or burned to CD's.

The King County Library System in Washington State, which serves communities like Redmond and Bellevue and the computer-savvy workers at local companies like Microsoft and Boeing, has also embraced both e-books and audiobooks.

In November, the King County libraries added 634 audiobooks to the 8,500 e-books in its catalog (www.kcls.org). With no publicity at all, 200 of the audiobooks had already been checked out. ''As soon as people find out about it, it will be extremely popular,'' said Bruce Schauer, the library's associate director of collections.

At the King County Library System's Web site, patrons can watch film trailers and reserve titles, which they can pick up at a branch. Before long, they can expect to be able to borrow entire movies online.

Mr. Potash of OverDrive says the company plans to release such a video program for libraries by next summer.

Posting electronic versions of libraries' holdings is only part of the library's expanding online presence. Library Web sites are becoming information portals. Many, like the Saint Joseph's County Library in South Bend, Ind., have created Web logs as community outreach tools.

Others are customizing their Web sites for individual visitors. The Richmond Public Library in British Columbia (www.yourlibrary.ca), for example, offers registered users ways to track books and personal favorites, or receive lists of suggested materials, much like the recommendation service at Amazon.

Other libraries have moved their book clubs online. Members of the online reading group at the public library in Lawrence, Kan., (www.lawrence.lib.ks.us) receive book passages by e-mail and discuss them in an online forum.

''Libraries have been very enthusiastic adopters of technology,'' said Patricia Stevens, the director of cooperative initiatives at the Online Computer Library Center, an international cooperative with some 50,000 libraries that share digital resources.

The center, which recently acquired the netLibrary e-book service, plans to announce a downloadable audiobook package with the audiobook publisher Recorded Books this month. It also provides add-on Web site programs that put traditional librarians' functions on the Internet. ''The services found inside a library are now online,'' Ms. Stevens said. ''And the trend is to continue moving to remote self-service.''

An example is QuestionPoint, a creation of the Online Computer Library Center and the Library of Congress that offers live 24-hour assistance from cooperative librarians via a chat service. More than 1,500 libraries worldwide make remote reference help available through QuestionPoint, which recently consolidated with a similar program, the 24/7 Reference Project, started by the Metropolitan Cooperative Library System in Southern California.

Another library IM tool, Tutor.com, is geared for a younger audience, helping children with their homework. More than 600 library sites offer the program, which matches students with tutors, whether for help reducing fractions or diagramming sentences. More than 105,000 tutoring sessions have been logged in the United States since September.

But libraries' investments in online services are aimed at more than just remote users. They are also adding technology inside their buildings to draw community members in. Despite all the modernization, old-fashioned formulas still matter.

''Most libraries measure success by using circulation, so if you check out a book, that's good for us,'' said Ms. Lowrey of the Cleveland Public Library. ''There might be a door counter as well, so if you come in to use a wireless connection or a PC, we're watching those numbers as well.''

In Sacramento, the library system has drummed up interest by holding several after-hours video game parties in which teenagers gather to play networked games like Star Wars Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II.

Always on the lookout for the kernel of learning to be found in the fun, the librarians have matched the game play with reading material.

''We saw the Star Wars game as providing a great tie-in to books,'' said Suzy Murray, youth services librarian for Sacramento's Carmichael branch. ''Teen boys, in addition to being voracious consumers of video games, are also huge fans of science fiction, so the connection seemed very natural.''

But one of the most effective uses of technology to entice visitors, librarians say, is turning the building into a wireless hot spot.

For less than $1,000, a library can set up a wireless network and draw the public in for free-range Internet access.

The Wireless Librarian (people.morrisville.edu/drewwe/wireless) lists more than 400 such library hot spots in the United States.

Michele Hampshire, Web librarian for the library in Mill Valley, the woodsy San Francisco suburb, logs an average of 15 wireless users a day on the library's high-speed connection. ''We're not collecting personal information; we don't put filters on, you don't even need a library card,'' Ms. Hampshire said.

She and other librarians do not consider the rise of online access a threat, Ms. Hampshire said. Rather, it will allow librarians to spend less time and money reshelving books and reordering supplies, and more time helping online and in-person visitors to find materials.

''Google will never replace me,'' she said.

Correction: December 13, 2004, Monday Because of an editing error, an article in Circuits on Thursday about the increasing use of digital materials by libraries misstated the name of the public library in South Bend, Ind. It is Saint Joseph County Library, not Saint Joseph's.