Tapping the Power of the Local Library Anytime, Anywhere

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I live at the library, stopping by after work at least 3-4 times a week. My only beef is that they don't get the newest information out there as fast as I would like. Everything new I need is always "on order."

Rix of AZ 12:26PM December 04, 2009

I live in houston and have been telling myself to visit our public library one weekend. Next weekend, no excuses! new york public libraries assisted me with many research papers while I was in college. Now that I'm done with school I suppose I don't feel the need to go anymore. I will go however, in this economy perhaps I'll borrow books rather than buy.

dee of TX 9:18PM November 28, 2009

Yay Susan!

Todd of MO 9:54AM November 25, 2009

We have all these wonderful resources and no skills to get the word out. I'm a public librarian frustrated that we don't get more help from our big money providers.

Ellen of NY 12:55PM November 13, 2009

Its too bad that libraries are cutting hours and firing staff. I am just graduated with my Master's in Library Science, and guess what? There are no librarian positions in my home state. Taxpayers want the benefit of the library, but don't want to pay for it. Often the library is the first to get its budget cut.

Sublue of AZ 2:36PM November 11, 2009

Unfortunately digitization comes at a price, and you always get what you pay for. The institutions that signed on with Google to digitize their libraries have already begun to realize that the thought of a big corporation coming in and digitizing their libraries for free was too good to be true.
The Google digitization, not even considering their efforts to digitize orphan works is plagued with quality issues, the institutions lose the digital rights to the content that Google has digitized (Google plans to make them pay for access to their own content via a subscription based service in the future), and the quality is so poor that the books can't be effectively re-printed. Google is digitizing books for one reason, and that is to feed their search engine. Period.
Try kirtasbooks.com. They will digitize any book you order, and deliver either a PDF or a paperback for $10. They have arrangements with UPENN, and The NY Public Library, its a great service.

Todd of NY 1:36PM November 04, 2009

Knowledge should never be for a price. We fret over the loss of our competitive edge but we ask our citizens to pay for knowledge that could benefit the country in the long term. That goes for books, data, and higher education.
The only science journal I read is PLoS--totally free. Science and Nature and the other parasites can take their Nobel Prize caliber contributors and (you know the rest).

PublicLobbyist of NJ 11:30AM November 04, 2009