[Publib] Re: Friday/Monday afternoon topic for discussion

[Andy Barnett]

I would be a vote against mixing circ/non-circ. Yes, you can train your 
patrons, but that puts a burden on both you and them. People bring our 
rental items up to the self-check all the time, even though the books are 
in a unit labeled RENTAL and each book says RENTAL on the spine. Even 
clearly labeled reference items from a clearly labeled reference section 
are presented for checkout.

Also, why clog up your non-fiction shelves with items that people aren't 
using? Better to thoroughly weed the non-fiction. People are a lot less 
tolerant of out of date material now. Beyond that, many libraries are part 
of large shared systems, so there is less need to have older editions on 
the shelf in case, since "in case" you get a nice newer title delivered in 
a couple days, as fast or faster than Amazon.

If you have reference items that are getting dusty, do what you do with 
other books that don't get used. Libraries simply need a much smaller 
reference print collection these days. We can get road maps of any 
location, find mileage between cities, find zip codes and phone numbers, 
identify obscure scientists, access college level periodical resources on 
medicine, literature, business, download model specific auto repair 
information, just for a start. Our on-line magazine collection is a library 
in itself, easy to use, available remotely and never checked out. These are 
all resources that our local students will be using in college and need to 
learn how to use. This is all part of a move from information scarcity to 
abundance, even glut. The only bonus is that some of the books have value 
and can be sold after being discarded.

Our reference collection is about 1/2 the size it was, so we now have room 
for more seating in the area. It now looks like an area where people might 
find a book and sit and use it instead of mini-stacks. Over 50% of our 
reference budget goes for electronic resources and we are a medium sized 
public library.