1. A Book Graph
2. Public libraries vs Archives
3. Categorisation
4. What will we need to collect that may disappear?
5. The future architecture of Libraries: Futurists vs Architects.
1. Book Graph - Value against Time
This graph shows how the perceived value of a book changes over time, from the point of view of a Library and an Archive.
A book is first published - the origin point on the time line. It has a high value for the library, it's new and it attracts users. The value then declines over time as it's newness wears off, and quantity of the book increases. The curve can bottom out and turn upwards over time, as copies of the book become scarce and book attains a collectors or archival value. At the low point on the curve, the public library may need to make the decision whether to retain or discard the book. The decision may depend on the libraries need to attract users with newly releases, or pressure on shelving space, weighed up against the predicted value of the book for the library in the future. For example a book may be retained as it has particular history about the local community.
2. Public Libraries operate at the beginning of the time line, Archives tend to operate towards the end of the time line when the book has become scarce and collectable.
Important to archivists is the provenance of the information - where it came from - and how it makes connections to other archives. Archivists draw parallels from one collection to another.
3. Thus categorisation of archive material is multilayered to enable these connections to be found. Archival categorisation is able to locate specific information within a larger document, for example a statement minuted and transcribed on a particular date, by a particular committee, within a certain council.... as opposed to Library categorisation for a book, where a book is more of a stand alone item, identified by author, subject, and keyword.
4. The Berlin Library is both a public library and a repository. These two co-existing states are therefore concerned with the acquisition of the New and of Everything, and hoarding and collecting Everything. The Library / Repository needs to ask the question, what will we need to collect for the future?
Formatting of information, ie music, is a challenge for the two states of the Library / Repository, as the format of information is constantly outdated. To access the information the user needs technology which may be obsolete, or the information needs to be reformatted. Reformatting each time the technology shifts is expensive and there is a change in quality of the information. For example, the original format of some of the music collection is on vinyl. Digitalisation makes them more accessible and proofs against deterioration, yet there is a loss in quality of sound. By preserving the original format the library is also preserving a quality and depth of sound from the past, that the future may not have access to.
How would a library preserve smells which may disappear - artic air, fresh air, the smell of a forest which disappears, a plant which disappears?
5. What is the future architecture of the library? In the 1990s the phenomena of monumental libraries paralleled the rise of digitalisation of information, a seeming contradiction as digitalisation means millions of books can be contained in hundreds of CDs, accessed from anyplace.
What is the significance of the library in the future, does it exist as a civic institution, or an archival storage space for digital information?
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