No-Book Library? BiblioTech Is Coming
From ABC News:
A book-less library.
It sounds like an oxymoron, but come the fall of 2013, San Antonio’s Bexar County is going to be home to the BiblioTech, the country’s first book-less public library. Of course, there will be books — just e-books, not physical books.
The 4,989 square-foot space will look like a modern library, Bexar County Judge Nelson Wolff, who was inspired to pursue the project after reading Walter Issacson’s Steve Jobs biography, told ABC News. (A glance at the photo shows that its inspired by Apple in more ways than one.) Instead of aisles and aisles of books there will be aisles and aisles of computers and gadgets. At the start, it will have 100 e-readers available for circulation and to take out, and then 50 e-readers for children, 50 computer stations, 25 laptops and 25 tablets on site.
“We all know the world is changing. I am an avid book reader. I read hardcover books, I have a collection of 1,000 first editions. Books are important to me,” Wolff told ABC News. “But the world is changing and this is the best, most effective way to bring services to our community.”
Link to the rest at ABC News and thanks to Dumitru for the tip.
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Love the concept. Hate the chairs. Wish they could make the reading stations more private. Then it wouldn’t feel so much like a bastardized version of a wonderful place.
Sartre was mistaken. Hell is not other people. Hell is a place with no real books.
Gorgeous. And think of all the money saved by not having to buy, maintain and store paper books. Think of how much access people will have when not limited by the physical storage space – all the books in the world, available in one library.
I agree with Elle, though – the chairs look really uncomfortable.
Why exactly do you need a physical space to be an eBook library? Project Gutenberg has been giving away public domain ebooks for 40 years without opening a public office.
And if you do need a physical space, why make it look like a factory production line from the last century?
Surly lots of comfortable chairs, bean bags and hammocks arranged in alcoves, or outdoors under the shade of trees, would be better.
Physical space is for people who cannot afford computers or Internet at home – about 30% of my community – and for those who do not want computers in their home – anther 5%, mostly elderly.
I agree that the place could be more comfortable. Not so sure about going outside, though. Between the summer heat and winter’s ice storms, it might be hard on both patrons and computers.
Until they hire an interior designer who also reads this idea is dead in the water. The concept looks like a bar in a stock market.
Where’s the comfy armchair? The subdued lighting? The space around each chair to ensure you and the book you’re reading won’t be disturbed ? I’d rather read in capsule than in this place.
Looks like the internet cafes I frequented while visiting London in 2000. The cafes were great! Loved being able to stay in touch online. But I agree with you guys: surely a library should have a more comfy vibe.
They’re kidding, right?
100 ereaders to borrow available for an entire population??
And the rest of the people are sitting in public, under Big Brother’s eye?
Surely there must be thousands of physicals books borrowed every day in our public libraries.
Oh, maybe you have to bring YOUR ereader in, so they can put on it a copy which will disappear in two weeks.
Where is the leisure, the joy of renewing a book until you finish it?
Where are the small guilty pleasures of paying the library fines when you’ve loved a book so much you have trouble returning it?
I guess if I can borrow a book for my ereader WITHOUT ever having to go to that bullpen, I might be able to live with it, and maybe we will have no choice, but I can’t see ME perching on a stool, listening to hundreds of nouth-breathers practically in my lap.
PG,
We really need that edit button.
Your sidebar covers the right quarter of my comment space – and ‘nouth’ was over there (instead of ‘mouth’, of course),
and I can’t see it to FIX it until there it is, flaws and all! Sorry.
I know I should comment in my own text file, makes sure spellings, etc., are correct, then copy and paste, but it IS a lot harder that way.
Are we sure that’s the actual design and not an artist’s interpretation? I couldn’t find any specific statement either way in the original post.
Anyway, weird stools aside, I vote it’s a good idea. Personally, I’d rather see digital incorporated into existing, paper book libraries, but either way, one of the big complaints about the digital media wave is that it’s not available to everyone. E-reader lending is a good idea. I think it could equalize things and expose people to e-reading that might not otherwise have access. Sure, they might have to fiddle with the numbers, work out the bugs…and yes, install comfy chairs.
But they’re still not sure who they’re marketing to, the paper readers who like the fireplace side reading feel or the tech hungry modernists.
I bet they work it out eventually.
I hope they do.
At least they’re thinking ahead and not huddled in a corner clutching a card catalog whispering, no, no, no. It’s not really happening.
This kinda makes me sad. I go to the library to browse the art section and plant myself in a comfortable corner and wile away a rainy afternoon with books I otherwise couldn’t afford or find. There’s nothing like print for photography and illustration.
Can you imagine this place full even at half capacity. There isn’t much room between those tables and there would be students with their packs, parents with kids and all their stuff mushed in there. I could see this working as a section of a regular library but if this was all there was I could get it by staying at home thanks.
Can you imagine this place full even at half capacity. There isn’t much room between those tables and there would be students with their packs, parents with kids and all their stuff mushed in there.
I’ve worked at benches in computer labs with CPUs, monitors, test units & switches above & beside me — they are definitely less glamorous than the tv shows make them out to be — & I’ve had more workspace than this diagram promises the average library patron.
The initial plan is not going to survive real-life use. In six months, the layout will be different — I can predict that.
I see that there will be massive loss of jobs for people of wonderful knowledge. There will be no reason to go to a bookless library space crammed with furniture and noise. Access to books and other media will be everywhere available there is a mobile device. The end of libraries as buildings and holders of paper books is right around the corner. They may become events centers or other. But taxpayer dollars to support a huge plant of heat and a.c. and light etc, including many many salaries, will soon be gone. There are so many important matters in cities and towns, and libraries that used to be thought of as education and research, wont be supported as infotainment in digital overall. Just a sad .02 worth, as I see it here in a major city where I live. Taxpayers are livid about supporting huge underused facilities. They realize the times have changed. We’re no longer in Kansas, for certain.