What I Wish I Had Known

“I wish I had known that the solution for needing to teach our users how to search our catalog was to create a system that didn't need to be taught—and that we would spend years asking vendors for systems that solved our problems but did little to serve our users. I wish I had known that we would come to pay the price of our folly by seeing our users flock to commercial companies like Google and Amazon….

It's about the user, stupid. While we were focused on crafting integrated library systems that served our needs, our users got left behind. Is it any wonder that they can't understand why our systems aren't as easy to work with as Amazon?” [Library Journal]

Pew Internet Report: Search Engines Gain Ground

“According to the recently released Pew Internet report on online activities:

On an average day, about 94 million American adults use the internet; 77% will use email, 63% will use a search engine.

Among all the online activities tracked, including chatting and IMing, reading blogs or news, banking, and buying, not one of them includes searching a library OPAC.” [MaisonBisson]