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March 16, 2005
What do Gartner's predictions really mean to libraries?
Stephen Abram explored the possiblity of the butterfly effect from technology to libraries in reference to the Gartner Predicts predictions and research for 2005.
Gartner Predicts research for 2005 spanned more than two dozen tech and vertical industry areas, and Abram's analysis for the effects on libraries is based in his 3 key facets of collecting, collaboration, and community.
GWB has declared an initiative for universal and affordable broadband by 2007, because it'll speed the flow of information to everyone in the country. That's good, because the US and Canada are, like, the last developed places on the planet without universal wifi.
The next wave of innovation and demand for IT will start in 2006(and/or 2007) and include the following:
- Secure broadband wireless
- Low-pwer consumption mobile/display devices (we kinda have this covered, but it needs to be improve)
- Real-time infrastructure
- Transition to service-oriented architecture (It's what librarians do. Libraries have been operating in a tech-oriented architecture, we need the complimentary service stuff.)
Some of the crazy tech stuff that has arrived or is on the rise:
- MEMS: Like "living in a video game". The Diamond Age! Mites and sites! Smart pills, nano, quantum, all sorts of fun.
- RFID: Interesting potential for supply chain automation. Apparently the Walmartians use RFID, but once the stuff leaves the store, it stops working. But the challenge for librarians is making the RFID last 25 years. (The very same RFID that is totally controversial in the library world.)
- Trusted computing: Federated identity management, like using your fingerprint to check out a book at the library book. Because, well, a 10-year old is hard pressed to lose his fingerprint.
- Biometrics: Speech recognition/response, eye position readers, handwriting recognition.
- All kinds of smart: Smart paper, E-ink, talking avatars, search engines "learning" your search style and/or methods and adapting, more sophisticated natural language searching, changes in taxonomies & browsing. It's scary, almost only a few steps away from Cylons or something.
Trends in data analytics for the next decade:
- The hardware revolution driving the data explosion (Libraries: keep your hardware current, beg, borrow, and steal funding, then have librarians who are good with tech on board to work it.)
- Data analysis will be critical (Libraries: learn to find and analyze your data!)
- Data mining is still niche to business intelligence (This is a shame, really. I think that there should be a presentation at Internet Librarian, or the next Computers in Libraries about data mining using web and OPAC stats to learn more about patron practices and how to leverage those stats in developing library services and collections.)
Some stuff that libraries should be doing to get ahead of the curve:
- Let's get visual! Patrons are visual learners, unlike librarians, who apparently in Abram’s estimation are better text learners. So, we need to develop more hands-on, visual learning stuff.
- Patrons are learning to pull information out of audio and video through searches, so we should get on learning how to do that, too.
- Get on the XML train. XML is smart enough to translate the data depending on the device, and since gadget diversity is also in the future, libraries need to learn how to deliver information to as many devices as possible.
- We need a baseline of technology competency and online service offerings, and to keep educating ourselves on new tech, because by 2010, 70% of the population in developed nations will spend 10 times longer interacting in E-land than they will with real people.
- 93% of young people have more than one instant messenger username. That means they use IM a *lot*. These are our future patrons, so we need to communicate with them on their level, and IM is becoming an absolutely critical medium for libraries to get into.
- IP telephony is the "Killer Environment". That means that real-time, instant communications and information transfer are really how people are going to do things, and if libraries aren’t communicating in the killer environment, we basically don’t exist.
- Portals are also key, since they are all about integrated content and services, following the trend of integration in general technology. Libraries as places are portals of information and content, and now the web sites need to reflect that.
A few of the 2005 predictions from Stephen Abram:
- Smartphones will outnumber PDAs by end of 2006
- 4 out of 5 mobile workers will have access to email on their mobile devices
- By 2012, knowledge workers will be evaluated on how fast they respond to email
- Ratio of knowledge managers to knowledge producers will decrease 50% end of 2012
So really, the future is about collaboration, communication, integration, and technology. By the end of 2005, the majority of interactions among people will be mobile and instant. Librarians need to tap into this because the next generation of library users is already there, and the next gen already doesn’t care who we are or what we do, because we’re not in it with them.
March 16, 2005 2:48 PM