Quiet Libraries Part II and "Please Do Not Bite the Librarian's Head Off"

I wrote a post about two months ago about silence in the library and how that seems to be a forgotten thing. I explained that I was writing said post because it was, amazingly, nearly silent in the library. That silence I thought there was is nothing, absolutely nothing, compared to today. The only voices I heard until about noon are those of my coworkers and three students.

This is because today, our computers are down. They're not broken: this isn't a repeat of that whole issue a few weeks ago with the printer. No, they're simply being worked on. Signs were put up yesterday morning *all* over the first floor informing students and faculty (and interlopers) that the computers would be unavailable until 1pm. So, for the most part, students have not come in. Or they've come in, noticed the signs, and left. A few have wandered over to the computers and been told that they can't use them (they've looked rather confused when we've said that), but that's only a few people, and they're particularly quiet.

I don't think I fully understood just how noisy computers make people. Or rather...the presence of the computers down here in the front seem to make people perceive this part of the first floor as a hangout space. Personally, I don't understand why they don't go to the computer labs to work on their group projects and generally chill out in front of computers, but they like to use our computers, and as long as they're not yelling, this doesn't bother me.

NOTE: The computers are back up now (well, most of them), but it's still pretty quiet. The people who waited, came in later, or were granted access despite the signs saying no computers were available...those people appear to be the quiet ones. Apparently the impatient ones are the noisy folks.

But really, the quiet in the room when the number of computers available is remarkably small is amazing.


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Also, a note: just because you're not yelling and you say "thank you anyway" at the end of your speech does not mean you're being nice or polite. A student came in and, after being rude to the woman at circulation, came over to tell us that it was terrible that our computers were unavailable since the computer labs elsewhere are all being used, and that "it would be nice if people talked to each other" (I'm not sure if she means we should communicate more with IT or if she means we should tell the students in ways other than posting signs around the library), and that it's toward the end of the semester and students need to print and and and and. And thank you anyway, of course.

Look, student. It's not our fault the other labs are being used. They're not our responsibility. Was there a miscommunication somewhere? Possibly, but I think it's highly likely that the computer people are aware that our computers are unavailable for part of today. And by the way, please notice that I said "for part of today". The signs (and there are MANY of them) specifically say that the computers will be unavailable until 1 pm. Not for the whole day, just until 1 pm. And, in fact, if you hadn't be on a tirade and had simply told us that you really needed to print something and could we help you out, we would have. But since you went on a tirade (even-toned as it may have been) and left before we could offer, we couldn't help you. This is not "if you're not nice we won't help", this is "if you're not nice and you walk away before we can offer help, we won't help". A young man was just politely expressing concern over the fact that he couldn't use the computer and really needed to look something up, so I let him use the other computer at this desk. Another student had similar concerns, so we let him use one of the computes which the staff just finished fixing. They're fixing the computers in sets, which means some are already done. There were, as of about 15 minutes later (when I was writing this section initially), 3 or 4 students using computers that had already been fixed. Those students were sent over there because they did not start ranting and then stomped off. The stomping off is the bigger issue, frankly. I've retrieved a rude student before, because he was easy to get to, but if you run off, I can't help you.

Moral of the story: please be nice. And if you're not going to be nice, at least don't stomp off before we can prove that, in fact, we are the "bigger man" and will help you despite the fact that you're unkind.

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So much for having a very objective, polite, "professional" blog. I guess all blogs have to go this way, don't they.

A General Letter to IT Departments Everywhere

Dear IT people:

Please stop messing with the internet connections. I understand that you have to update the systems, I really do. But when you mess with the systems for weeks on end without telling us, we have problems with our computers for weeks on end. Couldn't you please mess with them at one time during the day? If we knew that our internet would be having issues from, say, 1 pm to 2 pm, that'd be fine. I do realize, incidentally, that the problem is with the IP Addresses because you're doing something or other and it's confusing the computers, and I realize that all it really takes is restarting the computer to fix the issue. However, I would still really, really appreciate if you'd stop changing things so frequently that I have to do a general restart of all computers at least once a day.

Thanks!

-Your Librarian

One of Those Days

Today was just one of those days. It wasn't a *bad* day, not at all. In fact, despite being psychotic, it was a relatively pleasant day. But it *was* psychotic. Unbeknownst to, well, pretty much everybody, all the computer labs in the building I work in (at the university) were closed today, being used for testing for incoming students. This is all well and good for the students being tested, who presumably knew they would be using the rooms, but nobody else seems to have known. And, of course, today was the last day of this semester, so everyone was frantically running around trying to type, or at least print, their papers. The former issue, well, if there were available computers, great, though too often we were totally overbooked (I almost had to ask casual users to get off the computers, but it never quite came to that). The latter issue, needing to print something? More of a problem.

Because, of course, today of all days, the printer in the library decided to stop working. Don't misunderstand, the printer itself is fine. The connection between the printer and, oh, every computer in the room, *that* is what is shot. For some reason, the printer's connection to the network went fwoosh and, at least when I left two hours ago, that was how it was going to continue for a while. So, when this disaster (and disaster it was) was brought to my attention, I called my boss's boss (my boss being out of town this week) and asked if I could please pretty please let people use the printer at my desk. He said yes, which was great, except for one small problem: I lost my computer for a good long time. Now, there *are* two computers at that desk, but there were just *so* many people who needed to print that I ended up turning over my computer as well as the other computer. The only real problem with this is that I could not be on chat reference, and not only is it our day to do that but I had actually been getting questions today. So I ran around getting paper, ensuring people could get onto computers, fixing printing issues on the computers at my desk, and so forth. And, of course, this was the day I was alone on the desk for all but one hour of my shift and since the problem didn't start during that first hour, well...Of course, that also meant lunch was a problem. At a certain point I was just too hungry to wait much longer, so I went to the circulation desk I said "I *have* to eat lunch. I know there's a printer crisis but would you tell people to just wait a few minutes if they need me? I'll be right back..." The circulation librarian said not to worry, to take my time, because "they're getting free printing, they *better* be able to wait." I didn't take my time, which is good because there were people waiting for me when I returned, but she certainly made me laugh when she said that.

Oh, and before the crisis with the printers, I had a somewhat impatient young man asking for materials on a business topic that I completely did not understand (because, well, it's a financial analysis kind of question and that's just...a little over my head). I tried to get him articles and then discovered that he wanted books instead. Alright, fine, I can get that for him. But on first glance it seemed that everything we had was from the late 1980s and earlier. "Why do we have those? Oh right, they're artifacts." he said in the disgruntled tone I have heard on many occassions. "Well, what we have really depends on how much the school is willing to give the library for new books, and that isn't very much, so..." I said in response, tired of students who do not understand that they are not at a university costing $40k and thus having a huge, impressive library. He was in too much of a hurry to wait for me to try my other method of finding books when basic searches don't work (*cough*amazon*cough*), but I said if he'd be around I'd look. He sort of grunted and wandered off. I found something about two minutes later: it was from 1995, but he said anything from 1995 on would be fine. So I waited and waited for him to return, which of course he didn't. So I thought I'd pop upstairs, find the book, and hopefully find him (the crisis with the printer hadn't started yet, so I was able to leave the desk). I went upstairs and immediately saw him, so I grabbed the book and came toward him. He looked up and saw me coming and said "no way!" I showed him the book, explained it was a touch old but that it might work, and listened to him say "no way!" several times while he glanced. It turned out that I had found what he believed would be the perfect book, and thus he was extraordinarily grateful, which made me forgive his earlier impatience. I suggested another tactic for finding material if we didn't have enough, and returned to my desk. The insanity ensued about 30 minutes later. No rest for the weary.

All of this proves, of course, that I am awesome.

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As a side note, my public library has apparently decided that the Sherlock Holmes mysteries are YA Assignment. So are almost all of the classic novels and novellas (Pride and Prejudice, for example). Why? This makes no sense to me.

Virtual Reference

I've been considering the issue of virtual reference, partly because I recently had a conversation with my co-intern at the synagogue about working from home. How much library work can you do from home? You can certainly do reference work, at least to a certain extent. I am the LivePerson person at the university on Thursdays, and I can answer the questions that people put to me online just as well as I can in person. Sure I can't give them books, but generally they're not asking me for books, they're asking me for articles or information. Now, I realize that the articles thing probably comes up much more at a university library than at a public one, but I suspect the information thing is more prevalent at public libraries (as I get comparatively few of those). But what if I was doing my job from home? Certainly I could still get most of the information people want, but not everything. I wouldn't have access to the actual books to find a piece of information specifically regarding a book. I wouldn't have a ready reference set of books (though, honestly, ready reference sorts of books are increasingly showing up in virtual form, either instead of or in addition to the book for). So the question is, how limiting is that really? How often would my not being at the physical library limit my ability to do reference work, as long as the reference questions were coming via email or im? And if someone wanted a book put aside for them, that can still be done even if I myself am not sitting at the reference desk at the library. I suspect that the time when virtual librarianship as done from home is most useful is probably late at night. 24 hour reference is becoming more common: presumably those people do their work from home. Do they have a set of ready reference type books that the library has given them or do they simply have a large folder / delicious / bookmark set on their computer which allows them to easily access that same information?

And what about more complex virtual settings for libraries? What about Second Life? I am very familiar with the central library system in Second Life, having taken classes there (yes, *in* Second Life regarding virtual librarianship), done several presentations on it, and spent a decent amount of time in there. In fact, I am presently looking to start working in there (I'll update you on that). But what is the future of virtual librarianship? Is it in Second Life and other similar 3-D virtual settings? There was a class offered in my MLS program this past spring (which I hope to take in the spring, assuming it's offered again) on librarianship in virtual environments. A large portion of the work students did was set in Second Life, but presumably the knowledge they gained could apply to other virtual environments as well. Is this something which is going to be used more and more? If you could ask a librarian for help, and you were going to do it virtually, would you prefer to do it "face to face" (even if it's still text) or would you prefer to simply get a faceless answer to your question? As a librarian, if you were doing virtual reference work, or reader's advisory, or some such thing, would you rather just type or would you prefer to type while looking like someone and at someone (what if that someone is a furry or a neko or some such thing?).

Interesting further thought on virtual librarianship, based on things I've seen: book talks and book clubs. I know that they do those in Second Life, but I don't know if any libraries are considering doing such a thing. But there's something cool about the idea, isn't there? Like, you could do a book club and talk to people from your area about a book, but wouldn't it be more enlightening to do a book club with people from all over the country, even the world? I know what I and my local friends might think of a book, but what would someone from Texas think? Oregon? Wales? Sicily? Japan? Tibet? Kuwait? Angola? Queensland? South Africa? Brazil? Iceland?

So these ramblings come back to a central set of questions: is virtual librarianship valuable and how can it (should it?) be used? Thoughts?

Problematic Cataloguing

At the synagogue library, my co-intern and I have been going through *all* the books and re-cataloguing them. For the most part, we're following (fairly closely) what WorldCat tells us the Dewey Number is, but sometimes we're making up our own numbers. More on that in a moment. One of the reasons we're doing this is because whoever catalogued these things before did it in an incredibly illogical and incorrect way. Some things are in completely wrong parts of the numbers (in the 200s when they should be in the 800s, for example), but thus far, the vast majority of books are at least a little bit out of place. The ones we've been dealing with the most lately are the vast number of books on Judaism, Talmud, and so forth that have somehow been given call numbers which are for Christian and Christianity-related materials. We're unclear on how on earth the previous librarian(s) made this bizarre error, or whether it was an error at all. Perhaps the people just made things up.

Which would not, in fact, be *wholly* unreasonable. After all, too many of the books in that library are meant, according to WorldCat, to be call number 296. Which is hardly surprising: 296 is the catch-all call number for Judaism. If it's not the bible, or a book related to the bible, or the psalms or some such thing, there is no call number covering that. Those are numbers 220 through 224. After that, everything is Christian or Christianity-related until call number 288 (which is, incidentally, an "unassigned" number). Given this problematic fact, and the fact that we do not want a 296 section which covers twelve darn shelves, we too have been making alternate choices about where we want to put things. But our choices are logical: we don't avoid putting things on Jewish Mysticism in the 296s by giving them the "Christianity & Christian theology" call number, we use an unassigned number to create a Jewish Mysticism section. By the same token, we don't put a book on Yiddish literature in the section for Jesus and his family, we put them into the "Other Germanic Literature" section. Sometimes, when we want to keep things together because they are part of a greater topic - such as our "Life Cycles" section, which includes materials on birth, death, marriage, b'nai mitzvah, etc. - we choose a call number and *create* that section.

The point is, we're trying to maneuver around the Dewey Decimal system. The problem with that of course is that we shouldn't *have* to. But the Dewey Decimal system is, in many ways, horribly outdated. It was created in 1876, and though it has gone through many, many revisions (including one five years ago), it is still ridiculously unfair to many topics. How is it possible, for example, that there are 64 call numbers assigned to Christian topics (though that's not always obvious by the vague description for call numbers) and only one for Judaism (plus 5 for holy books, I grant you)? Incidentally, Israel does not have its own call number. Guyana does; Paraguay and Uruguay have one; Israel does not. Even more horrifying is the complete dismissal of Islam: there is only one call number for Islam, none for Islamic holy books, and in fact Islam does not have its own call number, but rather shares number 297 with Babism and Bahai. How is that possible? There is an entire call number for "Games of Change", but Islam cannot have its own number?

Perhaps, as my co-intern suggested, Library of Congress call numbers are better. It is true that they are more specific and provide greater variety of call numbers through the use of letters and longer call numbers. However, that specificity is also, in some ways, problematic. Perhaps university students have the patience to search for very precise call numbers with two letters and four numbers before the decimal and another six after the decimal, but your average person does not. In fact, many of the students I interact with here at the university library do not have the patience or the attention to detail necessary to find things with all of those letters and numbers. It can be very confusing for them and they get frustrated. I cannot begin to say how many times I have been told by a student that the book is not there, only to find it on the next shelf over from where they were looking because the call number was too long and confusing. So clearly the Library of Congress numbers, though more accurate, and not terribly user-friendly.

I am looking forward to taking cataloguing next semester and learning more about this problem. I'm increasingly inclined to just try making my own Dewey-esque system. Perhaps when I'm older and have been in the industry a long time, I'll lose my mind and decide to get a PhD and I will use the problems of the Dewey Decimal system as my topic. In the meantime, I'm just going to have to deal with the irritations of a system too old and too unchanged, for all its 22 updates.

Bizarre and Interesting Books

In addition to the job I hold as a reference intern at a university in New York, I am an intern at a synagogue library. My job, in essence, is to fix it, along with one other intern. We are at present combing through the books in the library to make sure they have proper call numbers and to determine if we think they are in the right place. Along the way, we have found some odd books. I would like to keep a running list of the strangest, or most interesting, books we find.

Interesting:

• A special edition copy of Ani Maamin by Elie Wiesel, number 339 of the set, autographed by Wiesel himself (and the illustrator).
• A first edition of The Sabbath by Abraham Joshua Heschel with actual physical prints of the pictures inside shoved into the book (how they never fell out is beyond me).
  

Interesting and Odd:

• Choosing a Sex Ethic: A Jewish Inquiry, by Eugene B. Borowitz. I don't think I need to explain why this is a little strange (or perhaps just interesting).

Just flat out strange:

• This is actually our favorite oddity that we've found so far. It is called Escape From the Holocaust by Kenneth Roseman and it is part of a larger series by that author. The series is the Do-It-Yourself Jewish Adventure Series. That's right: it's a choose-your-own-adventure book about the Holocaust. Other books in the series include: Jeremiah's Promise, where you are a young Holocaust survivor who has emigrated to Palestine in 1945; The Tenth of Av, in which it is the year 70, Roman soldiers have besieged Jerusalem, and you must choose whether to stay and fight or escape with the followers of Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakkai; and my personal favorite, The Cardinal's Snuffbox, which takes place during the Spanish Inquisition and has you making choices about whether you will leave Spain, convert, or probably die for being a Jew. I intend to find all of these books (since we only have Escape From the Holocaust) and read them. Hopefully a review will be forthcoming.

The odd things you find sometimes...
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A General Letter to Professors Everywhere

Dear Professors:

When you are putting together your syllabus, please put accurate information regarding what books and articles your students need. If, for example, your syllabus says that your students need Emergency Medicine Manual: A Comprehensive Study Guide, but that book doesn't exist, I'm a little stuck. If Emergency Medicine Manual exists, and Emergency Medicine: A Comprehensive Study Guide exists, but I don't know which one you're talking about, I can't do my job as well as I'd like. Also, please check your spellings of author names and, for that matter, your authors. If the author of the book is not so-and-so, please do not put that as the author, as it will confuse both me and your students.

I realize that you are extraordinarily busy. I was a teacher: trust me, I know. But please, take a little extra time to check your syllabus. I understand that typos happen: those aren't what worry me, as your students and I can figure out what you mean when spelling errors exist. But please, make sure you're giving correct information about what books your students need.

Thank you.

Love,
Your Librarian