Do we still need libraries after Google Books passed by?

Sylvia van PeteghemGhent University

your correspondent in Barcelona (under the Volcano)

First : I got a lot of inspiration for this talk from Wim de Waele, director of IBBT, a Flemish research institute on

new internet technologies .

Especially the video’s, you’ll see!

What are libraries anyway?

Is it about silence?

Bibliothèque nationale de France, Parijs, 1996 (Dominique Perrault, arch.).

Is it places to show off …

Bibliotheek van de Rechtsfaculteit van de universiteit van Zürich, 2008 (Santiago Calatrava, arch.).

Hauptbücherei, Wenen, 2003 (Ernst Mayr, arch.).

Hauptbücherei, Wenen, 2003 (Ernst Mayr, arch.).

Koninklijke Bibliotheek, Kopenhagen, 1993-1999 (Schmidt, Hammer & Lassen K/S, arch.).

Bibliothèque nationale de France, Parijs, 1996 (Dominique Perrault, arch.)Voetgangersbrug over de Seine, 1999 (Dietmar Feichtinger, arch.).

Is it about books?

Is it hybrid?

Openbare Bibliotheek, Amsterdam, (Alvar Aalto, arch.)

Is it working places?

Stedelijke Bibliotheek, Montpellier, 1996-1999 (Paul Chemetov, Borja Huidobro, arch.)

By the way: the secret formula:

Light , correct proportions (golden section), well

chosen materials

UNIVERSITEITSBIBLIOTHEEK GENT 1939

British Library, London, 1997 (Colin St. John Wilson, arch.).

Stedelijke Bibliotheek Montpellier, 1996-1999 (Paul Chemetov, Borja Huidobro, arch.)

A library for the coming generation needs to be

flexible

Openbare Bibliotheek, Amsterdam, (Jo Coenen, arch.)

Openbare Bibliotheek, Amsterdam, (Jo Coenen, arch.)

Should it be a library or a learning centre?

Saltyre Centre Glasgow

A place to learn

and experience and meet

Is it about buildings or is it about scholarly

communication?

Filtering and bringing together information?

Shouldn’t libraries take care of filtering and

bringing together valuable information ?

Shouldn’t they take care of quality control for choice of sources,

presenting the sources and making them visible

and usable?

Good metadata also means quality but they

shouldn’t be too exhaustive

What’s the importance of metadata anyway, think

about augmented reality?

Patty Maes video

You see what I mean?

Is Google a threat to libraries ?

Don’t think so … they bring them back!

Ghent University’s experience

It all started with …

Herbert van de Sompel

Wim de Waele, director resaerch institute IBBT Ghent

What does Google do exactly?

Myths• Google scans quick and dirty• Google scans whatever they see • Google violates copyright (1871)• Google will make us pay• Google has a bad OCR• Google only scans English works • Google pays …

What’s the benefit?

Google brings back users virtually

What’s the negative side?

Why all the fuss about the contract?

What about Europeana?

Think of what digital borns want us to do…

Digital born youtube