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July 15, 2007
The internet and book lending
The battle for public libraries in Hampshire goes on and on. Here is a piece of propaganda put out by the Hampshire Press Office.
Notice the glib statement "book lending is in decline because we access information via the internet" - as if that was such an obvious thing to say that it could underpin a whole argument.
For those councillors, politicians and local government officers who haven't noticed
- The content of books is not available on the internet- except in a tiny handful of cases- and those have to be paid for. The exception to this is books which are out of copyright- which broadly means they were written more than 100 years ago.
- Information was generally not loaned- it was in reference sections. While much information is now freely available on the internet, authored, edited, published works of reference are not. They are in books or in e-books which also have to be paid for.
Can you believe the sentence "Fiction is being knocked off the shelves as most people choose to buy books?" This, of course, as we have often seen on here, is an invention that comes directly from the Heads of the Hampshire Library service, Yinnon Ezra and Richard Ward. What would you think if you were a parent trying to encourage their children to read and make use of the public library? Could you believe it if you were told that these are the two people in Hampshire charged with, and extremely highly paid for, the job of promoting reading in their libraries?
Book spending, undr the direction of these two men has fallen to such a low level in Hampshire libraries that barely anything is spent on adult books at all. Now they tell us that the fall in lending is because of "changes in society" - and has nothing apparently to do with their deliberate actions. You have to laugh-- except that they believe it.
In the Gosport Discovery Centre, despite the expenditure of more than £2m -which is a huge amount for one library building- book lending has fallen dramatically since it reopened. The place can hardly be regarded as a public library any longer.
Hampshire has spent over £100m in the past 5 years on its library service and in that time visitor numbers have declined and book issues have fallen by 40%.
But if you can always decide where the goal posts are- and you have no team playing against you- you can always claim to have won the game and draw your enormous salary.
And- believe it or not- in contrast to the mocking tone of this article- for some people studying at the so called University of Street Corner, which is what public libraries aspire to be- requires some dignity and silence.
Andrew MacIntosh was dismissed as Minister for Libraries not long after making the quotes attributed to him. It's time that the same fate befell Ezra and Ward and those elected councillors who support them.
Do we have any readers in New Hampshire? What do you think? Should libraries cease to stock and provide access to fiction ?
Posted by Tim Coates at July 15, 2007 3:59 PM
Comments
I'm not in Hants, but no, libraries should not stop stocking fiction. Nor should people being happy with the new centres indicate success for libraries; rather that 'discovery centres' are a success.
As I have said elsewhere, if libraries become everything they eventually become nothing. This is not to say that libraries can never change- it is righ that they reflect the changing ways we access information for example- *but* they have to have a clear focus which right now is primarily books and access to them.
Posted by: Pete at July 16, 2007 3:01 PM
I agree that the fall in lending rates is a shame, but if visitor numbers to Gosport library have increased 59%, as the article claims, is that not something to be praised? Surely those involved have done well in increasing these numbers - they have work still to do in getting these new visitors to actually borrow books, but isn't getting them through the doors a start?
I've visited Gosport Discovery Centre once or twice (and only not more because it is the other side of Hants from me) and I thought it was very pleasant. The ground floor is indeed noisy, by the cafe, but there are quieter, traditional library areas upstairs.
Posted by: Liz (Hampshire resident) at July 17, 2007 12:42 AM