Matt Goldner Product Evangelist OCLC Next generation catalogs and discovery layers 6 th AMICAL Conference May 2009

Students, faculty and the library … “For the past 10 years, online searching has become simpler and more effective everywhere, except library catalogs.” University of California (System). Final Report : December 2005: Rethinking How We Provide Bibliographic Services for the University of California. [s.l.]: University of California Libraries, 2005.

Three Information Market Trends

Market Trend #1: Changing distribution model

Market Trend #2: Changing nature of “content”

Market Trend #3: Changing user expectations Customized information Personally programmed devices Collaborating at a distance From “ Future Worker 2015: Extreme Individualization,” Gartner (March 2006)

What this means to libraries

OCLC Studies over last 5 years

Realities of information discovery 93% — Agree Google provides worthwhile information From OCLC’s Perceptions of Libraries and Information Resources report: 85% — agree Yahoo provides worthwhile information 78% — agree library Web sites provide worthwhile information 69% — feel libraries and search engines provide the same level of trustworthiness

33 % 186 % 27 % 33 % 10 % What we have learned Change in use of Web services from

Starting an information search

Reasons for never using the online library Web site Most college students know about the library Web site, but respond that other sites have better information as their reason for not using it.

How can we summarize the cause and effect of this rapidly changing information market place and its relation to libraries?

Then: the user built their Workflow around the library Now: the library must build its service around the user workflow

Then: resources were scarce and attention was abundant Now: attention is scarce and resources are abundant

Who is engaging users? Search Engines Amazon MySpace Facebook SecondLife YouTube Flickr Newer Emerging Sites

Expectations in a networked world Simplicity and ease of use Self-service Immediate gratification Single source for one category Rich interactivity User participation, contribution, collaboration

Are we willing to change and meet these expectations One simple example: Netflix goal: Getting movies to me Not controlling how long I keep them

The Challenge How do we deliver our value – collections, services and community … To the user On the network At the point of need?

Getting into the “flow” User workflows, not products or services, should be the focal point Users care about the “jobs” they need to complete, not about products Solutions that users need will vary by task and change over time From Outside Innovation, Patricia Seybold (2007)

How do we do this? Aggregate services around users Discover resources, services, expertise Deliver needed items to users – wherever they are Share & Collaborate expertise, recommendations, experiences

Moving to NextGen discovery to delivery services Our desired outcome is to engage end users How? Find out who is engaging them successfully Learn and adopt from those successes Be willing to try and fail or succeed

Successful Web services leverage cooperation and add value for the user: Google: Advertisers matched with searchers. eBay: Many buyers and sellers with histories over time. Amazon: Thousands of stores, millions of products, served up in one Internet storefront. Every user adds value for all users and to the platform as a whole The system is more efficient through shared resources (improvements, feedback, data) Web sites vs. networked services

What can we learn These sites are user centric We tend to be library centric Why this is important 15 years ago attention was abundant and resources where scarce Now resources are abundant and attention is scarce

Engaging today’s information consumer Means learning from those outside the library space and adopting new practices or we will be isolated and obsolete Means starting with the user and building library services that meet their expectations Getting into their workflow Showing them we add value

Exercise #1 – Learning from success or Whose OPAC is it?

Comparing our OPAC to other discovery interfaces

Exercise #2 – Survey Says?

Survey on data quality enhancements 1. More cover art 2. More tables of contents 3. Links to online content 4. More summaries 5. Merge/remove duplicate records 6. Add more formats 7. Add more records for non-English materials 8. Add excerpts to records

Survey Says... Students / Public 1.More links to online content (1 st ) 2.More tables of contents (3 rd ) 3.More summaries (4 th ) 4.Add excerpts to records (7 th ) 5.Merge/remove duplicate records (8 th ) 6.More records for non-English (10 th ) 7.More cover art (11 th ) 8.Add more formats (18 th ) Librarians 1.Merge/remove duplicate records (1 st ) 2.More tables of contents (2 nd ) 3.More summaries (3 rd ) 4.More cover art (7 th ) 5.Add more formats (13 th ) 6.More records for non-English (14 th ) 7.More links to online content (15 th ) 8.Add excerpts to records (17 th )

Other important items Students / Public High 1.More subject information 2.More information in details tab 3.More author information Low 1.Reader and editorial reviews 2.Citation information 3.Recommendations 4.Accuracy of information (name, subjects) 5.Ratings Librarians High 1.Fix typos 2.Upgrade brief records 3.Fix MARC coding errors Low 1.More records for non-English 2.More links to online content 3.Add excerpts to records 4.Greater exposure of holdings on the Web

High level conclusions 1.Librarians use bibliographic data to find what they want and demand accuracy of that data 2.Users use evaluative data such as summaries, excerpts and the actual full text to find what is useful

What is a user doing? Either Looking for a known item Or Looking for something that will be useful for the task at hand Really asking two questions: Is this useful? How do I get it?

Current solutions offered for next gen discovery to delivery

Three types of solutions 1.Open Source software 2.Distributed software from a commercial supplier 3.Software as a Service 4.(There is a fourth if you have lots of money, Endeca)

Open Source software Is a business model for the creation, distribution and maintenance of an application Has potential savings in start up costs not paid to a service provider Industry growing to help with implementation, support and enhancements for some open source solutions Requires in house IT expertise and possibly programming expertise Usually allows high degree of local customization and with a programmer can enhance the software in house and share with community Most widely known in North America is VuFind created at Villanova University

Distributed software from a commercial supplier Most common business model for library applications Up front license fee and implementation fee with annual maintenance fees Need local IT support unless library pays service provider to host the software for them Hosting is not the same as Software as a Service Usually allows a high degree of local customization Most prevalent in North America and Europe are AquaBrowser, Primo and Encore with Summon being a new comer

Software as a Service Single instance of software accessed via Web Browser Site configures their “instance” Normally has no license fee but has an annual subscription fee and can have implementation fee in first year Loss of varying amounts of control over customization of the application Gain in fast delivery of new features Only one at this time (I am aware of), WorldCat Local Some other service providers are moving towards larger sharing of data between instances of their software

Some sites to try VuFind: Primo: (Discover Library box) WorldCat Local:

“It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change.” —Charles Darwin