New Column: “What ProQuest’s Udini Means for Libraries”

Henrietta Thornton-Verma from Library Journal and I have co-authored a column and it’s now live on LibraryJournal.com.
The piece looks at the recently launched Udini research service from ProQuest and discusses our views about what Udini and similar services (available from others with more likely coming in the future)  mean for libraries and librarians. We hope you stop by and give it a read.
The bottom line about this article and a recent infoDOCKET post about the constantly expanding Kindle Owners’ Lending Library is that libraries have, like it or not, is competition from a number of resources and content sources.
Sure, what we offer might be better, free to the end users, and let’s not forget about our skills that we can share with a researcher/library user. However, what we know we offer and are capable of might not be the same as what the public knows or thinks.
We MUST do a better job dealing with the fact that competition exists and conveying/marketing/selling what we offer and can provide to our current users and hopefully new users. If we don’t do it who will?
Finally, as I mentioned in the Kindle commentary, ebooks are important and access to them needs to be discussed. We devote a lot of time sharing ebook related news on infoDOCKET. However, ebooks are just some of what a library offers in terms of content. Perhaps not only do we need to do more to market other content sources and tools but MOST IMPORTANTLY let the public know what we, as information professionals, can provide to a specific user or group of users. We know we have both very relevant skills and access to relevant resources but do others?
Direct to: What ProQuest’s Udini Means for Libraries (via Library Journal)
Direct to: Harry Potter Titles Coming to Kindle Owners’ Lending Library and What This Should Mean For Libraries (May 10, 2012)

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