A friend and I were having a debate about the future of libraries. We have both recently purchased electronic reading devices and he wondered how much longer until physical libraries were no longer needed. We had different opinions, then somehow wandered into a discussion of where Superman's Fortress of Solitude was located, but generally agreed that the library of today, as we commonly know it, will have to change or die as just another obsolete idea.
As children, we spent many hours in libraries taking books out to read for pleasure and or research to do reports. However, as more and more novels and children's books are available electronically in the coming years, a child may not have to go to a physical library to take out a book, instead streaming it to a reading device much the way one can now stream movies and TV shows with the right subscriptions and devices. How much longer until e-readers are advanced and cheap enough to allow picture books to be streamed/downloaded in as good a format as the physical book? As for research, much of the same information can be found today (and quicker) via the Internet, either through free sites or through pay sites that students, with proper IDs, can access at school, the library or home.
As adults, our trips to the library to take out books, already in decline, has gone to near zero. We can now download, for free, many older works to our electronic readers. We can already download, from our homes, books that are cheaper and easier to carry than physical books. Sooner or later publishers and libraries will figure out a way to make e-books available for e-lending.
I responded that physical libraries will not disappear but will morph into something different. There will be many older works that will never be digitized for various reasons. For now, there are still many people without broadband connections and they will still need a library hotspot to get materials. Third, many digital materials will remain behind paywalls in databases controlled by publishers. Speaking of databases, professional librarians will need to learn how to manage them and help patrons navigate them -- think of the Jedi library in Star Wars II.
The definition of a library is going to change -- libraries are already part virtual. Space arrangements will change. Who in the future will buy massive treatises and research journals that fill bookshelves when they can be stored in an e-book allowing what once filled rows of bookshelves to "fit" onto a piece of plastic smaller that my laptop. Perhaps branches will close. Perhaps they will become much smaller, coffee house sized entities where one comes to socialize and download reading materials, with dedicated, separate physical facilities remaining to house older, print only collections. Perhaps they will become virtual where one downloads reading materials from their own home. Or, more likely, perhaps they will encompass all those options.
Libraries of the foreseeable future will probably remain important for researchers and civilians, both online and offline. Publishers aren't going to want to deal directly with customers on a regular basis. People will still be able to borrow books from the library, either by going in or downloading from home, but, perhaps, will have those works expire within a set period of time (and libraries may be forced to renew those books from publishers from time to time where they now replace books that wear out or are lost). Maybe they will pay a fee ala Netflix that will allow them to take out a book or two for an unlimited time?
For these reasons, and more, I don't believe that brick and mortar libraries are going to go away anytime soon. We are only at the beginning of this revolution and it is hard to predict what will happen. Paper is still king, though its kingdom is shrinking. I do think the physical space will change with less books and more public seating/gathering areas -- maybe they'll partner with Starbucks? Ask me again in 10-20 years, when e-readers and broadband are much more mainstream and my answer will change.
I think the better question is will brick and mortar bookstores still be necessary in a wi-fi world? Why go to to the bookstore down the highway. aside from social reasons, when I can download a book to my e-reader. Like computers, e-readers will undoubtedly continue to decline in price and it is probably not too long before book sellers start giving out e-readers for practically free as long as you maintain an account with them. I already know people who have bought their last physical book and I suspect that it won't be long until I'm one of them, especially when generic e-readers become available for next to nothing. And, as soon as the libraries and publishers figure things out, it probably won't be long until I take out my last physical paper copy of a book (well at least newly published books).
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