When Books are Bytes, What Adds Value?
As content goes digital, the local infrastructure developed and optimized over a century to store and provide access to books and journals becomes less valuable. Putting aside preservation, when an article becomes available electronically, one might argue that the physical infrastructure to store the print version of that article has no value at all. Perhaps that is less true today for books, because of the current limitation of reading long-form content digitally, but that too is changing rapidly and is nearing a tipping point. If one imagines a future when nearly all content is in digital form, the role of the library shifts from being one primarily managing physical infrastructure and inventory efficiently and effectively, and one oriented toward providing services. The speaker will explore a number of examples of companies that have experienced this kind of shift and how they have responded. He will also share some of the initial findings of a recent faculty survey exploring changi
