In 2010 I finished a two year ethnographic study of that aimed at understanding how the digitization of rare texts is changing scholars’ work and in turn how it is changing their relationship with the library. I will present some highlights from the findings of that research and discuss more recent research to understand the future of libraries by understanding communities of users. In other words, what can we learn from Tibetan Buddhists, the Parakuyo Maasai, and the CTOs of our top technology companies about how to build the library of the future? This presentation was the 2013 Breslauer Lecture at UCLA GSEIS.

1. On Formats, Function & Faith
Christine Madsen
Head of Digital Programmes, Bodleian Libraries
Director of Humanities, Sobota Foundation

2. 1. Lessons from the Tibetan Diaspora

3. 2. Building a library for pastoral nomads

4. 3. What does any of this have to do with
Libraries?

18. Why do we adopt new technologies?

20. Q: Why do we adopt new technologies?
A: When they are actually of more use than
the previous technology

40. Each prayer wheel contains 128 DVDs, for a total of over 1.8 trillion prayers.

41. Sometimes the best technology is the
least technology

42. NumberofUsers
Amount of Innovation in Practice

43. Less disruption in practice = more users

44. Be useful

45. Communities of users

55. 14 Sept. 2010
Brown University Library
Slide 56 of

56. • History pin

58. Sometimes the best technology is the
least technology

59. Sometimes the best technology is the
most technology

60. Format

63. Some rights reserved by bigoteetoe

64. What do libraries do?

65. Libraries are about learning

66. Understanding the history of libraries

67. Libraries were about learning

68. January 31, 2005
Open Collections Program,
Harvard University Library
69

69. Why do people come to the library?

71. Oxford

72. Oxford

74. Oxford

75. c. 1320

76. c. 1320 1443
280
560

77. c. 1320 1443 1598
250
0

78. c. 1320 1443 1598 Library of Congress
per day

79. Sir Frances Bacon Thomas Bodley

80. “In regard
of your
great and
rare desert
of learning”

81. “…having
built an arc
to save
learning
from deluge”

85. Storehouse of information

86. Warehouse of knowledge

87. Learning?

89. Some rights reserved by bigoteetoe

90. What do libraries do now?

91. January 31, 2005
Open Collections Program,
Harvard University Library
92

92. Oxford

93. Storehouse of information

94. Libraries are about learning

95. Information

96. Knowledge

102. Set of Services

103. In support of knowledge creation

105. Generative

106. Participatory

107. Creation of something new

109. Collection

110. Discussion

111. Debate

113. Some rights reserved by jenny8lee

116. Google can bring you back 100,000 answers

117. a librarian can bring you back the right one
- Neil Gaiman

119. Lessons?

120. Communities

121. Innovation

122. Space for learning

123. Questions?

124. Thank you
Christine.madsen@bodleian.ox.ac.uk

125. Sometimes the best technology is the
least technology

126. Sometimes the best technology is the
most technology

127. Less disruption in practice = more users

128. Format