MARS Products & Services Committee Discussion Forum
2009 Midwinter
Discussion Questions
Print Reference Sources:
1) Are print sources obsolete? Should we continue to order them? Why? Why not?
2) Have you conducted any use studies of your print reference collection lately? Can you share the results?
3) What do you think is the right balance between electronic and print reference sources? What is the current balance in your library?
Electronic Reference Sources: Access & Integration
4) How do you provide access to your electronic reference collection? (catalog, portal product such as Reference Universe?) How successful do you find this approach?
5) Do you integrate access to electronic and print reference sources so that key print tools for a particular subject/discipline aren’t overlooked?
6) Do you integrate free and purchased reference sources? Why? Why not? How do you do it?
7) How do you facilitate patron discovery of electronic reference sources? (Browseable electronic reference collection? Subject or course-specific web pages? Subjection to google-like searches? Other ways?)
Electronic Reference Sources: Use by patrons
8) Do you find that your patrons are willing to use electronic reference sources? If not, how can we better promote these resources?
Are electronic reference sources valuable even if our users DON’T use them? For example, librarians may use Reference Universe all the time.
The Future of Electronic Reference Sources
9) What features would you like to see in electronic reference sources? For example:
a. Multimedia (graphics, sound files, videos)
b. Web 2.0 functionality (tagging, blogs, RSS feeds, discussion forums)
c. Customization options for librarians, faculty and students
d. Better inter-operability between different publishers and third-party products such as catalogs, portals, metasearch engines)
10) Do users currently use such features if available in reference sources? Do you think our users expect these features?
11) What message should librarians send to the major publishers of online reference sources? What are our priorities? (interface, platform standardization, variety of pricing models, ong term access, etc)
Answer the questions and we'll have our own online discussion forum. All comments welcome.
2 comments:
Are print reference sources obsolete? I would have to answer "almost." Should we continue to order them? Yes, but only the ones that have proved to be used regularly. Users, including librarians, consult online sources first. Most librarians now consult reference books only when they have been unable to find an answer online. And the average patron will often just give up if he doesn't find an answer online.
Furthermore, when people do use books, they want to take them home. No one wants to sit in the library for hours doing research anymore. Browsing the many publishers' catalogs that come across my desk, I see many appealing reference sets that probably contain lots of useful and interesting information. I resist the urge to order them, though, because I know that once they reach the shelves in the Reference collection, no one will ever look at them again. If we do think a reference set might be useful for our patrons, we should order it for the circulating collection. A patron who finds one of these resources in with the other books in his chosen subject area might actually check it out and use it.
I agree with Mary, especially when we consider the cost of the print copy per use. Materials meant for reference tend to be very expensive. It is not worth spending hundreds for books that will be used a few times before the information becomes outdated. Electronic resources can be updated at any time.
There are instances when a print source is quicker for finding informaion, but that is the case less and less often. The Martindale-Hubbell law directory online is far superior to the M-H books in scope and ease of use, for example.
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