I apologize for my recent lack of posts! I will be finished with my post on the recent library developments in Camden soon.
In the meantime, we found out today that the PA Department of State sent one of our approved filings to a random PA citizen ("Sara Knowles" ??) as opposed to sending them back to us. This has cost us a two week delay in our regulatory filing process since we were waiting on this approval to move forward with some federal paperwork.
In other news, I will soon be adding the capability for our donors to sign up on our website to make timed contribution to support Library Build (weekly, monthly, yearly, etc). I am very excited about this because it will provide an excellent solution for supporters who want to both support us over the long haul and carefully manage their personal cash flow.
Wednesday, August 18, 2010
Wednesday, August 4, 2010
Well What About Digital Books?
After reading Callie's discussion of the digital book trend, I thought I would add my two cents. The questions in my mind are:
1) Are digital books a disruptive technology?
2) Do digital books make sense for Library Build's school libraries?
I think that question #1 is a very difficult question to answer. Two recent examples of disruptive technologies that come to mind are the replacement of film photography with digital photography and the replacement of CDs and DVDs by digital downloads. Both of these examples, as well as many other examples of disruptive technologies, have a few features in common. One is cost. The replacement technology's cost is substantially less than the technology being replaced once the cost curve has come down and the disruptive technology has matured a bit (Is this happening to solar energy right now?). Another feature in common among disruptive technologies is the high adoption rate with the exception of specialists. The disruptive technology goes through the usual stages of being adopted by innovators, then early adopters, early majority, late majority and finally laggards. By the end of this cycle all but specialists have taken up the new technology (think of music enthusiasts who still enjoy vinyl because of its unique characteristics or serious amateur and professional photographers who still use large format film due to the high quality images it is capable of producing). So will Kindles, E-Readers, Mini Netbooks and the like replace physical books? Well, the cost of these devices is coming down and it seems likely that many people are open to this technology. It definitely seems though that there will always be a sizable number of "specialists" who will prefer traditional bound books for aesthetic and other reasons.
There have been some recent articles regarding E-books, primarily focusing on digital borrowing rights and competition with the traditional publishing industry establishment. For instance, the NYT reported last year that the NY public library has about 18,000 digital books and they now devote about 1% of their annual book purchasing budget toward E-book purchases. But several publishers are reluctant. Some of the main publishing houses have refused to sell E-books to libraries for fear of eating into sales. You can read the article here: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/15/books/15libraries.html
Additionally, I speculate that publishers fear that the E-book format will allow many authors to self publish. Without the need to actually print and distribute the book, authors only have to focus on editing and marketing, two tasks that don't necessarily require the traditional publishing industry.
As for my second question, do digital books make sense for Library Build, the answer, at least for now, is a firm, "No!". Among other reasons, digital books require expensive readers (which require maintenance) and thus far digital copyright and borrowing privileges have not been sorted out. What may make sense for a suburban high school district that already has a laptop program (think Lower Merion) may not make sense in elementary schools in Philadelphia where schools receive only about half the funding per student as their suburban counterparts and where our focus is on students who are not yet in high school. This certainly does not mean that kids in Philadelphia don't deserve the luxuries that some suburban kids receive (regardless of what one thinks about the value of a laptop program) - quite the contrary - I argue that if we believe that every woman/man is created equal, then shouldn't every kid in the United States get the same school learning resources and thereby chance to succeed in life? Unfortunately, Philadelphia does not, and for the foreseeable future, will not have the funds to implement a laptop program or purchase E-readers. Nor do I think that a laptop program (in Philly or the suburbs) is appropriate for elementary and middle school kids (do we really want or need our 5-year-olds addicted to the internet or middle school kids surfing the internet in the middle of class?). The best way to spend nonprofit and precious school district resources is not on laptops so that elementary school kids can have E-books. We must put resources into traditional libraries to serve elementary and middle school students. We must give them access to the resources they need in order to learn and be able to achieve at the same level as their peers in Montgomery, Bucks and Chester counties.
There is a lot of potential for digital books to both eat into the traditional market for paperbacks and to enable and enhance the learning process. This does not mean that this is the right solution for Library Build. In the meantime, however, it will be an interesting trend to watch. We will certainly be keeping an eye on it and constantly re-evaluating our position as times change.
1) Are digital books a disruptive technology?
2) Do digital books make sense for Library Build's school libraries?
I think that question #1 is a very difficult question to answer. Two recent examples of disruptive technologies that come to mind are the replacement of film photography with digital photography and the replacement of CDs and DVDs by digital downloads. Both of these examples, as well as many other examples of disruptive technologies, have a few features in common. One is cost. The replacement technology's cost is substantially less than the technology being replaced once the cost curve has come down and the disruptive technology has matured a bit (Is this happening to solar energy right now?). Another feature in common among disruptive technologies is the high adoption rate with the exception of specialists. The disruptive technology goes through the usual stages of being adopted by innovators, then early adopters, early majority, late majority and finally laggards. By the end of this cycle all but specialists have taken up the new technology (think of music enthusiasts who still enjoy vinyl because of its unique characteristics or serious amateur and professional photographers who still use large format film due to the high quality images it is capable of producing). So will Kindles, E-Readers, Mini Netbooks and the like replace physical books? Well, the cost of these devices is coming down and it seems likely that many people are open to this technology. It definitely seems though that there will always be a sizable number of "specialists" who will prefer traditional bound books for aesthetic and other reasons.
There have been some recent articles regarding E-books, primarily focusing on digital borrowing rights and competition with the traditional publishing industry establishment. For instance, the NYT reported last year that the NY public library has about 18,000 digital books and they now devote about 1% of their annual book purchasing budget toward E-book purchases. But several publishers are reluctant. Some of the main publishing houses have refused to sell E-books to libraries for fear of eating into sales. You can read the article here: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/15/books/15libraries.html
Additionally, I speculate that publishers fear that the E-book format will allow many authors to self publish. Without the need to actually print and distribute the book, authors only have to focus on editing and marketing, two tasks that don't necessarily require the traditional publishing industry.
As for my second question, do digital books make sense for Library Build, the answer, at least for now, is a firm, "No!". Among other reasons, digital books require expensive readers (which require maintenance) and thus far digital copyright and borrowing privileges have not been sorted out. What may make sense for a suburban high school district that already has a laptop program (think Lower Merion) may not make sense in elementary schools in Philadelphia where schools receive only about half the funding per student as their suburban counterparts and where our focus is on students who are not yet in high school. This certainly does not mean that kids in Philadelphia don't deserve the luxuries that some suburban kids receive (regardless of what one thinks about the value of a laptop program) - quite the contrary - I argue that if we believe that every woman/man is created equal, then shouldn't every kid in the United States get the same school learning resources and thereby chance to succeed in life? Unfortunately, Philadelphia does not, and for the foreseeable future, will not have the funds to implement a laptop program or purchase E-readers. Nor do I think that a laptop program (in Philly or the suburbs) is appropriate for elementary and middle school kids (do we really want or need our 5-year-olds addicted to the internet or middle school kids surfing the internet in the middle of class?). The best way to spend nonprofit and precious school district resources is not on laptops so that elementary school kids can have E-books. We must put resources into traditional libraries to serve elementary and middle school students. We must give them access to the resources they need in order to learn and be able to achieve at the same level as their peers in Montgomery, Bucks and Chester counties.
There is a lot of potential for digital books to both eat into the traditional market for paperbacks and to enable and enhance the learning process. This does not mean that this is the right solution for Library Build. In the meantime, however, it will be an interesting trend to watch. We will certainly be keeping an eye on it and constantly re-evaluating our position as times change.
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
Website is Up!!!
Finally!!! I have finished the first version of the new website! Please take a few minutes to check it out and let me know if you see any errors, have any problems or have a comment in general.
Sunday, August 1, 2010
Updates
I am excited that I can safely say that Library Build's new website will debut sometime this week. It will have tons of information on Library Build, including our two flagship programs, Working Libraries and Library Fellows.
I have been working on a couple of posts for the blog, which I will also hopefully be able to put up this week.
Jeff
I have been working on a couple of posts for the blog, which I will also hopefully be able to put up this week.
Jeff
Thursday, July 22, 2010
Well what about digital books?
Today, I have asked Callie to discuss her views on digital or e-books since this is a topic that comes up frequently in our discussions.
Well what about digital books?
Callie Hammond
Every time we mention that we are starting a nonprofit to create and support school libraries, 9 out of 10 times the return question is: "Well, what about digital books?"
It's a question that I personally find annoying, aside from my work with Library Build. I love books. I like their smell, their feel, their pages, you name it. I do not ever want to look at a screen 15 hours a day. I'm already on the computer too much as it is! Reading, holding, and finding a book is a personal experience, and to me, computers and their screens are simply impersonal.
Yesterday, Amazon.com announced that in the past 3 months they have sold more e-books than hardcover books. What bothers me about that statement is that it leaves out paperback books. More people buy paperbacks than hardcovers anyway - I (usually) try to wait until books I want are in paperback because they are so much cheaper.
The second part of rebuffing the Amazon.com statement is that the print industry is still churning out the hardcovers while e-books are still only a small part of the industry. Wired.com had this to say:
"The overall e-book market is still a 90-pound weakling next to the Asiatic elephant of print publishing. According to a report from Publisher’s Weekly last year, hardback sales were projected to be about $4.4 billion in 2009 (including both adult and children’s titles), while paperbacks were expected to generate $5.1 billion in revenue, audiobooks $218 million, and e-books just $81 million — less than 1 percent of the print equivalents. That’s not even counting textbooks, Bibles and professional books — with those included, Publisher’s Weekly estimated the overall book market at $35 billion in 2009."
Read More http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2010/07/amazon-more-e-books-than-hardcovers/#ixzz0uQdP9IDl
Also, as Cnet.com points out, alot of those e-books on Amazon are from self-published authors who list their works for 99 cents and get a few people to buy. Obviously those people are better served by e-books (just as most people are better served by online blogging than publishing their own books). So how many of those people are eating in to the e-books market?
So how does this affect school libraries?
The general argument is always that kids today like computers and digital books so much that making everything digital will increase kids' enthusiasm, and thus, their literacy. But thats not so. Ralph Raab wrote an article for "American Libraries" entitled "Books and Literacy in the Digital Era" in which he argued the following:
"According to Todd Oppenheimer in his book The Flickering Mind: The False Promise of Technology in the Classroom, and How Learning Can Be Saved, from the early 1990s through the first part of this century, school districts across the country spent billions of dollars promoting computer-based learning, promising that computers would engage students in a way that books could not. A school district in Union City, California, spent $37 million to buy computer equipment and software—and paid for it by cutting science equipment and field trips. An elementary school in Los Angeles dropped its music program in order to hire a “technology manager.” But we need to ask ourselves: After nearly two decades of this philosophy, have we seen a rise in literacy? The answer, sadly, is no—or at the very least, not nearly enough to justify what we have lost in the process."
However, an option like the Kindle or the Nook could inspire kids to read more than they already are (aka, if they are already literate). But this argument does not lend itself to creating an entire digital library without books, magazines, research journals, etc. As Raab states, "since copyright issues will most likely never be resolved, people will always need to find a physical book on a physical shelf. Also, not every book can be digitized; there have been different versions of books throughout history, and permission will never be granted by every institution to digitize those editions. The works of William Shakespeare are an example: They have been changed and modified through successive editions over the last 500 years. We will never see every version of his works on Google."
So. Yes, people, digital books and e-books are cool. But they will never replace tangible books, nor should impersonal digital libraries replace tangible (and personal) school libraries.
- Callie
Well what about digital books?
Callie Hammond
Every time we mention that we are starting a nonprofit to create and support school libraries, 9 out of 10 times the return question is: "Well, what about digital books?"
It's a question that I personally find annoying, aside from my work with Library Build. I love books. I like their smell, their feel, their pages, you name it. I do not ever want to look at a screen 15 hours a day. I'm already on the computer too much as it is! Reading, holding, and finding a book is a personal experience, and to me, computers and their screens are simply impersonal.
Yesterday, Amazon.com announced that in the past 3 months they have sold more e-books than hardcover books. What bothers me about that statement is that it leaves out paperback books. More people buy paperbacks than hardcovers anyway - I (usually) try to wait until books I want are in paperback because they are so much cheaper.
The second part of rebuffing the Amazon.com statement is that the print industry is still churning out the hardcovers while e-books are still only a small part of the industry. Wired.com had this to say:
"The overall e-book market is still a 90-pound weakling next to the Asiatic elephant of print publishing. According to a report from Publisher’s Weekly last year, hardback sales were projected to be about $4.4 billion in 2009 (including both adult and children’s titles), while paperbacks were expected to generate $5.1 billion in revenue, audiobooks $218 million, and e-books just $81 million — less than 1 percent of the print equivalents. That’s not even counting textbooks, Bibles and professional books — with those included, Publisher’s Weekly estimated the overall book market at $35 billion in 2009."
Read More http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2010/07/amazon-more-e-books-than-hardcovers/#ixzz0uQdP9IDl
Also, as Cnet.com points out, alot of those e-books on Amazon are from self-published authors who list their works for 99 cents and get a few people to buy. Obviously those people are better served by e-books (just as most people are better served by online blogging than publishing their own books). So how many of those people are eating in to the e-books market?
So how does this affect school libraries?
The general argument is always that kids today like computers and digital books so much that making everything digital will increase kids' enthusiasm, and thus, their literacy. But thats not so. Ralph Raab wrote an article for "American Libraries" entitled "Books and Literacy in the Digital Era" in which he argued the following:
"According to Todd Oppenheimer in his book The Flickering Mind: The False Promise of Technology in the Classroom, and How Learning Can Be Saved, from the early 1990s through the first part of this century, school districts across the country spent billions of dollars promoting computer-based learning, promising that computers would engage students in a way that books could not. A school district in Union City, California, spent $37 million to buy computer equipment and software—and paid for it by cutting science equipment and field trips. An elementary school in Los Angeles dropped its music program in order to hire a “technology manager.” But we need to ask ourselves: After nearly two decades of this philosophy, have we seen a rise in literacy? The answer, sadly, is no—or at the very least, not nearly enough to justify what we have lost in the process."
However, an option like the Kindle or the Nook could inspire kids to read more than they already are (aka, if they are already literate). But this argument does not lend itself to creating an entire digital library without books, magazines, research journals, etc. As Raab states, "since copyright issues will most likely never be resolved, people will always need to find a physical book on a physical shelf. Also, not every book can be digitized; there have been different versions of books throughout history, and permission will never be granted by every institution to digitize those editions. The works of William Shakespeare are an example: They have been changed and modified through successive editions over the last 500 years. We will never see every version of his works on Google."
So. Yes, people, digital books and e-books are cool. But they will never replace tangible books, nor should impersonal digital libraries replace tangible (and personal) school libraries.
- Callie
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
Mind Trust and other applications
Today, Library Build, Inc threw its hat in to the ring for the Mind Trust Fellowship. Mind Trust is a nonprofit which promotes education reform and education nonprofits (and only education nonprofits in the USA!) with salaries, stipends, and support. It's a fantastic fellowship, and we are crossing our fingers.
We're also eyeing the Echoing Green Fellowship coming up in September. We applied last year and didn't make it through to the next round, but maybe this year we can make more of a statement.
Today, we are visiting with our lawyers to discuss our 501(c)3 application, and will hopefully be well on our way to sending it in to the IRS!
We're also eyeing the Echoing Green Fellowship coming up in September. We applied last year and didn't make it through to the next round, but maybe this year we can make more of a statement.
Today, we are visiting with our lawyers to discuss our 501(c)3 application, and will hopefully be well on our way to sending it in to the IRS!
Thursday, July 15, 2010
Inspiration for Education Reform
Library Build, Inc is focused on libraries and librarians, but we are also dedicated to overall education reform for all of America's public school students.
People like Geoffrey Canada of the Harlem Children's Zone are particularly inspiring. The charter school in the Harlem Children's Zone (Promise Academy) has seen awesome results including 100% of 3rd graders scoring at or above grade level in math, and 93% of 3rd graders scoring at or above grade level in reading (2009).
Here's a recent video of Canada talking about how Harlem Children's Zone has been successful and what needs to change in the current public school system: Get Schooled.
The best part about recent education reform is the media coverage that has been following these inspiring entrepreneurs. Within the next few months a new documentary is coming out about the charter school movement: "Waiting for Superman". You can check out the trailer for it here: Charter Hope.
Check out this video which discusses just why we need to reform our school systems: Stop the drop-out factories.
People like Geoffrey Canada of the Harlem Children's Zone are particularly inspiring. The charter school in the Harlem Children's Zone (Promise Academy) has seen awesome results including 100% of 3rd graders scoring at or above grade level in math, and 93% of 3rd graders scoring at or above grade level in reading (2009).
Here's a recent video of Canada talking about how Harlem Children's Zone has been successful and what needs to change in the current public school system: Get Schooled.
The best part about recent education reform is the media coverage that has been following these inspiring entrepreneurs. Within the next few months a new documentary is coming out about the charter school movement: "Waiting for Superman". You can check out the trailer for it here: Charter Hope.
Check out this video which discusses just why we need to reform our school systems: Stop the drop-out factories.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)