Libraries of the future: Strategy, technology and common sense

Are you one of those people who, like me, loves to be surrounded by books (the hard copy kind)? There is something uplifting by seeing all the ideas, hard work and knowledge shared on the shelves of a library. On the other hand, who has time to go to the library? And what about students... How can we convince them that web search is not research?

Rather than lament the past, let's use strategic design approaches to make libraries useful, living, and dynamic places for our students and communities.

"To understand how libraries will change by the mid-21st century, people need to understand what function they currently serve. At their core, libraries in the information age provide a public means of accessing knowledge, he says. That's what people crave.

The hallmark of future libraries, meanwhile, will be hyper-connectivity. They'll reflect our increasing reliance on social media, streaming content, and open-source data." says

David Pescovitz, research director at the Institute for the Future, a Palo Alto-based collective.

I agree with Pescovitz, but I'd take his arguments one step further. Libraries of the future will be meetings places for face to face connections, too. Libraries are places that are safe and comfortable for people of all ages and with different interests. The search for information, knowledge, a quiet place or a feeling of community (without being intrusive) are aspects that bring us together. Yes, libraries should improve their technology and ease of gaining information but they should also take into account their physical spaces. Libraries are both repositories of culture, but also places where we continually make culture. So keep the books, improve the technology, create a variety of spaces to respond to the different profiles of users, and of course, make the architecture memorable.