Got information?

First, I had to laugh when I logged in to WordPress to type this blog post. Instead of using a phrase like “Already a member” or “Existing subscribers”, it actually asked “Already hip?” I thought that was a perfect example of what the librerati have been talking about over the last day or two.

Sarah’s post touched me for a number of reasons. Working in libraries is often a second (or third) career for many, and therefore, librarians reflect the skills, knowledge, values, and interests they’ve already cultivated. That one can be a puzzle or zine curator, a manuscript librarian, or a cello music cataloger, is in fact awesome. But it points out the fact that the library profession is not monolithic. One receives basically the same 3-5 library courses, but then you’re on your own in designing a program.

Since we’re telling “how did you know you wanted to be a librarian” stories, I’ll offer a bit about my path. While I had a fleeting thought my senior year in college of going to library school, I thought I would be either a music teacher, professor, or arts administrator. I went to school for arts management/education, to get more people to go to concerts, and involved in the arts. My knowledge of music history was helpful for putting it into context. I continued to research and write program notes on the side. I love doing research, and knowing the sources to help people find information. So, from this, and getting to know recordings and labels (by working at public radio stations) and scores and orchestral music (by working as a performance librarian), I got really good at organizing collections and cataloging items in databases for quick retrieval.

What I didn’t bank on when I entered library school was a growing appreciation of archives and the unpublished. Working with original master recordings of interviews of people from various cultures (like at the Archives of Traditional Music) completely sold me on wanting to be a sound archivist. I like cataloging, and I think it’s what I do best, so it’s a good fit for me; but I definitely feel like a music librarian and an archivist. I have deep concern over the preservation of audiovisual media (and all the digital files which are being created), how musical works are created and transformed (and how we’re going to identify all of those instantiations), and the general music and aural literacy of succeeding generations (who’ll have gone deaf because their iPods are turned up WAY too loud). I think that works to make me an information professional with a stake in the future of this profession. In short, curiosity, service, dedication, and passion are what sustain you for the long run, not the false promise of “rock star” fame which this article implies.

Is it hip to be a librarian?

The recent New York Times article “A Hipper Crowd of Shushers” has already provoked a number of responses from across the biblioblogosphere, specifically from IU/SLIS folks, because my friends Pete and Sarah are mentioned. I was in the audience that night at Selam, and spoke to the reporter about being a librarian. I remember being a bit over the top, trying to express my passion for cataloging and metadata. (I think I used the term “cataloging culture” and tried to explain the concept of authority). I also pointed out the difference between libraries and archives. Too much perhaps, but what I find “hip” [can we please have a new word?!] about librarians, archivists, and information professionals is are those who desire to make their workplaces, and more broadly, their profession better by direct involvement (by getting involved directly through new media, rather than waiting a year or more to get their opinions published in a journal). This openness to more voices–diverse, experienced (and not-so-experienced)–helps to promote a better conversation I believe.

On the other hand, I believe libraries and archives are institutions which are meant to be a repository of human knowledge and creativity. How can we share materials if we can’t keep the bits alive, the books free of silverfish, and the acetate discs from delaminating? We must have a balance of preservation and access, so that we can serve future generations as well as those that walk in the door tomorrow.

Pete recently reminded me that I once said that I was a “culture conservative.” By this I don’t mean social, economic, religious, or political. I mean that I have an interest in preserving and encouraging the continued performance and cultivation of traditional forms of artistic and cultural expression. I do this by listening to classical music on the radio, as well as other forms of noncommercial radio. Whether it’s classical, jazz, show music, oldtime radio, stories, folk, country, or bluegrass. Where is the place for innovation in all this preserving? It’s an age-old question, that everyone has to make for themselves–because it is ultimately a question about taste. Aesthetically, I consider myself a blend of a formalist and a humanist, because I think that the elements of the artform are essential to the construction and intrinsic to the worthiness of a piece of art. And art is best when it informs the human condition, makes us ask questions of ourselves, and helps us to understanding what it means to be a human being. (This paragraph brought to you from memories of my aesthetics class in grad school). I don’t mean this as a high-low art comparison, because there’s place for both (and everything in between) in life.

ALA 2007: Registration and reflection

Friday, June 22, 2-4 pm:

Today I worked for half-a-day, and then went over to the Convention Center to register. As I said in a previous post, I decided to go to this conference a little bit late in the game.
In May, I rejoined ALA, which wasn’t that big of the pain with the easy online registration they offer. Then I waited a few weeks before registering for the conference.

They were tremendously efficient at handling all aspects of my membership, except for a little matter about reconciling my old membership with my new membership.

Can we say database people, help!

I arrived at the will call line, and there weren’t many people waiting. (Unlike the badge holder check-in line, which is very long—lesson: procrastination does pay sometimes).

The official numbers are in, and the American Library Association (ALA) Annual Conference in Washington, DC, was indeed a record breaker. The show drew 28,635 people, including 21,466 registrants and 7,169 exhibitors. The previous record was 27,962, set in Chicago in 2005.

(“ALA 2007 roundup: stats, SPARC, Google, and innovation,” Libraryjournal.com, June 28, 2007.

This conference is vast beyond the scope of anything I’ve experienced to date. I would imagine it would be like attending a presidential primary convention. After signing in and getting my badge, tickets to certain events, and a bag of goodies, I headed to the ALA store to peruse what they were selling, and just walked around the Convention Center to get my bearings. I had close to an hour before attending “Conference 101”, a session hosted the New Members Round Table, or NMRT (per the ALA Acronym list provided in the Program Guide). I felt like I had just purchased a study packet, when I got my guide. It was shrink-wrapped with the Exhibits guide (which was a bit briefer in volume). Sitting on the stairs of the Convention Center, I began to ponder what we all had in common, that would bring so many librarians of so many varying interests, types of institutions, subject specialties, and different publics. It was a heady question to begin with, but I wondered if the hive would coalesce around a central theme or idea; or remain disparate and factional.

More to come on the NMRT session.

Remembering ALA 2007: Introduction

If you’ve been a regular reader of Audio Artifacts in the past, I hope you’ll continue reading for a series of posts coming up on my experiences at this year’s American Library Association conference, held in the city I live…Washington, D.C. Many other bloggers have already talked about their experiences, and it is in this esprit de corps that I offer these posts, which are really not audio-related, but relate to the larger sphere in which I work: through cataloging, music librarianship, and media archives.

I had not planned to go to conference one month ago. (Or else I would have payed a lot less). This was poor planning on my part, but with a lot of pressures and frustrations in my life, I just thought it was not important. I was wrong. The chance to attend the nation’s largest library conference is an event not to be missed. I don’t know if I will ever have the chance to go again, but it was rewarding on a number of levels.

I was not an official blogger, nor do I intend to represent any one, or any organization besides myself. It was a mini-vacation for me, but one that helped me revisit some of the lessons I learned in library school two years ago.

Search vs. browse, or downloading vs. broadcasting

HERE’S TO RADIO IN THE 21ST CENTURY: A Librarian’s Perspective

I listen to audio all day long. Whether it’s the digital files my library creates or its collection of over 1 million recordings in all sorts of formats; WAV and MP3 files, and my ever expanding collection of CDs and iTunes, both my apartment and my workstation (and computers) are filled with them. I could start with John Adams’s Chamber Symphony, and in a year, never make it all the way through my classical section to James Conlon’s recording of Alexander Zemlinsky’s two-act opera Der Traumgörge. The same is true of a number of other genres as well: folk, jazz, musical theatre, soundtracks…everything, well, except contemporary pop or hip-hop. As a music major, I started to collect classical recordings to build a basic music library, sort of an audio encyclopedia. Why would I do that now that I can subscribe for $20.00 a year to Naxos’s subscription service where I can stream every piece of classical music they own and license from their online? Sure there are pieces they don’t have, and hundreds of unique performances I crave. But as an encyclopedia Naxos does pretty well. (Alexander Street Press has a similar service through their Classical Music Library, Smithsonian Global Sound, and African American Song).

As a librarian and a music cataloger, searching is what I do best. I can write metadata with the best of them; I tag my Gmail with multiple subjects for efficient retrieval; and can devise complex search strings using keyword or Boolean (limiting my searches by date, language, format, etc.) operators. But what do I enjoy most about going into a library, bookstore, or record store? BROWSING. Whether it’s finding a book that I’ve heard of, but have never seen in person before, or impulsively buying the complete set of DVDs from a television series long since canceled, some joys can not be calculated or quantified so easily. Computer searching requires precise logic, but we can let our imaginations wander and take us to unknown lands when we browse. The audio equivalent of browsing is listening to radio.

I no longer think of the standard radio itself as the only (or even the predominant) means to receive programming. Through the web, via satellite radio, and yes, through their AM/FM band on your car’s stereo, one can receive opinions you’ve never thought of, discover music you’ve never heard before (even re-discover a piece you thought you knew), and hear other people’s stories through music and voice. (OK, internet radio is still sort of stuck in search mode, buried beneath the avalanche of Internet content which only a search engine can penetrate). Why do I forsake my own collection to listen to a medium that’s constantly changing? I don’t often know, but I keep doing it, just like my grandfather did. In a way to tune into radio is like throwing open a window, rather than rummaging through your attic. You may know what you have, but without radio (in all its modern forms), you’ll never know what you’re missing.