Libraries depend on their users.
Libraries are text providers rather than temples. Governments and politicians are increasingly watching traffic - or usage - rather than buildings and collections. They speak the language of economy and look for tangible benefits from their investments in libraries and other public services.
We may call this NPM - New Public Management. Some embrace it. Others oppose it. But nobody can avoid it. In the industrial economy culture was insulated from the market. In the post-industrial economy, culture IS the market.
The production and consumption of symbolic or cultural goods - media, education, research, entertainment, travel - is our new economic core. Libraries are moving towards the centre, losing their sacred status “beyond the market”. The time of reckoning - and library statistics - has arrived.
I hve prepared two studies of library traffic - one based on physical, and one on virtual statistics - for IFLA 2008 in Quebec. The relevant links are here:
Count the traffic
This is an empirical study of visitor behavior in Norwegian public libraries in 2007-08 - with Drammen Public Library (at “Papirbredden”) as the main case.
- Slide set. Forty-eight slides as a Google Docs presentation.
- Slide set on SlideShare.
- Paper in PDF-format on IFLA web site
- Paper in HTML-format at Google Docs
How much is much?
Developing and interpreting national library visitor statistics
This is a conceptual study - with empirical illustrations - of web traffic to national libraries.
- Slide set. Eighteen slides as a Google Docs presentation
- Paper in PDF-format on IFLA web site
- Paper in HTML-format at Google Docs
Resources
