Reply-to: Association for Recorded Sound Discussion List <ARSCLIST@xxxxxxx>
I'm assuming you're joking, but just in case not -- our library system has an online reservation
that covers the whole county. So, I can search on Charlie Parker for instance. Oh, there's a 2CD
anthology by Rhino but it's at the Yonkers library. OK, place a hold right there online and the
actual physical product, in this case a 2CD set, turns up at the Bedford Hills library a few days
later. I get an e-mail letting me know it's there.
There's a similar system for Putnam County, where I live, but it's not as sophisticated or fast.
But, our local library is nice enough to call us instead of "impersonal" e-mail. Seriously, I don't
care which way I'm notified, I just appreciate the notification.
Apparently, some libraries in some areas charge a small fee to grab-and-hold, but not around here.
A nice trend I'm noticing is that local libraries -- notorious for being feifdoms of head librarians
and/or board members, and thus not known for organized buying and amassing coherent collections --
seem to be checking the network and thus you're not seeing every library go out and
duplicate-purchase the latest best-seller. This frees up funds for deeper and more eclectic local
collections, summed into one deep/wide mass by the networked borrowing system. For instance, Bedford
Hills is amassing a very good DVD collection -- much more than what a typical video-rental store
would have as far as variety. The main reason is that they have one librarian who is a movie buff
who trolls local non-Blockbuster video stores and convinces them to sell her circulated movies very
cheap (a couple of dollars). Some of these stores are owned by movie buffs who will try out all
manner of small films, foreign films and documentaries -- just because they like to watch them. They
go into rental circulation and most never get rented. So, to write off the inventory for taxes, it's
very convenient to unload them for free or cheap to the librarian. Thus, instead of 50 copies of the
"king Kong" junky remake, like a Blockbuster, the library has 500+ different titles and is rapidly
growing. My company gave them a donation to acquire more documentaries and a local guy from the
horse-farm set gave them a very generous donation to acquire more foreign films.
-- Tom Fine
----- Original Message -----
From: "steven c" <stevenc@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
<snip>
"Grab-Hold..." of WOT? Are you taking belongings for repair? Buying
replacements?
Winning things on eBay? Or e-mailing your lunch order to some digitally-
accessible eatery?