ABSTRACT: Libraries have been experiencing low usage statistics, in the number of book loans, reference consultation and information inquiries. With this trend in mind, the authors have studied three overseas library models and introduced their innovations as well as the new roles of teaching at their own libraries. They come to the conclusion that libraries are at a crossroad in the 21st century. Jobs are changing, so are the roles of librarians and libraries. Librarians and library services still have a full workload ahead. Roles and shapes can be changed or shifted, but the fundamental infrastructure remains, at least for a long while.

I. Introduction

The Sheldon Margen Public Health Library (PHL) at the University of California, Berkeley is a small, subject-specific academic library, serving the students, staff, and faculty of the School of Public Health as well as the campus at large, the general public, and four state agency organizations via contract agreements. Over the years, the PHL has experienced a significant decline in the number of reference interactions in the library, via the telephone and emails. It has also experienced a decline in circulation figures. One explanation for the decline in circulation is the advent of electronic resources.

Notwithstanding a recent sign of revival in this past July, there has been a steady decline in the usage statistics of reference services at Santa Cruz Public Libraries (SCPL), compared with their peak year in July 1997.

Reference services at the SCPL consist of walk-in reference service and a system-wide telephone reference service, housed in the Central Library but responsible for all phone inquiries routed from its ten branches. Despite the low statistics in reference services, a staff writer from Santa Cruz Sentinel, a county newspaper, finds that Santa Cruzans love their libraries. Nearly 2 million books, CDs, DVDs, books on tape and other materials were checked out of local public libraries in the year of 2005. This is a 4% increase in checked-out items from the previous year[5]. How could one explain the phenomenon of an increase in circulation services, but a decrease in reference services? Does this indicate that library users do not need librarians or professional staff anymore? Can a library in the 21st century be run by itself, or on autopilot?

With these questions in mind, the authors examined the phenomenal success of a few exemplary libraries presented at the 3rd Shanghai International Library Forum (SILF)[6]. In addition, they took a closer look into some critical aspects of library operations and services, hoping that during the process, vital keys to the questions mentioned above might be discovered.

II. Innovative Models

Model 1: McGill University Libraries: Promote Traditional and New Library Services

There are thirteen branches in the system of McGill University Libraries, Montréal, Canada. They are run under the firm belief of Mrs. Janine Schmidt, Director of Libraries, that libraries are facing new challenges such as a changing client base, multiple information formats, multiple information and communication technologies and changes in methods of teaching and learning[7]. Most library surveys, however, find that few users are aware of existing library services, let alone new services when they are introduced. One of the problems lies in the fact that little emphasis has been placed upon the understanding of users and their new needs, and thus new services.

What do today’s users want? Mrs. Schmidt is of the opinion that they still want basic services—competence, reliability, responsiveness, timeliness, honesty and a caring approach. They want assistance with information access, and to be able to read materials in both print and online formats. They want to use library resources effectively with minimum effort and in a timely manner; therefore, library training and motivation in resource discovery are expected. When patrons come to the library, they want the facilities they desire. This includes computers as well as printers and other accompanying services. Thus, libraries have much to learn from shops, restaurants and Internet cafes. Mrs. Schmidt’s’ libraries have considered a series of effective strategies. The following two aspects are a summary.

1. Badging the Library
As commercial sectors rely heavily on branding and badging promotional strategies, so should libraries. The @your library theme, for instance, is a good start. It has been adopted by the American Library Association and accepted by the International Federation of Library Associations. McDonald’s "golden arches" is a familiar logo all over the world, but customized in various countries. In Canada, a maple leaf has been inserted in the arches, and in China, a bilingual slogan has been added beneath the arches in both English and Chinese: "I’m lovin’ it" = "我就喜欢" . Therefore, unique but familiar logos, as well as selling products like book bags, and incorporating slogans like "Educate! Inform! Promote!" should be considered in library advertising and service delivery. All these ideas and tools are targeted at promoting library awareness in the 21st century as well as increasing library usage and funding.

2. Promotional Strategies for New Products
According to Mrs. Schmidt, most promotional strategies today are targeted only at traditional library services, such as interlibrary loans, special collections and information literacy programs. Apart from popular strategies such as seminars, open houses, newsletters, bookmarks, flyers and handouts, she advocates employing professionals to write articles for in-house or external use to ensure effective communication. Moreover, she proposes to develop new products to meet users’ changing requirements, e.g., the convenient integration of iPods. Since library users are seeking the information they need in one place at a time, the traditional library services need to change to accommodate them. By searching most library catalogs, one cannot help noticing one distinctive change, i.e., they have started to catalog not only items residing in libraries, but also remote resources, such as electronic and Internet resources, as a result of cataloging rules changing slowly to respond to the users’ need for one-stop shopping.

Model 2: Oslo Public Library: Promote Nontraditional Library Services

Oslo Public Library (Deichmanske bibliotek) has thirteen branches and one main library. It is one of the pioneers in promoting nontraditional library services to anticipate and meet the needs of the 21st century library users, with its three notable projects, namely, the Deichman Digital Workshop, Kinoteket, and Traditional Library Services in Digital Form.

1. The Deichman Digital Workshop (Deichmans Digitale Verksted)
The Digital Workshop is a project financed by the Research Council of Norway, in cooperation with Sony and Apple, to support broadband-based services in the public sector. So far, it has developed into three fully equipped media studios as zones for media production, communication, and live presentation. Situated on three different locations across Oslo, the studios are interconnected with a fiber-optical network, and equipped with professional environments, theatrical lighting systems, projection equipment, and Public Address loudspeakers, so as to create an optimal experience for the audience.

The Digital Workshop encourages users to make productions in the studio and to give a presentation at the end of their studies. Lecturers, writers, actors, artists and other users can perform or debate their works. Those events are broadcast live on the web, with advanced announcements. The broadcasts will be added later to OPL’s media archives and available on its website, where students and other interested users can retrieve them for their school reports and research.

The workshop aims at stimulating efforts to teach library users with media literacy, including both specialized concepts and straightforward software training, like Photoshop and video editing software. Either guest lecturers or in-house specialists teach the workshops. All of these facilities, equipment and tutorials are provided as free services to the general public. Reinert Mithassel, the project manager, is happy to recall that not a piece of equipment has been broken or stolen during the two years the workshop has been offered. The studios are prototypes in planning for future library services as well as showcases to inspire other libraries with nontraditional services as they define new roles for the library[8].

2. Kinoteket (Cinematheque)
In 2004, in collaboration with the Norwegian Film Institute, the OPL initiated project Kinoteket to establish a video-on-demand based movie service, presenting Norwegian film heritage to library users. The project is based on a commercial pay-per-view service for the Internet, originally developed by the Norwegian Film Institute and Norgesfilm (Film Archive). The two organizations handle content, copyrights and technical solutions. Participating libraries pay a set monthly fee to gain unlimited access to the archive. For end users, the service acts like a DVD-style player. The central video-server is located at the main branch and supplies the same content to the four branches via a fiber-optical network. Besides these five viewing places, users can access the same content in the reception area where plasma-screens and wireless headphones are provided.

The library is experimenting with promoting other library materials, and pushing forward the progress of the city of Oslo’s Metropolitan Area Network. According to Olav Celius, project coordinator, the goal of this project is to establish a framework for handling and distributing digital media in the library, in a broader context than the film archive. The main challenges, however, are issues like copyright, standards and commercial incentives. For these reasons, he and his staff do not limit themselves to any particular media, format or supplier, but want to grow as new media or technology becomes available. To prevent any copyright issues, they keep their service strictly web-based, as it is where the most interesting developments takes place at the moment, and where most efforts have been made to work on standards and services[9].

3. Traditional Library Services in Digital Form
a. LåtLån (Borrow a Tune), an Electronic Lending Service
On March 1, 2004, the OPL inaugurated its collaborated project with the Bergen Public Library (Bergen Offentlige Bibliotek) and Phonofile, a Norwegian digital music archive and central distribution office for audio files. The project was financed by a grant from ABM-utvikling, the Norwegian Authority for Archives, Libraries and Museums.

The Phonfile's database included over 50,000 titles recorded by independent Norwegian record companies, covering hip-hop and electronic to traditional folk music, jazz, rock, metal, classical and contemporary music. Loans were made by streaming content to the users’ computers. To stream, rather than download, was to anticipate legal and financial issues. "In effect, 'loan' consisted of a listening experience. Each file a user began to listen to is registered in the system's statistics module as a loan, and when the file finished playing, the transaction was complete, and the file could be said to be 'returned'."[10]

As users must be registered borrowers, but application process needs to be conducted in person, the library staff was happy to recollect that lines issuing library cards grew long for a while. The lending system attracted new user groups who had never given a second thought to the public library system. In the first four months of the trial period, the OPL had over 4,000 unique visitors in a city of a half million people. More than 15,000 unique tracks had been streamed. Due to the lack of a continuing funding, the project was discontinued at the end of 2004. However, a new plan is in the works to reorganize and redesign a model, based on simultaneous licenses, similar to the electronic periodical system. The model of LåtLån has been continued by libraries in Sweden and Denmark, both of which have similar services up and running.

b. Digital Reference Service
Besides the pilot project of LåtLån, the OPL uses software called Sentinel eDialog 24 to conduct its digital reference service. It combines three ways of digital communications, namely, online librarians can discuss among themselves, see other online partners and refer specific questions to appropriate colleagues. It classifies various questions for future reference and has been welcomed by both library staff and users. In 2005 alone, the OPL received 5,966 email reference inquiries, 3,591 SMS messages, and 13,452 online chats.

Such a success in nontraditional library services is by no means accidental. Ann Kunish, head of the OPL Music Department, is a living example of the 21st century library professional. After graduating from University of Wisconsin-Madison with a Bachelor’s degree in music (French horn), she went to Norway for one year to study under a well-known horn teacher at the Norwegian Academy of Music. Once she earned her Master’s degree at the Music Academy, she played with various national music organizations, such as the Norwegian Opera, the Oslo Philharmonic and Norwegian Radio Orchestra. Having been a performer, teacher and organizer of band seminars, Ms. Kunish finally sold her horn. Since the end of 1999, she has been employed as head of the Music Department at the OPL. Her hiring was an experiment of sorts, for it was the first time the position of department head was given to a musician, instead of a librarian with formal library school education. However, the experiment has proven successful. She has been heading the project entailing both circulation and reference services in digital format. Staffed with ten people, the Music Department is popular in and outside the OPL, with about 190,000 loans per year.

Model 3: Shanghai Library: Promote Leadership in Society

Shanghai Library used to be a very traditional library, with a history of 150 years. In 1847, the Library of the Xu Jiahui Catholic Church was founded, with a collection of 200,000 volumes in both Chinese and Western languages. In 1995, the Shanghai Library and Institute of Scientific & Technical Information of Shanghai (ISTIS) were merged with combined resources and collections to serve the general public, academia and the government. In 1996, a new building was opened to the public. It is a landmark in Shanghai, built in the shape of pyramids with escalating cubic blocks, symbolizing the solid foundation of cultural heritage and human pursuit of knowledge. The library covers an area of 83,000 square meters, housing approximately 50 million items. Its conference center holds international arts and scientific exhibits and seminars all year round.

Under the Shanghai Central Library System, there are 19 district and county public libraries. Headed by Dr. Jianzhong Wu, Director, Shanghai Library has been promoting itself to be a new leader in the 21st century. Since 2002, it has hosted three international library conferences, namely, the Shanghai International Library Forum (SILF), a biennial international event, aimed at promoting professional and academic exchange among librarians and information professionals all over the world. In its first conference, the Shanghai Library focused on four major subject areas: knowledge management, reference services, interlibrary cooperation, and digitization. There were more than 100 representatives from 12 countries attending the forum. Seventy-seven papers were published in the 2002 Proceedings and 53 library and information professionals delivered speeches at the meeting. In its second conference, the Shanghai Library devoted itself to the theme of "City Development and Library Services," with four sub-themes, namely, the Library and Lifelong Education, Reference Service and Research, the Library and City’s Knowledge Infrastructure, and the Library and the World Expo. Eighty papers and 25 abstracts were published in the 2004 Proceedings. In its third conference in 2006, the Shanghai Library reaped another resounding victory. It gathered over 300 library professionals and specialists from 28 countries. Eighty-five full papers were compiled and published in its 2006 proceedings. Excellent papers from the Proceedings were selected to be further published in two special issues of Library Management, a journal of Emerald Group Publishing Limited. In addition, authors of 75 papers were invited to make presentations at the conference’s concurrent sessions.

By examining three conferences of SILF, the authors clearly witness another important innovation that Shanghai Library has made: its active partnership with international, national and local publishers. The printed and online proceedings, scholarly research papers and presentations have effectively helped SILF to achieve its ultimate aim of promoting worldwide professional and academic exchange among librarians and information professionals. Mr. Xuyan Chen, International Cooperation Division of Shanghai Library, eloquently summarized at SILF 2006 the innovative role that his library had played[11]. Shanghai Library has been seeking partnership not only with publishers, but also with the government, tourism sectors and international professional organizations, such as the Chinese American Librarian Association (CALA). It publicizes its various programs through CALA’s listserv and newsletter to Chinese librarians living and working in North America.

In spite of new challenges in library acquisitions, cataloging and facilities, Shanghai Library continues to adopt novel innovations by soliciting more help and attention from its governing body and the Central Government. It is instrumental in initiating the "Window on China", a national program based on its model of "Window of Shanghai". The program will include not only leading publishing houses and libraries in China, such as the National Library of China, the Library of Chinese Social Academy, Peking University Library and Shanghai Library, but also libraries at various levels and of various types. One of the tangible goals is to help produce national publications in a greater number of foreign languages.

Model 4: Santa Cruz Public Libraries & UC Berkeley Public Health Library: Promote Teaching Roles

One of the surprising similarities among the library models listed above lies in the fact that with the advent of information technology (IT) in the library world, the role of librarians has evolved from that of an observer in the wings to an active partner to guide users to appropriate information sources and advise on their use, as Mrs. Schmidt has observed in her paper[12]. In other words, librarians and other library professionals have been undergoing a process of shape shifting: they have assumed a brand-new role in the 21st century, namely, teaching or tutoring. At both the SCPL and PHL, the librarian's role is no longer just at the Reference Desk or answering the reference telephones.

1. Drop-in Instruction at the PHL
For many years, the PHL has offered drop-in instructions sessions to the students, staff, and faculty of the UC Berkeley School of Public Health. Previously, these had been one-hour sessions, covering topics such as PubMed, EndNote, Internet/Web Resources, and Medline/HealthStar. This training has had mixed results, partly because the sessions have not always been hands on, and partly because the PHL does not have a training room in which to conduct these sessions; participants have to go to another building. Attendance has been uneven since sign-ups are not required. This year for the first time, the PHL is offering ninety-minute hands-on sessions, to allow participants adequate time to follow along and explore as the features and resources are being explained and taught.

2. Saturday Computer Catalog/Internet Classes at the SCPL
The project of teaching the general public was launched by three ordinary reference librarians in March 2002, just as Daniel Goleman described in Primal Leadership, "Some have no official leadership position, yet step forward to lead as needed, then fade back until another ripe moment arrives."[13] They stepped forward not only to respond to an interest in staff holding training sessions on Saturday mornings[14], but more importantly, to meet an increasing need among the general public ever since the SCPL put its online resources on its website, but with limited help provided to its users.

On the morning of April 13, 2002 from 8:30 to 9:30, Fred Ulrich and Jim Tarjan taught the first official class, with Deborah Lipoma as coordinator. At the beginning, there was no official name for the class, and the facilitators just called it "Using the Santa Cruz Public Library Catalog" or "The Computer Catalog". The initial goal was simple: helping the public to learn to use the library catalog. "This one-hour class will help you to: find books, videos, CD’s and other library materials; place your own reserves and check your personal library account; learn about the many databases and other online resources on the library’s homepage."[15] The requirements were equally simple: Admission was free; registration was required. The same class was repeated at the same time two weeks later at one of the ten branches of the SCPL.

Four and half years later, the 3-member team is still teaching the public twice a month, one at the Central library and another at a branch library, never missing a single class. The notable change is that the scope of their classes has become more comprehensive and defined: it has evolved from the "Computer Catalog Class", to "Free Internet Classes"; from just learning to use the Santa Cruz Public Library Catalog to learning to acquire basic Internet skills to search the library catalog, reference databases and health information on the Internet. Another change is that the class has made itself indispensable in the community. People will come to the Reference Desk, just to enter their names for the next class. Attendance of the class has also gone through a dramatic change: from one or two students initially, to an average of ten students per class now. But the public is not yet satisfied: they want classes to be held more than two Saturday mornings a month, and they want classes longer than one hour. To answer such needs, SCPL has considered a more permanent and flexible location as a teaching site, i.e., the meeting room of the Central Library, which will be equipped with newly acquired laptops.

3. Encouraging Staff to Teach Staff
Both at the PHL and SCPL, the staff are encouraged to teach their peers or other department personnel with their acquired specialties and knowledge.

At the PHL
For the last six years, all of the PHL staff have participated in the training of new staff members. As a new staff member is hired, a two-to-three month training plan is developed with input from staff members. To take advantage of the exceptional experience and expertise of the staff, each current staff member is scheduled to provide at least one training session in his or her area of expertise (e.g., circulation, monographs, serials, document delivery, etc.). Even if a new staff member has some experience in a particular area, they still get training from a current staff member. This ensures that everyone has the same foundation of knowledge on which to build. Previously when new staff started they only received training in the areas in which they were lacking knowledge. This caused some issues later because the assumption was made that they had adequate knowledge from their previous experience, which sometimes was not the case.

Training for reference is a shared experience provided by all reference staff. Librarians take responsibility for sharing their knowledge of the reference collection and are assigned particular sections of the reference collection (e.g. statistics, handbooks/textbooks, toxicology, encyclopedias/dictionaries, guides, directories, and laws) to cover with the new reference staff member. When the newly hired first perform duties at the reference desk, they are guided and mentored by experienced reference staff. Initially, new staff members start out sitting at the reference desk along with a current reference staff member to hear the types of questions that arise, and see the public service philosophy in action. After some exposure, the new staff member begins to answer reference questions with the current staff member beside them. When new staff members begin to feel comfortable, they start manning the reference desk alone with a current staff member assigned to serve as a backup. This method allows new reference staff members to learn the reference collection and experience the very specialized reference questions in a gradual manner. It also ensures that all new reference staff members receive the same foundation training. To maintain a high level of reference skills, the reference staff meet twice a month. One meeting is to review current reference issues and the other is for reference staff development. The reference staff development meetings can be training on a new resource, demonstrating new features of old resources, clarification of how a resource can be used, etc. The collegial training of staff members helps new staff get a fuller picture of everyone's role in the PHL, thus enabling everyone to work together to provide a higher level of service to our users.

At the SCPL
Like many libraries that have catalogers performing reference duties, the SCPL requires the Technical Services staff to shoulder two four-hour shifts per week, either at Central Library Reference, Telephone Reference or at the Circulation Desk, depending upon their job titles. Because of this unique exposure to public services, the Technical Services staff has considerable insight into the needs of the public, as well as the strengths and weaknesses of the library catalog.

The SCPL provides an eighty-hour comprehensive training session for new employees, and ongoing classes to employees in general. Those classes are typically taught by local or national professional organizations such as MOBAC (Monterey Bay Area Cooperative Library System), OCLC or InfoPeople. They are very beneficial to professionals on a particular subject, but not so much to library supporting staff in understanding intimately what their library catalog can do and how it works. This is especially true in their ability to correctly read bibliographical records, enabling them, when they stand in the front lines at different branches, to efficiently serve library users. After observing this process for nearly three years, Dody Anderson, former head of the Cataloging Department, volunteered to teach a MARC (MAchine Readable Cataloging) class, as a continuing education program for internal users. She would either organize a few branches to gather together in one location to conduct a class, or go to individual branches for onsite classes. Typically she started her teaching by outlining an overview of major fields in a bibliographical record, such as leaders (fixed-field elements), 0XX, and 1XX-8XX fields.

The staff used to know only how to search an item by using the call number, ISBN, title or author. Through these internal classes, they have been taught other access points, such as publisher number (028), LCCN (010), series title (4XX) or subjects (6XX). Moreover, they have learned how to use such simple elements as indicators in 2XX, which is extremely helpful in solving irretrievable problems in their daily work. At the Receiving Department, staff members are asked to create brief records as needed. However they were never told or taught to leave filling characters when an article existed before the title proper. As a result, neither the public nor staff was able to retrieve titles preceded with articles even if they had already been purchased and in fact owned by the system, thus creating a long list of problems.

Apart from the problem list, the SCPL generates a weekly request list that details patrons’ requests for that particular week. Only a few people understood this mechanism, and most felt very tongue-tied when the concerned public inquired about the status of their requests. To address this issue, Ms. Anderson would conduct a post-MARC class and showed the staff how everything was conducted in the system and behind the scene. Library staff members who went to those classes have been empowered with new tools and knowledge. The public, on the other hand, is assured of the transparency of their requests, instead of worrying that their requests will end up in a black hole. Ms. Anderson continued her MARC classes from 1999 until late 2005 when she left the SCPL to take the higher position of principal librarian in another library system. Though her legacy has been left unfilled, her students are passing on her lessons to their successors.

3. Proactive Tutorials for eBooks & eAudiobooks
Mr. David H. Rothman points out in his Razing the Tower of e-Babel that along with cumbersome anti-piracy protection and the limits of today’s gadgetry, e-Babel is a big reason for eBooks’ pathetic sales[16]. He attributes the fact that eBooks have not caught on to one simple problem: they are too complicated. It is true that there are too many formats existing for eBooks. Therefore, a genuine eBook standard is a highly desirable solution. Meanwhile, the authors are less pessimistic than Mr. Rothman after studying the high and stable demand reflected by the SCPL’s increasing circulation statistics. The Tower might be the bane of publishers and online retailers whose sales are under $48 million, but might not necessarily be the bane of librarians and eBook readers who love the convenience of 24-hour accessibility and full-text searchability. With the support of Susan Elgin, assistant director, the SCPL has begun to acquire eBooks since 2001 via Califa, a consortium of over 250 member libraries in California for eBooks and eAudiobooks. Today there are more than 9,000 eBooks and eAudiobooks at the SCPL through NetLibrary, Proquest Safari, and TumbleBook Library eBooks for eKids, not to mention incoming new titles by Overdrive. The following table illustrates a very telling example.

One important aspect Mr. Rothman fails to address in his article is the variety of new roles for the 21st century librarian, such as teacher, writer and leader. Consortiums like "Califa" have been effective in organizing and leading libraries in California. Anthony Costa, a librarian and Califa Operations Manager, has managed to help member libraries to identify their common goals, to meet the needs of users and overcome their common difficulties of limited funding by sharing eBook and eAudiobook subscriptions. He stays focused on the major issues of negotiating with eBook publishers and vendors with a bigger and stronger voice, and assisting member institutions with vital technical support. When a member has written a good tutorial for an e-product, he will make sure that other libraries share it, thereby maximizing benefits and avoiding duplicated efforts.

SCPL librarians like Gail Mason and Heidi Jaeger-Smith, on the other hand, have taken an active role in learning beforehand technical specifics from Califa, publishers and vendors. Equipped with an in-depth knowledge of their products, they are able to teach eBook and eAudiobook users on the phone or in person how to set up a user’s account, how to download, and other topics. In addition, they are in the process of writing and revising a series of easy-to-follow tutorials to be posted under each product on the library website for interested users to follow. If there are any further complicated issues, they are willing to contact vendors on behalf of their users, or encourage users to contact the vendor in question directly. Such preemptive and proactive measures aim at ensuring the satisfaction of eBook and eAudiobook users.

III. Not an Ending, but Future Improvement

At the PHL:

1. Better ways of counting usage of library services (e.g., use of the library web pages, use of electronic resources, number of questions and answers provided electronically);
2. A simpler yet easier way to maintain the website, and to conduct usability studies to determine what users want;
3. Expansion of topics for the drop-in library instruction session;
4. More visibility among the students, staff, and faculty of the School of Public Health; and
5. Better evaluation methods of library instructional sessions.

At the SCPL:

1. A better organization of its homepage, which is overloaded with information. It is simply too overwhelming for any users who have already been frustrated after their long hours’ Googling.
2. A statistical account of its website usage. The SCPL is known for generating many useful statistical reports, including online database usage account, but somehow website usage accounting is lacking, even though it is technically possible to generate by any given parameter of time. With the availability of these statistics, librarians and technical staff will be provided with more food to ponder, and room to improve.
3. A closer examination of the existing library catalog which should catalog physical items available in the library as well as other formats, such as library subscribed databases, and Internet integrating resources. The available databases, for instance, rely solely on the library website for users to access, and are inaccessible via the library catalog. One of the key elements for eBooks to have such a high usage number lies in the fact that they are listed in the library catalog and retrievable like any titles. If improvement can be made in this area by the Cataloging staff, the usage of expensive databases can be dramatically increased and catalogers’ expertise, more effectively utilized.
4. The SCPL is laudable in its teaching endeavors. However, more librarians need to be encouraged to participate in teaching to strengthen the existing team and revive the lost tradition created by Ms. Anderson.

In consideration of the models and reasons above, librarians and library services still have a full innovative workload ahead. Roles and shapes can be changed or shifted, but the fundamental infrastructure remains, at least for a long while. Apparently, libraries in the 21st century cannot be run by themselves, let alone on autopilot.

[1] Reference stats 2005-2006 & Record stats 2006-2007 maintained by the Central Reference Department of the SCPL.

[2] T-Ref = Reference via Telephone Reference Service

[3] T-Info = Information inquiry via Telephone Reference Service

[4] Starting from June 1999, SCPL ceased keeping tax statistics, but restarted Internet statistics, which was discontinued from April 1998 to May 1999 when Internet was put on networked computers.

[5] McCord, Shanna. (2006, September 12). "Two million checkout can’t be wrong: County libraries very popular," Santa Cruz Sentinel.

[6] Shanghai Library. (2006, August 21). "Library news: A grand gathering for international librarianship--The Third Shanghai International Library Forum convened at Shanghai Library". URL: http://www.library.sh.cn/new-eng/events/list.asp?id=1243. (Accessed 22 November 2006).

[7] Schimdt, Janine. (2006). "Promote library services in a Google world," Management innovation & library services, the proceedings of the Third Shanghai International Library Forum. (pp. [172]-177). Shanghai: Shanghai Scientific and Technical Press.

[8] Mithassel, Reinert. (via annk@deichman.no). (2006, September 25). reinerts innlegg.doc. Re: Contact & Other Info Please, E-mail to Hui-Lan Huang Titangos (titangosh@santacruzpl.org).

[9] Celius, Olav. (via annk@deichman.no). (2006, September 25). New ways of presenting and distributing cultural heritage. Re: Contact & Other Info Please, E-mail to Hui-Lan Huang Titangos titangosh@santa cruzpl.org).

[10] Kunish, Ann. (2004). "LåtLån: Circulating digital music files via the public library," IFLA 2004, Buenos Aires, 4 Sept. 2004.

[11] Chen, Xuyan. (2006). A Window Open to the Whole World--Shanghai Library's Global Cooperative Promotion "Window of Shanghai." URL: http://www.libnet.sh.cn/silf2006/table.htm. (Accessed 22 November 2006).

[12] Schimdt, Janine. (2006). "Promote library services in a Google world," Management innovation & library services, the proceedings of the Third Shanghai International Library Forum. (pp. [172]-177). Shanghai: Shanghai Scientific and Technical Press.

[13] Goleman, Daniel; Boyatzis, Richard; & McKee, Annie. (2002). Primal leadership. (p. x). Boston, MA.: Harvard Business School Press.

[14] Schwamberger, Jane. (schwambergerj@santacruzpl.org). (2002, January 7). Re: The old computer docents training committee, E-mail to Barbara Snider (sniderb@santacruzpl.org).

[15] Lipoma, Deborah. "Class flyers".

[16] Rothman, David H. (2006, August 28). "Razing the tower of e-Babel: the reason e-books haven't caught on is simple: they're too complicated," Publishers Weekly, 62(1).

[17] Courtesy of the SCPL’s Office of Collection Development, eBook usage statistics for Santa Cruz Public Libraries 2004-2007, & NetLibrary usage statistics 2001-2004.

Deborah Jan (djan@library.berkeley.edu) is the Head Librarian at the Sheldon Margen Public Health Library at the University of California, Berkeley, USA.