New Library World

In an analysis such as this, on the working of a special department of the library, references to the work of other departments, and to library administration in general, cannot be omitted, since the duties of the various departments to some extent overlap. One aspect of the subject— that of private reference libraries in the larger business offices— has not been mentioned, because there is no literature and little information on the subject, and the examination of one such library was disappointing, in spite of the excellent arrangement and really good collection of books, because no information of any great value (from the standpoint of the student of library routine) was gained by its inspection.

FOLLOWING ON from Roy Tomlinson's article (NLW July), while agreeing with much that he says I would like to enlarge on some points. I had hoped that the educational technology argument had been laid to rest after the publication in the Times higher educational supplement of correspondence occasioned by the Library Association's statements on resource centres.

Discusses alternative methods of providing a public library service to one‐house stop clients of south Lincolnshire’s mobile libraries. A literature review revealed a lack of up‐to‐date cost information for alternative methods of service provision. Four methods were selected for further investigation: books by mail; village shop libraries; extending the housebound service; and transporting clients to the library. Annual cost and cost per issue were calculated and compared to the cost of the mobile library. Staff and users were also surveyed for their opinions of the current service and the alternative methods proposed. The results of the costing exercises showed that transporting users to the library was the most cost effective method but this was not popular with the current users of the service. Services considering replacing the one‐house stop mobile service will also need to consider issues including social inclusion, best value and the public library standards.

This article explores some of the applications of the e‐book in the modern library. With over 30 years of history, recent computing advances have finally made electronic book technology a viable option to both publishers and libraries. The advantages libraries gain from the medium are many, but companies such as NetLibrary and ebrary have shown that the industry still needs to establish a definitive means of making their products successfully usable in the library environment. Library networks and consortia, such as the Golden Gateway Library Network and the Marion County (Indiana) Internet Library, have found practical ways to share e‐book subscriptions with their members; by obtaining subscriptions for the consortium, the individual members can all make use of the same collection. E‐books continue to be a matter of discussion in library discussions, and the benefits and disadvantages are being weighed in libraries across the country.

THE first surprise when travelling by air from Fiji to Western Samoa is that one leaves Fiji on Saturday and arrives in Western Samoa on Friday. This is because of crossing the International Date Line en route and a story is told in Fiji of a man who owned a shop through which the date line ran. Sunday trading is frowned on in Fiji but our friend got round this by opening only half of his shop on Sunday—the half on the Saturday or Monday side of the date line. It is therefore not surprising that the Fiji Times describes itself as “the first newspaper in the world every day”.

AS INDUSTRIAL LIBRARIANS we are conscious of increasing efforts being made by the major public libraries to serve information to all those executives whose companies pay substantial rates towards the maintenance of local library services. LESLIE SMYTH, Commercial Librarian at Manchester Public Library spoke recently of the efforts being made to serve industry better. It is with his kind agreement that his talk is published here.

Sufficient time has not yet passed to enable us to remark more than the immediate effects of the new Libraries Act; but there are already signs of much activity and probable expansion. The most significant event in the past month has been the adoption of the Public Libraries Act by the long‐delaying metropolitan borough of Marylebone, which is about to spend eighty‐thousand pounds on establishing its system; and lately Paddington has referred the question to a special committee for report. Thus, at last, all the London Boroughs may now be said to be on the way to possessing a library system. Much remains to be done. St. Pancras—the apostate borough—must needs fall into line with these. The impelling fact in the case has been the matter of control. Unless these boroughs adopt the Acts before the 31st March their power to do so will have passed to the London County Council, and the residents may appeal to that Council over the heads of the borough councils. There seems to have been some virtue, at any rate, in the clause empowering education committees to become library authorities. No borough is anxious to have its own powers restricted, even in what have been not exactly popular matters with them.

ON MAY 1ST, 1766, diligent newspaper readers, perusing the front pages of their favourite journals over breakfast, noticed a brief announcement amongst the plethora of advertisements for miracle cures and infallible nostrums. It read: ‘This day is published: elegantly printed on fine medium writing‐paper, in quarto, price five shilings, The New Bath Guide: or Memoirs of the B—n—r—d family. In a series of poetical epistles … Sold by J. Dodsley in Pall Mall’.

– The purpose of this paper is to investigate current practices in employee satisfaction assessment to determine if quality in the production of library services and work systems are being assessed from the employees' perspective. It is grounded in the theoretical perspective that customers judge quality and that employees are internal customers, equally important to assessment efforts as are external customers. The paper argues that employees provide a unique perspective to the assessment of quality that external customers cannot provide and that quality assessment needs to be an additional form of employee assessment from that of employee satisfaction or organizational climate initiatives., – A content analysis of measures in organizational climate surveys gathered from the Association of Research Libraries was performed. Each item of several organizational climate surveys was analyzed for words and phrases identified as associated with quality assessment. Conclusions were made based on this analysis., – Each of the organizational climate surveys examined included some measures of quality, though there was no consistent focus on quality. Quality issues in these surveys included sharing skills, work load issues, and alignment with library vision and mission., – This is the first part of an ongoing research project. The next steps include content analysis of employee satisfaction instruments and a Delphi study of quality measures gleaned from this analysis., – The paper contends that quality assessment is different than employee satisfaction assessment, but significantly enhances employee assessment in general – providing benefits to both the library and its employees.