Innovation Blog

« Previous day (Apr 22, 2007) | Main | Next day (Apr 24, 2007) »

Monday Apr 23, 2007

Library? Cybrary? A Shifting Paradigm at Stanford

The thinking around what libraries are and how we can utilize them is changing, as is evidenced by some innovative work being done at the Stanford University Library. Hal Stern, Sun's VP of Global Systems Engineering talks with Stanford's Michael Keller in this latest edition of Innovating@Sun about the shifting paradigm in the world of research, knowledge attainment, and sharing.

According to Keller, we need to think about libraries in a broader sense and realize they have multiple manifestations. He says libraries are places where information is chosen and made available to members of a community. Whether the information artifact is physical or virtual, how we deliver services based on this new paradigm is both complicated and interesting.

The interview discusses:

The key role of IT, whether for storage, cataloguing, content collection, or distribution

The technology needed to serve up very large databases that are enriched weekly by thousands of e-articles, and which are highly-trafficked by science professionals who cite them regularly.

How cross-referencing and content consumption deepen links making the library more valuable because common areas of interest can be detected.

How Sun's Try and Buy program enabled Stanford to test Sun's Honeycomb technology and prove its efficacy, ousting a competitor's bid for the business.

Digital content safety via LOCKSS (Lots of Copies Keep Content Safe)

Keller also notes how they are currently building out features that will allow "Web 3.0" to deliver to readers, automatically, relevant content that is based on previous uses of similar content based on subject, language or author.