Jabes 2009 - Conférence inaugurale "Un avenir sans livres pour les bibliothèques ?" Stefano Mazzocchi, Metaweb Technologies dans le cadre des Journées Abes 2009

1. A bookless future for the libraries?
~ A comedy in 3 Acts by ~
Stefano Mazzocchi

2. ~ Act I ~
where we go looking in the past to understand
more about the present

3. information
vs.
information technology

4. what
vs.
how transfer
encode
our focus

5. speech
enabled coordination
pros
required no tools

6. speech
cons
transient
synchronous
localized
marginal cost >= 1

7. [aside: marginal cost]
after acting on N items,
the cost of acting on one more

8. Transition [⇒]
reduction of marginal costs

9. speaking ⇒ cave drawing

11. cave drawings
pros
persistent
asynchronous

12. cave drawings
cons
immovable
marginal cost ~ 1
require tools

13. cave drawing ⇒ clay inscribing

15. inscribed clay
pros
persistent
asynchronous
portable

16. inscribed clay
cons
marginal cost ~ 1
fragile
heavy

17. clay ⇒ fiber

19. fiber inscribing
pros
persistent
asynchronous
portable
light

20. fiber inscribing
cons
marginal cost ~ 1

21. fiber inscribing ⇒ fiber printing

23. printed fiber
pros
persistent
asynchronous
portable
light
marginal cost < 1

24. printed fiber
cons
many marginal costs still > 0
production
consumption (access)
storage
preservation

25. fiber printing ⇒ electronic publishing

27. electronic publishing
pros
asynchronous & synchronous
portable
high density
many marginal costs ~ 0

28. electronic publishing
cons
?

29. ~ Act II ~
where we look at the present with our
knowledge from the past

30. a transition is in progress

31. substantial benefits
unprecedented information density and access
unprecedented retrieval ability
unprecedented reduction in distribution costs

32. yet there are issues

33. degraded consumption experience
very low screen resolution
batteries needed
poor user interfaces
poor network access

34. disrupted business models

35. disrupted institutions
[the libraries]

36. ~0 marginal costs are here to stay

37. which means an “ipod for books” is an
ecosystem necessity (the only missing
piece), not just a possibility

38. ...how does that impact the
libraries?
if the ecosystem of information
turns into all-electronic...

39. libraries vs. museums of books
Managing physical non-unique copies of books
will often be uneconomical
Think of VHS tapes and vinyl LPs

40. no more shelves
What happens to serendipitous discovery?
Browse vs. Search?

41. nearly infinite storage space
Is there a justification for filtering anymore?

42. indices created from full text
Is metadata still needed?
Does metadata have to be a human production
or can it be emerged by computers
thru statistical analysis?
or a mix of the two?

43. fragmenting information
unit of information goes from book of pages,
to journals of articles,
to webs of hyperlinked pages,
to networks of relational assertions
Can library technologies and
skill set still be useful across all such
granularity spectrum?

44. networks of relational assertions
(a.k.a. a web of data)
small pieces of information
uniquely identified
related to one another
can be mixed and queried symbolically

45. Demos!

46. first, a few questions

47. Who is the youngest winner of the
2008 Academy Awards?

48. What battles of the american civil war were
not fought on US territory?

49. What is the only building in Brasil
designed by an architect that designed a
building in New York City?

50. How many male actors that co-starred
in a movie with Al Pacino were born
in Russia?

51. how would you find out?

52. let’s use Freebase!

53. ~ Act III ~
where we save the day by applying the
wisdom of the past to an uncertain future

54. despite the obvious advantages, and
immediate shortcomings, electronic
publishing retains many long term
uncertainties

55. Digital Preservation
storing bits is not the same
as preserving information
format/system obsolescence
lossy format conversions
Librarians have unique skills
and affinity for such problems.

56. Digital Divide
Low marginal cost is not the same as low cost
Accessibility is not the same as access
Libraries, by definition, remain
a key institution in bridging these gaps

57. Data Modeling
Library metadata is just another form of
low granular relational data.
Librarians naturally understand
the value of modeling data.
Statistical emergence of metadata can
only go so far without human common sense,
help will be needed.

58. Data Integration
Different data models for similar data
will emerge and will evolve.
Integration between different schemas
requires specific skills and abilities, very close
to the current set of librarians skills.

59. Data Pollution
Vandalism, defacing, spamming or general abuse
are all negative sides of the low marginal
cost ecology of information.
Fighting the degradation of signal/noise
ratio in such ecology is another area where
librarians’ expertise will be highly valued.

60. Data Quality
How do we distinguish between
high quality data vs. low quality data?
How do we increase quality without
reducing diversity of opinion or
capacity of adaptation?

61. Dissent
How do we distinguish truth
from opinion and from deception?
How do we construct the new information
ecology so that people are allowed to disagree
yet without exploding in another tower of Babel?

62. ~ The End ~