Finally, I am asked, which of these library technologies will most improve libraries for the librarians and which would improve libraries most for the patrons. I think  RFID could do a lot for librarians and library staff while OPAC has already done a lot of patrons and will continue to do so if the trend toward emulating commercial search engines (Yahoo and Google) continues to make them even more user-friendly.

RFID

I think RFID is ready to revolutionize the way libraries are run today. I think it will make the lives of librarians easier, except for the librarians it threatens with unemployment. So many tasks that were carried out in the past have been changed by the integration of library systems, but those were administrative functions while RFID streamlines and simplifies actual operations in a library. RFID tags outlast the current electromagnetic strips used in libraries now and library staff members claim that they appreciate the way RFID can be used remotely so they do not risk repetitive stress injuries from handling books to check them out with the current barcode reader system.  While the barcodes need a good alignment to read the codes, RFID readers can read the tags remotely. The main qualms that have been mentioned with RFID is the maintenance of patron confidentiality, which is a part of the ALA Library Bill of Rights and currently some libraries believe that there is no problem since library RFID readers can’t be used beyond the confines of the library, but there is the suspicion that in an emerging police state, somebody other than the library could obtain readers outside of the library. However, these arguments are at the time being outside the scope of this course.

OPAC

I think OPAC will do the most to improve libraries for library patrons. They have made the task of searching for books so much easier than they were even 20 years ago. The fact that a patron can seek out a book and see if a library has it, which branch the item is located. I do not think I have ever talked to a reference librarian (other than my friend, Brian Weaver who was a reference librarian before heading SFPL’s digitization project) and web OPACs mean I will never have to. Not that I don’t like librarians, I just feel like an ultra geek checking out books on topics like ancient mystery cults, encaustic portraits of Fayum, the origins of the Dark Ages, the crimes of imperialism and colonialism, church history, space colonization, history of the Russian Revolution, biographies of Roman emperors, bird watching, corporate crime, numismatics in antiquity, economic development, Nineteenth Century political art, political science, the art of J.A.D. Ingres, Goya and Edward Hopper, pre-Christian paganism, and the history of science and technology. Like so much these days, I prefer to do my browsing online and reserve the materials I’m interested in. For patrons, having access to a library’s catalog from the comfort of home is a vast improvement over the way people had to find library materials in the past.

The combination of ILS and RFID have made self-checkout possible and cut down on wait times formerly associated with standing in line waiting for a librarian to check out your books. The trend toward making libraries even less of a hassle is a boon for patrons and a boon for libraries as less hassles means people are more willing to go to libraries, especially if they know the materials they are looking for are already there for them.