http://dbl.lishost.org/blog Just another WordPress weblog Fri, 12 Mar 2010 22:40:12 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.1 hourly 1 http://dbl.lishost.org/blog/the-dbl-philosophy/comment-page-1/#comment-13454 Off Topic: Thinking About Design « Looking at Librarians Wed, 12 Nov 2008 01:53:06 +0000 http://dbl.lishost.org/blog/the-dbl-philosophy/#comment-13454 [...] from working librarians. The authors of DBL advocate learning from business. For example, on their Philosophy page they say: A good example of library service change informed by design thinking can be found at the [...] [...] from working librarians. The authors of DBL advocate learning from business. For example, on their Philosophy page they say: A good example of library service change informed by design thinking can be found at the [...]

]]> http://dbl.lishost.org/blog/the-dbl-philosophy/comment-page-1/#comment-64 Designing Better Libraries » Design For Local Audiences Fri, 23 Mar 2007 12:55:51 +0000 http://dbl.lishost.org/blog/the-dbl-philosophy/#comment-64 [...] The DBL Philosophy [...] [...] The DBL Philosophy [...]

]]> http://dbl.lishost.org/blog/the-dbl-philosophy/comment-page-1/#comment-23 StevenB Mon, 19 Feb 2007 23:10:22 +0000 http://dbl.lishost.org/blog/the-dbl-philosophy/#comment-23 Thanks for sharing your public library example. It's great to help those who need access to public libraries for lifelong learning and career advancement. That said, opening a library is considerably different from the design approach used by the U. of Rochester to get a better understanding of of how their users really use the library in an effort to discover what their real information and service needs are. A better public library example would be the work that MAYA Design did for the Carnegie Mellon Library in Pittsburgh. This project was profiled in Library Journal about a year ago - and we did a webcast over at Blended Librarians with the project manager from MAYA Design (the archive is still available). MAYA did more of an ethnographic study of workflows within the building and that was used to redesign and rethink how to create a better library experience. Yes, Carnegie built a lot of libraries and that's a tremendous contribution to society that still helps people today - but I don't think he ever evaluated how effectively the services those libraries provided met the needs of the library users. That's something we want to pay more attention to here at DBL. Thanks for sharing your public library example. It’s great to help those who need access to public libraries for lifelong learning and career advancement. That said, opening a library is considerably different from the design approach used by the U. of Rochester to get a better understanding of of how their users really use the library in an effort to discover what their real information and service needs are. A better public library example would be the work that MAYA Design did for the Carnegie Mellon Library in Pittsburgh. This project was profiled in Library Journal about a year ago – and we did a webcast over at Blended Librarians with the project manager from MAYA Design (the archive is still available). MAYA did more of an ethnographic study of workflows within the building and that was used to redesign and rethink how to create a better library experience. Yes, Carnegie built a lot of libraries and that’s a tremendous contribution to society that still helps people today – but I don’t think he ever evaluated how effectively the services those libraries provided met the needs of the library users. That’s something we want to pay more attention to here at DBL.

]]> http://dbl.lishost.org/blog/the-dbl-philosophy/comment-page-1/#comment-22 Al Chambers Mon, 19 Feb 2007 22:55:53 +0000 http://dbl.lishost.org/blog/the-dbl-philosophy/#comment-22 You cover the academic roots well, but you have missed the traditional roots of the public libraries: boot-strapping! Remember Carnegie? His libraries were designed to help surplus agrarian workers in gaining necessary skills for a more technical world. That's what we're doing down here in McAllen, Texas - taking an old Wal-Mart and turning it into a public library that can help the motivated to gain needed skills and information. Beyond that, well, as Heinlein said, 'specialization is for insects.' You cover the academic roots well, but you have missed the traditional roots of the public libraries: boot-strapping! Remember Carnegie? His libraries were designed to help surplus agrarian workers in gaining necessary skills for a more technical world.
That’s what we’re doing down here in McAllen, Texas – taking an old Wal-Mart and turning it into a public library that can help the motivated to gain needed skills and information.
Beyond that, well, as Heinlein said, ’specialization is for insects.’

]]> http://dbl.lishost.org/blog/the-dbl-philosophy/comment-page-1/#comment-3 Designing Better Libraries » Welcome to Designing Better Libraries Mon, 12 Feb 2007 13:11:23 +0000 http://dbl.lishost.org/blog/the-dbl-philosophy/#comment-3 [...] The DBL Philosophy [...] [...] The DBL Philosophy [...]

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