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ALA MIDWINTER issue volume 32, number 6
ISSN: 1043-2094
TM
DECEMBER 2020 - JANUARY 2021
“Linking Publishers, Vendors and Librarians”
Will this Pandemic Ever End? by Bob Nardini (Vice President, Library Services, ProQuest Books) <bob.nardini@proquest.com>
T
hat wasn’t a question we asked when the pandemic began. Back then, in March, as we were sent home from workplaces, as schools closed, as shopping the grocery aisles was like a treasure hunt, we’d expected to be back in the office by summer; wondered when the spring school term would resume; hoped, at the store, we’d managed to buy enough of the necessities to last. That’s when the idea arose for this issue of Against the Grain. I thought, at the time, that the issue might be a retrospective account of how academic libraries and their parent institutions came through a period of
historic disruption, when everything that had been normal suddenly wasn’t. And that’s partly true; the contributors to this issue do recount the steps libraries took to face COVID-19. How Zoom became their central artery. How their print collection became problematic in ways nobody anticipated. How members of the teaching faculty needed the help of librarians in ways they’d never thought about. But today — in mid-November 2020 — much of this has become routine. The spring’s emergency measures are now daily library S.O.P., the “new normal,” a phrase by now we could all repeat in our sleep, and
If Rumors Were Horses
H
ello everyone! Happy New Year! This is the very last ATG issue that will be totally in print! See our letter from the editor (p.6) that will explain what’s happening with us at Charleston Hub! Here’s hoping it’s a great new year for each and every one of us! We are planning lots of good changes! Each print issue of ATG in 2021 will be 64 pages only. We will experiment with what should be in the 64 pages. Please let me know if you want to nominate something for print. All issues of ATG will be delivered online but the first 64 print issue pages will be embargoed for This adorable shih tzu mix 6 months. We know that most of you prefer online so is Shilah. She belongs to this is an experiment and we will see how it turns out! Sharna Williams, Registrar Thanks for your perseverance and patience with us! for the Charleston Library Saw the post that unit sales of print books rose Conference. Sharna says 8.2% in 2020 over 2019 at outlets that report to NPD she is about 8 months old in this picture. She is a cutie! continued on page 9
probably do. While the news at last brings encouraging, credible reports of progress in development of an anti-COVID vaccine, case counts and death counts are on the rise, nobody knows how or when a proven vaccine will be distributed, and when it is distributed, how many people will decline to take it. Nobody knows for how much longer campus spaces will be desolate, classrooms will stay locked, libraries operate in a half-closed, halfopen state. Today, when we wonder when libraries will reopen, we also wonder how much of what has changed will never change back. We all sense that we’ve entered a new stage in the history of academic libraries, but none of us knows exactly continued on page 8
What To Look For In This Issue: Web Archiving: The Dream and the Reality ...................................... 24 Prioritizing Digital Collections...... 60 The Used Book Market: Changes for Libraries.................................... 65 Marketing Planning When Nothing Goes as Planned............................. 67 Interviews
Jack Farrell.................................... 25 Rick Anderson................................ 29 Lisa Janicke Hinchliffe.................. 69 Peter Stockmann ........................... 72 Profiles Encouraged
People, Library and Company Profiles............................................ 84 Plus more............................See inside
1043-2094(202012/202101)32:6;1-5
