I attended a session on Mobile Services, led by groups from two universities, Penn State and the University of Houston. Both of these libaries had done pilot programs with handheld devices. Penn State had sought to adjust to budget cuts and subsequent changing in staffing levels by experimenting with closing service points and having librarians do “roving reference” with the use of handheld devices. They tried four different devices and set out to see if the concept would work. They determined that it did, with the caveat that it illustrated wireless dead spots in the libraries, and people had some difficulty with typing on the small devices. They also determined that is was sometimes essential to be able to have voice communication (e.g. to be able to call someone staffing a desk). They moved on from this pilot to institute the use of the iPod Touch for similar services, on which they are still experimenting.
Penn State also worked with Sony, who donated 100 Sony Readers to the library. These were pre-loaded with material purchased from the Sony website, circulated, used in three different English courses, and used for students with visual and learning disabilities. Overall, this project was quite successful and they have an ongoing relationship with Sony to work on different licensing issues, as well as updated technology. Sony was motivated to do this because it gave them feedback on their product, as well as, of course, advertising.
The librarians at the University of Houston also used the iPod touch, but they used it for subject liason librarians, rather than for reference. One of the benefits of this was, for instance, the librarian for Spanish language could bring her iPod on a book-buying trip to Guadalajara.
Despite the fact that I work for a public library, I could see some benefits to utilizing similar technology. We do have staff who attend that same book-buying trip to Guadalajara. We encourage the buyers to select books that already have OCLC records in order to minimize the amount of original cataloging our overworked cataloger needs to do. Last year, they tried to use a laptop to determine whether certain books had full records but had some difficulty with battery life and portability. We also have similar needs for our world language selectors when ordering Chinese and Japanese materials from stores in the Bay area. Our Chinese and Japanese selector talks about either sitting on the floor of the bookstore with her laptop, or asking to go into a back room. They allow this, but having a handheld device would make her life easier.
Also, with the Sony Reader and similar products, one of the panelists pointed out that in a public library, one could pre-load readers by genre (have one dedicated to mysteries, sci-fi, anime, etc.) Obviously, purchasing is difficult, but the panelists also mentioned funding sources, such as the relationship with vendors used by Penn State, as well as Friends of the Library. I can see some of the larger Friends groups, particularly those with large world language collections, being both willing and to purchase an iPod touch to facilitate world language ordering and availability. Also, given that our county includes Silicon Valley, we do have proximity and the possibility for forming relationships with a large number of technology companies to include readers. Also, Penn State did find the Sony Reader effective for students with disabilities and reaching out to persons with disabilities in our community is always a goal of ours.