Monday, January 15, 2007

Audio Books

Where do you look for books on CD and cassette? Do you keep them in their own section, or interfiled with the books?

I've always been an advocate of keeping them separate. At my last place of work they were interfiled and I was constantly getting customers who just wanted to browse. My impression is that most people who listen to books on tape (or CD) are browsers. Now, at my current place of work we have exceeded our space allotment for our audio materials and I am helping decide what should stay on the shelf, what should go to storage, and what needs to just go out the door.

There's been some talk about shelving multiple copies with the books, but having two locations seems like a nightmare to me.

I'm an advocate for getting rid of the cassettes. Are we at that point yet? Do people still listen to tapes? We've made the decision to get rid of the bulk of our video collection which, for the most part, no longer circulates.

On top of all this, hopefully, we will be able to move our entire audio visual section sometime to make way for the public space we need to fulfill our Family Place commitment. This will be slow in happening, as I'm learning everything here is. Maybe that's the norm.

Just my thoughts on AV materials and changing formats. Don't get me started on BluRay vs. HdDVD. I read one opinion, which I tend to agree with, that it will be the last format war. What do you think?

ETA: I've been giving it some more thought, more than I should, and I'm not sure if I do agree that this will be the last format war. Yes, I think that in the not too distant future everything will be downloaded and streamed, but for now hardware and software still vary widely. Ok, ok, this was not the point of the post at all.

1 comment:

Liz B said...

I've begun to dislike the "browsing collection" idea because I'm afraid it's allowing for some sloppy cataloging ("it doesn't have to be cataloged correctly because we have a browsing collection").

BUT, I do think that when people want to listen to a book, they don't want to have to hunt for the format thru books & that the audiobooks should be in its own area. And I don't think "readers" who want books see an audio book and say "hey, I want to listen to this instead." So yes, they should be in their own area.

Don't get rid of cassettes quite yet; a number of people still have cassette players in cars. At my location, we've found that the video collection still circs but it's a dying collectoin because of no more videos being made.