Re:The last thing libraries need is Silicon Valley “disrupti...
by Karishma1234 on Friday July 27, 2018 @02:15PM
(#17627900)
While I appreciate your idea, I think you should also see the other benefits people have from Netflix/Amazon like model.
Library's true customer is the reader and hence everything is designed to suite the reader. For Amazon the true customer (!) is the shareholder whose value needs to be maximised. That is why Amazon has astronomical market value where as libraries mostly depend on charity or taxpayer funding. There is a good reason why Amazon can offer you millions of products but a local library will have only thousands of books. There is a good reason why Netflix can afford to produce so much original content for your tastes but the libraries do not produce anything original. The factors you are citing are correlated.
There is no value judgement here, but I think we need to appreciate the good both kind of organisations are doing to the world and they are not comparable.
Library's true customer is the reader and hence everything is designed to suite the reader. For Amazon the true customer (!) is the shareholder whose value needs to be maximised. That is why Amazon has astronomical market value where as libraries mostly depend on charity or taxpayer funding. There is a good reason why Amazon can offer you millions of products but a local library will have only thousands of books. There is a good reason why Netflix can afford to produce so much original content for your tastes but the libraries do not produce anything original. The factors you are citing are correlated.
There is no value judgement here, but I think we need to appreciate the good both kind of organisations are doing to the world and they are not comparable.