How might some of the ideas in this book be relevant to libraries?

[Nina]

This book wasn't written specifically for librarians, but several of the ideas could be applied to the work we do.
What thoughts do you have about how our services might be improved?

[Eric]

I think that librarians are a very inclusive bunch. And I also think that libraries which are often slow to change actually work to make more thoughtful decisions. I was thinking about how Mark Zuckerberg was quoted as saying that and I’m paraphrasing, if you are not breaking things, you are not moving fast enough. I think that librarians want to get things right. I’ll have to think about it a little more and the though I had was that subject terminology might not be keeping up with a changing culture. I’d have to do much more testing on that, and I’m sure that people smarter than me are looking at this already. My initials searches were on trans terms and I’m not in anyway an expert but it appeared to me that LoC was making sure that there was wide terminology to describe trans topics.

[Nina]

Eric wrote: "subject terminology might not be keeping up with a changing culture"

I’m sure maintaining hundreds of thousands of subject headings is no easy task, but sometimes the Library of Congress needs a little nudge to help keep them up-to-date.

Radical cataloger Sanford Berman made hundreds of recommendations to the LoC throughout his career, and has continued to do so long after his retirement in 1999.

The term "Transgender people” (along with many others) was added over 10 years ago after Berman’s recommendation.

More recently, after the appointment of Carla Hayden to the Library of Congress, and amidst the 2016 election, Berman suggested many terms (page 8) that library users were likely searching for, such as "Antivaccine movement” and “Climate change denialism”. As the response to that letter shows, Berman’s methods are not always appreciated, but hundreds of heading have been added or updated based on his suggestions.

[Amy]

One area of relevance is in thinking about what data we are capturing in the name of library services and business.

For instance, when working for a government library, our registration forms included a SSN field... while we had a compelling reason to request this data, HOLY CRAP. The ramifications were simply not justified even though all our locations were supposed to be following security policies about sensitive data. I ended that practice and redesigned the registration form.

At a public library job, I had a community service web form I knocked the crap out of as well (among so many others...). While librarians most often are not intentionally being racist, etc... well... we also like to collect data we really need to question whether we need.

The form is for court mandated community service. After filling out name, contact, location and times preference, deadline and hours needed, date of birth (why?)... (it was a LONG form)... the next section was "Race". Why the hey are we collecting race? What was its purpose? Okay... so few more sections about skills and emergency contact (why?? it's an application, they don't have the "job" yet)... "Criminal History Information" with the question "What was the date and nature of the offense?" OUCH.

First off, who are we to call anyone a criminal? It didn't have to be a criminal offense. The person may not have even done it but got service time anyway. How judgmental did our form have to be? And racist? But here's the kicker. We had two buttons at the end, but white with a basic border: "Submit" and "Clear this form". Why??? Let's give this poor person a mile long form for something they aren't keen to do, have them fill in personally identifiable information (PII), ask them for their race and "criminal" history, and THEN toss in a "clear this form" button in the position one would expect the "Apply" button? Also, "Submit" is terrible language, especially if it was someone subjected to a sexual abuse crime. Ouch, ouch, ouch.

I removed the race question, emergency contact question, change a ton of language, removed the "clear" button (if you have this, get rid of it), and changed the "real" button to use the verb "Apply".

That's long winded, but the point is, seriously consider what data you are asking for, where it's being stored (physical and digital), for how long (what is the data retention policy), and how it's being used (and if it isn't, why is it being asked for). We have a lot of sensitive data, and I do not believe a lot of library staff treat it with the care it deserves (I say this from experience in trying to maintain security on a highly sensitive database with not so careful staff).

This is relevant to libraries in many other ways, but there's my initial response.

P.S. Users may want a more personalized experience, which requires data collection at an uncomfortable level (e.g. reading history). I also feel most users do not understand the ramifications of data collection, so it is in everyone's interest if we steward that privacy and security. And if something like reading history is strongly desired, make it opt in only (and not default enabled), and ensure the data disappears if opted out. Make sure you have a data retention plan in place!

[Eric]

Amy wrote: "One area of relevance is in thinking about what data we are capturing in the name of library services and business.

For instance, when working for a government library, our registration forms incl..."

This is so great and why I really miss working with AMY!

[Nina]

Amy wrote: "when working for a government library, our registration forms included a SSN field"

Yikes! A while back I stumbled upon a patron record that included a SSN, and was horrified. I searched for other records that might include that info, and found almost 200 patrons with SSNs listed in our catalog. They were mostly older records, from 25+ years ago, when I guess people were less aware of identity theft and other privacy concerns. But my reaction was "Holy Crap" as well! I can't imagine our public libraries asking for that information today, or our patrons being cool with giving it out. We got rid of those SSN fields right away.