The beauty of Amazon

Continuing in the same vein of the last post, i.e. online resources that we love, a word or two or forty-seven must be said about Amazon. Because we can not say enough good things about Amazon.com. And if you think it's just a Web site where you can buy books, you are woefully and greatly understating it's importance. Yes, you can buy books; you can also buy toys, clothes, shoes, jewelry, food, furniture...but that is not the point. The point is that Amazon.com has one of the most sophisticated information retrieval searches in the whole wide world. Second only to Google, Amazon's retrieval capabilities are astounding. For example, a registered user can type in the title of the book and get not only what they were searching for -- but also 20 recommendations for other titles they might be interested in. The way Amazon thinks for itself is almost scary.

So what does this have to do with Libraries? And why would a librarian be in agog of what is basically a giant online store? Because libraries are in the business of information retrieval and because we only wish our library online card catalog could be as efficient as Amazon's. We wish that when you come into our library and search for materials, that our system could not only retrieve what you were looking for, but that it would also retrieve other resources that might help you. We wish we could keep track of everything you've ever looked for that so that we can know our patrons as well as Amazon knows that we love British mystery novels. Unfortunately, such information retrieval systems are quite expensive. So, we will strive to use what we do have to the best of our abilities and hope that when you are looking for something, you will come and ask us.

It also might surprise you to know that we use Amazon in cataloging and acquisitions (purchasing materials) behind-the-scenes in the CBC library. If we have an obscure title with a questionable copyright date, we've been known to go to Amazon.com to look for other editions in an effort to sort out which one we've got. We've also used customer reviews to find out more about a book and decide whether it should be purchased for the library.

We can't help it. We're librarians and this is how we are!