Miriam Pollack

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When is my ship going to come in? global trends
affecting libraries
ALA Empowerment Conference June 28, 2008

• Miriam Pollack
• Miriam Pollack Associates
• www.miriampollack.com

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Global Trends Affecting Libraries

• Environmental Scan
• Trend Spotting
• Examples of Trends
• Strategies for Trend Spotting

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The Role of Change

• Understanding the Role of Change
• Paradigm shifts and driving forces

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Global Trends Affecting Libraries

• Environmental Scanning
• Observing what is happening in our environment
• Examples
• OCLC
• Your Community

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Global Trends Affecting Libraries

• OCLS SCAN
• Social
• Economic
• Technology
• Research and Learning
• Libraries

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Global Trends Affecting Libraries

• Environmental Scanning What to Look For
• Signs of change
• Signal for potential events on the horizon

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Global Trends Affecting Libraries

• TRENDS
• What is emerging or about to happen
• The general direction in which something tends to
  move

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Global Trends Affecting Libraries

• What is a trend?
• A manifestation of something that has unlocked or
  newly serviced an existing human need, desire
  want or value

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Global Trends Affecting Libraries
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Key Environmental Shifts

• Moving From ? Moving Toward
• Hierarchical structures Hybrid networks
• One Size Fits All Custom Fit
• Individual computing Participatory Media
• Computer labs Pervasive, Media-rich
  Learning

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Examples of Trends

• Let the Games Begin
• The Cashless Society
• The Pet Economy Roars Ahead

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Trend 1 Let the Games Begin

• The industry is not yet successful at moving
  game-playing to what is potentially the biggest
  market of all the mobile phone user
• Only one in four people have played games on
  their cell phones and those tend to be very basic
• When MMetrics studied the issue more closely and
  found that only 5 of cell phone users have
  downloaded games onto their phones

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Trend 1 Let the Games Begin

• Obstacles
• Mobile phone providers charge users high rate for
  the airtime they need to download games. Because
  transfer rates are slow, people can pay more for
  the download time than for the game itself
• The games available for download are low-quality
  versions of games that are made for consoles

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Trend 1 Let the Games Begin

• According to the New York Times
• By the end of 2008 mobile phone networks will
  have the capacity to move more data and
  higher-quality games at a faster rate and lower
  cost
• New software platforms for cell phones will hit
  the market in 2008

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Trend 1 Let the Games Begin

• Nokia N-Gage will be available on its N81 and
  Series 60 smart phones. Enables users to avoid
  download through cell phone carriers altogether
• People can use a Bluetooth connection or a USB
  port on a computer to access the Internet from
  their cell phones, download free trial versions
  of games, and then pay 7 and 9 for games they
  want to keep

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Trend 1 Let the Games Begin

• Forecasts
• The popularity of electronic games will be
  co-opted by politicians, activist, artists and
  terrorists

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TREND 2 The Pet Economy Roars Ahead

• Six demographic forces driving this trend
• The increase in single professionals who live
  alone and delay marriage until later in life
• The shrinking birth rate
• The increased mobility of the American workforce
• The aging of the massive Baby Boom generation
• The expanding life-spans of Seniors
• The migration of Boomers and Seniors to the
  nation's southern states

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TREND 2 The Pet Economy Roars Ahead

• Products and services pet owners are now buying
• Neuticles
• KissAble Toothbrush and Toothpaste
• Braces and root canals for pets teeth
• Plastic surgery including face and eye lifts, and
  liposuction for obesity
• Gourmet dog foods, including organic, vegetarian
  and kosher meals
• Frosty Paws frozen dog treats

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TREND 2 The Pet Economy Roars Ahead

• Prescription drugs
• Psychiatric service
• High-tech medical services including MRIs for
  dogs
• Pet grooming and boarding
• Indoor bathrooms for dogs at 430
• Pet perfume at 30 an ounce
• Raincoats at 225
• Upscale dog houses
• All-terrain strollers so dogs do not have to walk
• Pet whirlpool spas

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TREND 2 The Pet Economy Roars Ahead

• Pet owners also spend 20 billion a year on
  veterinary services and medicines
• Vet services are growing at 10 per year and pet
  drug sales are increasing at 9 annually

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TREND 2 The Pet Economy Roars Ahead

• 2007 Global Pet Expo in Orlando
• Chatterbowl (chatterbowl.com) a pet food dish
  contains a motion sensor and recording device so
  that the voice of the pet owner who is not home
  can encourage the dog as it eats with a message
  like Good dog, Fido.
• High-tech litter box Litter Robot II when a
  cat climbs into the box, its weight activates
  machinery that rotates the cat litter through a
  filter and returns the cleaned litter to the box
• Komfort Pets Climate Controlled Pet Carrier

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TREND 2 The Pet Economy Roars Ahead

• Forecasts
• The pet economy will keep growing for the
  foreseeable future
• Pet health insurance will become almost as common
  as human health insurance, as more pet owners
  spend thousands of dollars per year on health
  care for their animals
• Niches created by the convergence of the pet boom
  with other trends will be particularly successful

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TREND 3 The Cashless Society

• The long-anticipated cashless society is now
  starting to unfold.
• Credit and debit cards are now used routinely in
  many places where paying with cash was until
  quite recently the only option.
• Between 1999 and 2005, the number of terminals
  for swiping cards tripled to nearly 7 million.

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TREND 3 The Cashless Society

• Grocery Stores
• In 1990 most shoppers would not think of using a
  credit card to pay for groceries. Today,
  two-thirds of food sales are rung up on plastic
  cards.
• Retail Spending
• Online retail spending, not including travel
  services, surpassed 102 billion for 2006 a 24
  increase over 2005.

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TREND 3 The Cashless Society

• Banking
• In 2003, Americans wrote 13.4 billion fewer paper
  checks than just 8 years earlier.
• During the same period, the number of electronic
  payments nearly tripled, from 15 billion to 44
  billion.
• More than 80 of Social Security checks are
  transmitted digitally into the recipients
  accounts.

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TREND 3 The Cashless Society

• For every American over the age of 15, there are
  seven credit and debit cards for a total of 1.7
  billion active accounts.

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TREND 3 The Cashless Society

• Benefits Making Electronic Currency Popular
• Convenience
• Security
• Low Cost

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TREND 3 The Cashless Society

• Plastic will continue to take the place in more
  transactions that once were conducted only with
  cash- Taxi cabs, highway tolls and soda vending
  machines.
• Contact Cards
• VISA NYC Taxis
• MasterCard Airport Parking

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TREND 3 The Cashless Society

• Other substitutes for paper money
• Gift cards
• Toll way passes
• Taxi cabs
• Airport parking
• Vending machines

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TREND 3 The Cashless Society

• Cell-Phone Based E-Cash
• Japan, China and Singapore cell phones are
  increasingly being used to conduct transactions.
• 15 million consumers using in 2005 and expect
  that number to rise to 40 million by 2008.
• Use for restaurants, commuter trains, convenience
  stores, electronics stores,

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TREND 3 The Cashless Society

• Forecasts
• Cash will become increasingly obsolete as more
  and more transactions are completed without it.
• As the use of electronic transactions grows, a
  major concern will be the threat to individual
  privacy.
• As the need for cash decreases, consumer spending
  will increase.

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TREND 3 The Cashless Society

• Forecasts
• By 2012, expect to see the convergence of many of
  todays technologies into a new model.
• The underground economy will become more
  transparent as it becomes the only place where
  large amounts of cash change hands.

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Strategies for Tracking and Applying trends

• STRATEGY 1
• Know why you are tracking trends

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Strategies for Tracking and Applying trends

• STRATEGY 2
• Be Open to New Ideas
• Be curious and open minded
• Realize that you are not necessarily your patron
• Look cross-industry

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Strategies for Tracking and Applying trends

• STRATEGY 2
• You dont have to like every trend
• Try stuff out
• Get rid of taboos, prejudices, dogmatism and
  negativity
• Distrust straight lines

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Strategies for Tracking and Applying trends

• Strategy 3
• Study people
• IDEO.com
• University of Rochester Study

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Strategies for Tracking and Applying trends

• STRATEGY 4
• Develop a list of resources to continually
  monitor
• Goggle Alerts
• Magazines
• Advertising at large

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Strategies for Tracking and Applying trends

• STRATEGY 4
• Trendwatch.com
• MIT Technology Review
• Identify a few people to monitor, such as Steve
  Abrams

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Strategies for Tracking and Applying trends

• STRATEGY 5
• Make Sense of Trends
• Look for clusters

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Strategies for Tracking and Applying trends

• STRATEGY 6
• Apply Trends
• Trend Group

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Exercise

• Break up into groups
• Consider a trend we discussed
• List 5-10 ways in which this trend will affect
  libraries

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Miriam Pollack

• miriampollack_at_comcast.net
• http//www.miriampollack.com
• 847/272-5011