The Mario-themed, cube-shaped lamp cha-chings when punched. “That light was awesome,” said a Texas participant in the online chat sidebar. A bike rider’s jacket features an embedded turn signal indicator on the back. At the ALA Virtual Conference, held July 18–19, attendees learned that these are just a couple of ideas hatched in makerspaces, and they discussed the concepts as they appeared online.
The two-day event featured 16 sessions, all focused on transformation, experimenting, and innovating.
Libraries are well positioned to create makerspaces that offer “a shared space with tools where people with common interests can learn, teach, socialize, and collaborate on making things,” said MAKE magazine’s Travis Good, the first session speaker. Libraries from across the country—in Ann Arbor, Michigan; Omaha, Nebraska; Fort Wayne, Indiana; and Pittsburgh and Chicago, for example, are opening makerspaces for patrons to meet, learn, and create projects ranging from crafts for hobbyists to prototypes for businesses.
Good emphasized how inexpensive some of the tools are that libraries, as lending experts, can offer—from $10–$30 Arduino microcontrollers to $500 3D printers that create 3D models from a computer file. He also shared a number of open source collaboration sites for projects (instructables, MAKE: Projects), 3D models (Thingiverse), and more.
Later in the conference, officials from the Allen County (Ind.) Public Library talked about their makerspace, a collaboration with TekVenture that is housed in a 50-foot trailer in the library parking lot. The session included an inspiring story by a maker who took her idea for colorful bike panniers to prototype using the makerspace’s expert advice and tools.
In “Moving Upstream: From Contributor to Co-Creator,” James LaRue of Douglas County (Colo.) Libraries, said libraries not only could but should move away from volatile ebook pricing. “The fundamental economic proposition of the library is at risk,” said LaRue. By stepping away from distributors and traditional publishers, libraries can “focus on the excitement” of becoming the publisher and helping local authors while sharing revenue through a Creative Commons model. “Getting libraries to the center of the information/publishing world is an excellent strategy” wrote one Colorado participant.
Steven Bell, associate university librarian for research and instructional services at Temple University and ACRL president-elect, talked about how to develop a “Way We Serve” statement to enable a library staff to better serve patrons. “What experience do we want people to have when they come to our library?” he asked. Through videos, online polls, and other tools, Bell helped launch a spirited online discussion.
