the ancient Library of Alexander’s tribute to knowledge

Written by on February 5, 2012 to social networks

Status-seeking among the elite in the many cities of ancient Greece could have driven the Library of Alexandria’s collection to over 100,000 rolls.


Tagged:

how the great Library of Alexander was destroyed

Written by on January 22, 2012 to economics of attention

If the Library of Alexandria hadn’t been destroyed by violence, it would have been destroyed by lack of collection maintenance and media transition.


Tagged:

competition to share knowledge through libraries

Written by on December 25, 2011 to industry structure

Libraries in 10th-13th century Baghdad promoted sharing knowledge and disseminating books. Knowledge competition doesn’t always have that effect.


Tagged:

American University Library moving quickly to electronic resources

Written by on December 18, 2011 to industry structure

Electronic resources in fiscal year 2011 accounted for 74% of the American University Library’s collections expenditure.


Tagged:

a huge ancient Greek library?

Written by on December 2, 2011 to industry structure

Muslim scholars preserved an account of an ancient Greek library, probably at Ephesus, reportedly containing an estimated 1.7 million books.


Tagged: ,

government publications relatively more popular last century

Written by on November 13, 2011 to economics of attention

Government publications were borrowed amazingly frequently from the Muncie Public Library in Indiana between 1891 and 1902.


Tagged:

popular book publication age decreased greatly since 1895

Written by on November 6, 2011 to economics of attention

Books frequently borrowed from a US public library c. 1895 were about 17 years old, compared to under 2 years old for recent UK public library borrowing.


Tagged:

students at research universities are borrowing fewer physical items

Written by on August 14, 2011 to industry structure

Roughly speaking, from 1995 to 2008, U.S. research-university students substituted online resources for 50% of their prior university library borrowings.


Tagged:

Robert E. Molyneux, library data hero

Written by on February 13, 2011 to industry structure

Robert E. Molyneux has established at the Library Research Service a huge archive of U.S. library data from fiscal year 1987 to fiscal year 2008.   The archive also includes a section of hard-to-find library data reports dating back to 1973.   The relevant archive page notes: A number of the publications here are the results of [...]


Tagged:

what share of U.S. adults have used a public library in the past year?

Written by on December 26, 2010 to industry structure

While recent estimates of the share of U.S. adults who have used a public library in the past year range from 47% to 68%, the most credible statistics, in my judgment, are at the bottom of that range.   A relatively large survey that the U.S. Census Bureau administered as part of the Current Population Survey [...]


Tagged:
Next Page »