Scenarios for the Future of the Book

"ACRL has released a new report, "Futures Thinking for Academic Librarians: Scenarios for the Future of the Book," to help librarians reexamine their assumptions, which may be grounded in the current e-book zeitgeist. Authored by David J. Staley, director of the Harvey Goldberg Center for Excellence in Teaching in the History Department of Ohio State University, the report is a companion to the 2010 report Staley co-authored for ACRL, "Futures Thinking for Academic Librarians: Higher Education in 2025." This new report presents four scenarios, based in part on feedback from academic library directors. It includes scenarios which intentionally favor the continued existence of the printed book as a viable technology, so that academic and research librarians may expand their thinking about the future to include a richer set of environmental conditions."

The report is freely available: http://www.ala.org/acrl/sites/ala.org.acrl/files/content/issues/value/scenarios2012.pdf