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Sam Katz's Power Lunch: Library Scientist
Over a cozy meal at Sabrina’s, Sam Katz finds that Free Library Foundation CEO Linda E. Johnson gives new meaning to the phrase “book-smart”
By Sam Katz
- Photo by Nick Antony
Libraries tend to be rather sleepy operations, and ours is no exception. That’s about to change. A massive $175 million capital campaign to expand and modernize the Central Library on the Parkway is under way; $92 million has already been raised, with the aim to complete the work by early 2011. Leading the effort is Linda E. Johnson, formerly the president of a family-owned tech business in magazine publishing. In 1997, she joined the Library board; in 2006, she was asked to become CEO of its foundation. As a result, she’s everywhere, spreading her gospel about making the Free Library not just a place to read books, but a place that’s alive — a place to create, discuss and debate. In other words, a place very different from our long-held notion of what a library is. There’s a search on for a new Library president, since Elliot Shelkrot retired in December. The board and the Mayor shouldn’t have to look far.
Why does a successful IT entrepreneur chuck it all and go to work at the library?
I was in the information services business. I’d been to Wharton’s executive MBA program juggling work and school. My customers, magazine publishers, were thinking about how the electronic transfer and digitization of information was changing their world; content had always been the competitive advantage. But they were worried about the future because suddenly it was all about distribution. Non-publishers were driving the direction of the industry. My company was managing the business side of magazines, so I was I the middle of this transition. It occurred to me that the library must be dealing with the same issues. It was time for me to give back to the community, and I thought that I could bring what I was learning at work to the library.
Aren’t libraries a little like dinosaurs?
Not at all. I joined the board in 1997 thinking that I could help deal with this enormous challenge, only to find that libraries were barely thinking about these issues. So I define my role as assisting in the navigation through the change in information delivery from hard copy to electronics.
The Free Library of Philadelphia isn’t digitized? But how much of the collection should be?
From a business perspective, delivery of digitized information is less expensive than hard product. We have some digitized collections, and we are constantly working on the digitization effort. But it’s expensive to digitize, and we’re creatures of city and state budgets. You need to keep in mind that in Philadelphia barely 50 percent of the households have internet access, so digitization is not as essential to our constituency yet as it is to users of academic libraries.
Why does a successful IT entrepreneur chuck it all and go to work at the library?
I was in the information services business. I’d been to Wharton’s executive MBA program juggling work and school. My customers, magazine publishers, were thinking about how the electronic transfer and digitization of information was changing their world; content had always been the competitive advantage. But they were worried about the future because suddenly it was all about distribution. Non-publishers were driving the direction of the industry. My company was managing the business side of magazines, so I was I the middle of this transition. It occurred to me that the library must be dealing with the same issues. It was time for me to give back to the community, and I thought that I could bring what I was learning at work to the library.
Aren’t libraries a little like dinosaurs?
Not at all. I joined the board in 1997 thinking that I could help deal with this enormous challenge, only to find that libraries were barely thinking about these issues. So I define my role as assisting in the navigation through the change in information delivery from hard copy to electronics.
The Free Library of Philadelphia isn’t digitized? But how much of the collection should be?
From a business perspective, delivery of digitized information is less expensive than hard product. We have some digitized collections, and we are constantly working on the digitization effort. But it’s expensive to digitize, and we’re creatures of city and state budgets. You need to keep in mind that in Philadelphia barely 50 percent of the households have internet access, so digitization is not as essential to our constituency yet as it is to users of academic libraries.
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