Libraries in a cold climate

A couple of days ago, I heard an early-ish morning news report on the radio. Bleary-eyed, I managed to make out that Arnold Schwarzenegger was about to terminate textbooks and make all school kids learn from the internet. At least, that's what it sounded like. As a plot for an action movie, wasting textbooks wasn't grabbing me. Taking a few minutes to adjust to the day, I remembered that Arnie is no longer a movie star but the Governor of California. I woke up. Now I was interested.

Several cups of tea later, with no further mention of this news story, I was still intrigued. Was Arnie really saying that kids should be let loose on the internet in preference to using set texts? Was he threatening the education of a generation to save a few dollars?  I distinctly remembered saving money being mentioned several times. But then, it was a news story, and a coherent plan to move to e-books rather than keep on with paper-based textbooks might not be seen as sexy in media circles. But hell,this is a Web 2.0 world and I am the centre of my own information hub!

So I went online. I found the original scare story and it did rather gloss over the real situation. And, be still my beating heart, the real situation was rather exciting! The BBC story declared -

"From thebeginning of the next school year in August, maths and science students in California's high schools will have access to online texts that have passed an academic standards review.".

Wow!

Following the money, I zoomed over to the FT and found that saving money was important -  full details, including figures in the article -  but also that the State of California is "... one of the biggest purchasers of school textbooks in the world so the transition to digital learning could have big implications for publishers..."

Wow!

Arnie, bless him,is looking to save money. He's also worrying about the heavy bags of books carried by Californian kids and, of course, the strain on the planet from killing all those trees to make textbooks. But... but.. he is also highlighting that a more efficient way of publishing information that is regularly updated has got to be to publish digitally. Cost-saving is never a bad thing, of course. And I love trees. And good posture is fine habit to get into when young.

But the really, really hot news is that Governor Schwarzenegger, even with his need to economise, still has a significant budget.

Now I am excited!

The storm that passed over my teacup first thing whad been whipped up on the back of letting children loose online to learn by themselves. But that, it turned out,  isn't the case at all. California is one of the most technologically-forward spots on the planet, and this story, a story that seemed to get lost by the mid-morning coffee break in themain stream news,  is the first real plan on a large scale I've seen to separate form and content. Surely here it is the content that's important?

I am very excited to see how this develops, when a customer with a large budget starts talking digital to publishers. I'll be keeping a watch on this story, and, well, in Arnie's own immortal words, I'll be back.