America's first bookless public library appears to be a success

BiblioTech, located in San Antonio, is on track to surpass 100,000 visitors in its first year, with fans coming from as far away as Hong Kong to see it.

|
Eric Gay/AP
Caroline Ramirez (l.) and Sam Martinez, use computers at BiblioTech.

It’s been likened to a kitchen without food, a bank without currency notes, and a bakery without bread.

And yet, the nation’s first bookless library so far appears to be a success.

BiblioTech, the nation’s first – and only – bookless public library recently opened in San Antonio.

Stocked with 20,000 e-books, 600 e-readers for adults and 200 for children, 48 computers, and 10 laptops and 40 tablets, the $2.3 million library has been compared countless times to an Apple Store with its rows of glossy devices.

[Editor's note: The original version of this story misstated the amount of devices and books available.]

Patrons can peruse online catalogs on Apple touch screen computers and check out books on e-readers.

“Even the librarians imitate Apple’s dress code, wearing matching shirts and that standard bearer of geek-chic, the hoodie,” writes the Associated Press.

Considering its likeness to an Apple store, perhaps then it’s not hard to understand BiblioTech’s success. The library is already on pace to surpass 100,000 visitors in its first year, with library enthusiasts from as far as Hong Kong coming to view the library – potentially for similar projects in states and countries across the globe.

“I told our people that you need to take a look at this. This is the future," Mary Graham, vice president of South Carolina's Charleston Metro Chamber of Commerce, told the AP. "If you're going to be building new library facilities, this is what you need to be doing.”

Notably, BiblioTech is located in a low-income neighborhood in which many residents don’t have Wi-Fi. As such, access to reading material, electronic devices, and Internet, is a boon to the local community in Bexar County, Texas, where BiblioTech is located.

Though college campuses have been operating all-digital libraries for years, BiblioTech is the nation’s first public library that is bookless. (A similar idea was floated and quashed in California and an all-digital library actually opened in Arizona prior to BiblioTech but eventually began carrying books when residents protested.)

Though we hardly believe the bookless library will replace traditional ones, we wouldn’t be surprised to see more all-digital libraries – which attract younger patrons with their rows of glossy devices and sleek design – pop up in counties across the country.

Husna Haq is a Monitor correspondent.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

QR Code to America's first bookless public library appears to be a success
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/Books/chapter-and-verse/2014/0128/America-s-first-bookless-public-library-appears-to-be-a-success
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe