Lost in the stacks?!

Remember those school days when you moved into the library to study? And remember when you roamed the stacks trying to locate that one book you just had to have for class? Well, if you can remember those days, you are so out of touch with 21st-century libraries! Yesterday, I went on a tour of the library here at ICU for class and found out one of the most remarkable things - one that you immediately know "Only in Japan could they have this!"

Let me give a little background information about our library here first before I get to the surprise. First, ICU's library is rated as No. 2 in all university libraries in Japan, according to a 2009 survey by Asahi Shimbun, the NYTimes of the Japanese newspapers. The library here also has a large collection of English-language books and it continues to get new ones every month. I have already checked out two books to read for leisure.

So far, this entry must not seem very special. So your library in Japan is highly rated and has a fair number of English books. What of it? Well, the pictures that you see in the posting are from the library - I suppose you could say they are from the stacks. But these stacks are automated! In the two basement floors of the library they have stored about 370,000 books that are automatically retrieved within minutes of a request put through on the computer. An automated arm locates the book that you want in the basement, sends it up to the library reference desk, and then it gets to you. Here is a video clip of how it all works:

http://www.nipponfiling.co.jp/products/movie/index.html

We had a chance to take a tour of where this all happens, and it was simply amazing. Even more amazing is that they have had this system since 2000! I don't know of any schools in the US that have this - and I consider American universities to be at the forefront of technology use, what with wireless campuses and such. But this is a pretty cool gadget here, albeit a big one!

Alas, there was always something nostalgic about searching in the stacks of the library, taking in the aroma of old books and wondering what new idea you were going to learn or what new land you were going to travel to amongst all of those pages. I won't get that feeling as much as I thought I would, but technology has its tradeoffs. Thank goodness they left two floors dedicated to stacks of books that needs a human touch to get to - for those times I need to sniff old pages from a book for a refresher from the past!

JRG