Library technology initiatives and community building

Library technology initiatives naturally stand at the intersection of people and machines, and represent perhaps the most important case we have for understanding the ways in which our digital libraries can impact and be impacted by the social groups that interact with them. In many cases libraries have established facilities‐based centers to introduce new technologies to users. These centers offer places and processes within which and by which users can familiarize themselves with how they themselves can use these new information technologies in their own work. In other cases libraries have established wholly virtual “spaces” where older “physical” collections can be used in wholly new ways. In every case, whether physical, virtual or both, users groups are variously extended, changed,and sometimes alienated.