The challenges of streaming media and the library as a mediator
A conversation with Melissa Mallon of Vanderbilt University
I decided to seek out a fellow academic librarian to get a sense of issues that plague librarians in confronting new forms of media. Librarians have been working with physical media for centuries and new virtual formats make many of us (especially those that have been in the profession for decades) apprehensive, to say the least.
Many times, academic librarians can become caught up in their daily work, seeing a semester as a discreet chunk of time, where issues that arise are unique to their institution. I reached out to Melissa Mallon of Vanderbilt University, who is the Director of Teaching and Learning, to see what she was experiencing at her library. It was reassuring that we have similar concerns with approaches to new media formats and reaching students. Reading the literature surrounding issues in the library world is great, but having a sit-down, virtual chat, was refreshing for me and assured me that we are all having the same concerns with new forms of media.
“Dealing with a one off purchase of “boutique” films is a shared problem…”
Digital repositories for videos are a concern for libraries that purchase streaming media that does not live within a database. Melissa and I agreed that there are a few pay repositories that exist and can be paid to host items, but we don’t want to bother with another service we have to pay for. An internal server that hosts streaming services for the library would be one solution – if you have the staff to configure and maintain it. Dealing with a one off purchase of “boutique” films is a shared problem that can be solved by such an internal service for media hosting. Librarians typically defer to professors to suggest purchases for their discipline and areas of research and teaching, which sometimes involves a film that can only be purchased via an independent distributor and there is no physical media involved. Catalogers are then faced with making sure the film is accessible to everyone in a legal and uncomplicated link.
Package deals with lots of streaming titles are great things to have if they can easily be indexed and put in a library’s catalog. Not all provide MARC data and the like. This is a problem of exposure because these titles cannot be easily located in the catalog and the user must venture into the video database directly to see if an item is available. The other issue is staying on top of changes when titles are withdrawn from a collection. This can occur on a monthly basis and creates more work for catalogers. On a more positive side, the films in these large databases can also be easily embedded into course management software for ease of access for a class. Large, popular databases of streaming content contain very helpful tools such as transcripts, citation formats, and sometimes code to embed the video. Many also offer a tool to create clips, which is very helpful in the classroom where time is precious. Melissa and I agree this is more appealing when advising faculty of what content a library has in the form of streaming. Once you show a faculty member how easy it is to access, create clips, and embed films in a course management system, faculty are generally pleased with the ease of access. These tools are typically absent in films not associated with big databases and can be one of the factors librarians are reluctant to pursue them, yet this does not dissuade a professor from wanting access to one of these videos that the library must contend with. Newer faculty tend to only use streaming content. Anecdotally, physical video items placed on reserve are rarely checked out unless the title cannot be accessed via a streaming service.
“...how do you deter faculty from showing their personal subscription accounts in class?”
Other factors such as keeping track of Public Performance Rights and integrating that into the library catalog provides significant hurdles for access. Once a faculty member zeroes in on a particular film that has limited forms of access, how does the library ensure access in a correct and legal manner? On the other side of things, how do you deter faculty from showing their personal subscription accounts in class? Both of us acknowledge that they do this, but they don’t understand or want to be bothered with the terms and conditions they signed up for. At the moment, there are no library or school accounts that you can get with Disney+, Hulu or Netflix. Large companies would assume that those questionable extensions of the license as an erosion to lucrative, personal subscriptions. Melissa states her instinct is “...that we're going to get more and more requests for popular media, so that will be something libraries have to navigate. How do we help meet these requests while still respecting copyright and not spending our entire collections budgets on streaming media?” It’s a good point because working in the parameters of a limited budget can dictate what we can and cannot provide for faculty.
I believe that if big, commercial streaming services could impose a moving wall embargo on new content, and trim off more popular series and movies, libraries would be very amenable to this idea, as we have dealt with this issue of delayed content for decades. At this point, anything is better than nothing and abiding by copyright is a hallmark of librarianship. I don’t even want to think about faculty showing their own subscription based content in the classroom. We all know they do it! How can we, as librarians, be an effective advocate for fair use when we defer to the subject matter experts (faculty) for content they want to use in the classroom? Many times, we are met with an unshakable need from faculty to view specific content that the library cannot access as an institution. We turn a blind eye to what they are showing in the classroom because it’s convenient to do so. We do not have any good solutions at this point.
My takeaway from my chat with Melissa is that there are no easy solutions to streaming video issues…yet. If you feel like you are frustrated with the current state of access you are most certainly not alone.
