The iPod Experiments.

IPOD (Digital music player); DIGITAL music players; LIBRARIES; ACADEMIC libraries; HOUSEHOLD electronics; ELECTRONIC equipment

The article investigates ways that librarians are using iPods. No other consumer electronic device has created such an impact on popular culture in recent years as the Apple iPod. Since iPod's release in November 2001, music fans have been able to carry upwards of 15,000 song files on those sleek devices with their trendy white headphones. iPods are penetrating the larger educational world. Is there potential for a mass storage device in libraries? Are librarians using iPods? Yes, and in some surprising ways. Baylor University Fine Arts Library, Waco, TX, is circulating 12 iPods loaded with the course reserves for music classes. Sha Towers, music and fine arts librarian, notes that, "with the iPods, students can listen while walking between classes or at other times when being in the library or logged on to a computer would not be possible." Some libraries are circulating iPods to enhance and improve access to library services. The Duke Divinity School Library, Durham, NC, has launched a project that puts audio instructions for using two electronic tools (Bibleworks and the ATLA Religions Database) and for navigating the print exegesis tools (Bible analysis and interpretation) in the Reference Room.