ABSTRACT
The articles included in this special issue of the Journal of Library Administration examine the many issues research libraries currently face as we transform our spaces and services. These articles were originally delivered at a conference entitled “Climbing Out of the Box: Repackaging Libraries for Survival,” sponsored by the University of Oklahoma Libraries and held March 4–5, 2010, in Oklahoma City. In this issue, Jay Jordan, president and chief executive officer of OCLC, begins this examination by evaluating the current state of Web-scalability in libraries. Jordan argues that cloud computing, which has become standard practice in information technology sectors, will equally become pervasive in libraries in the future. This model will present different methods for providing and evaluating services in the future but contains the potential for a shift in resource allocations away from the parent library.
