Grouping and categorizing library services at the official websites of central libraries of RF constituent territories: The need for standardized diversification

Abstract

In the context of evolving digital environment, the authors point out the urgency of developing the library services classification, friendly to the users whose needs are satisfied primarily via the library websites.The findings of the study conducted in 2021–2022 on positioning of the services of the central libraries of 77 subjects of the Russian Federation on their official websites are discussed. The evidence is provided that information about services is often scattered across different website headings and subheadings, and there are no hyperlinks between them. The biased nature of structuring classifications of services, that are not comparable one with another and often confusing, is also emphasized.The barriers that prevent the prompt search for information about library services on official websites are specified: i. e. the absence of “Services” heading linking users to the entire range of library services, scattered information about services under different headings with no hyperlinks, lacking rubricated lists of services and price lists, irrelevant prices, etc.The authors suggest that one of the most promising areas of theoretical research is the development of linguistic tools that enable structuring and ordering of information about services, in particular, building rubricators of charged and free services, designing “aspect grids” to allow formalization and uniformness of characteristics of the most important headings on the official websites; and building unified lists of normalized lexical units for wording of headings on the library websites.The need for unified approaches to presenting the results of the activities of the central libraries of the subjects of the Russian Federation in providing services to users (in particular, remote ones) on official websites is substantiated.The authors argue that it is the standardized diversification that will allow the services to be adequately positioned on the official websites of libraries. This will enable to provide full representation of multiaspect library activities, to increase library competitiveness and to ensure the growth in the number of physical visits and online users.