The Library of the Future

In my quest to learn more and more about drone business models, I came across an interesting article by Francis Nath from the Rain Forest Research Institute in India. Library drone delivery is not something I’ve seen much in the drone blogs I read or even in the scholarly papers I read about drone technology and business.

So, I wanted to provide a summary of the article as well as provide a little of my own opinions and input on the article.

Over the past several years, drone technology has become much more commercialized and as a result, so many creative technology professionals and entrepreneurs are looking for ways to create scalable businesses around this technology. Some current sources of revenue for drone operators include filming video and movies, aerial photography, search and rescue operations, crop monitoring services, and meteorological services. As more and more business leaders become more familiar with this technology, many businesses are moving their drone services in-house.

In the article Library drone delivery programme: A study, Nath provides a framework for understanding how drone technology can be integrated into library resources for the community. Since people today are busier than every (well, except for right now in during the quarantine!), many don’t have the time to visit their libraries to use the resources available to them.

What if your local library offered drone delivery services? Would you use it? Delivery drones could deliver books wherever and whenever a patron needs the resources, just by using their smartphones. Worldwide, there are already a few drone delivery services up and running such as FlyTrex in Israel. The FAA is working with several drone delivery companies in the US, including Amazon Air.

One way libraries can bring drone technology into it’s offerings is to provide workshops and curriculum to the community of how to fly, code, and build drones. Drones will (and already have) created opportunities around content creation and research, therefore more libraries should be using this emerging technology.

In densely-populated areas, libraries are usually centrally-located. Urban expansion, traffic, complicated bus schedules, and hectic schedules often prevent people from using the library. To encourage more library use, delivery drones could deliver 2-5 books at one time the patron’s doorstep or right to their hands, regardless of location using the GPS technology in their phones.

In 2018, the cost of a single delivery drone was $5,000. Add on the cost of software and extending the library’s Integrated Library Management System, there does need to be an investment and long-term commitment to implementing a drone program in a library.

Should a library bring drone delivery to their available resources, here’s how it might work:

* The library patron use the library app to make a selection. The patron’s physical location would be found using the phone’s GPS.* The library receives the request and staff retrieve and check-out the documents (wouldn’t it be cool to have an automated robot retrieve the books?) * Staff hands over to drone-handling staff to safely pack the drone* Staff in the Ground Control Center fly the drone to deliver the books and fly back