"Fast Company" Features AADL

Tue, 09/09/2014 - 2:19pm by TimG

Fast Company, the award-winning national business magazine focusing on technology, business, and design, just released an online article about public libraries, highlighting AADL and its unique collections.

In the publication's Elasticity section, highlighting innovative businesses using the cloud and big data to stay in sync, the article Taking A Long-Overdue Sledgehammer To The Public Library describes how libraries are "lending tools you can't 3-D print -- awls, hammers hacksaws, mood synthesizers and human skeletons -- to keep pace with the times."

Deputy Director Eli Neiburger describes AADL's Unusual Stuff to Borrow collection and how "Ann Arbor launched its collection of objects three years ago with 30 telescopes. Soon, the waiting list grew to more than 100 people. Encouraged by the telescopes' success, the library added tools, giant-sized games, musical instruments" and more.

"Libraries have always been a place to access rare, hard-to-find objects." Eli states. "Commercial books aren't rare, hard-to-find objects anymore, so library collections are being used in different ways."