Joe Sipocz, my SJCPL colleague, just got back from ALA. He posts to the Lifeline about the Long Tail:
http://www.libraryforlife.org/blogs/lifeline/?p=1496M
We’re in the era of unlimited consumer choice, which has extended this long tail. Anderson predicts that our children will never know what the phrase ‘out of print’ means. All of this also explains why our public often asks us for books that we don’t own.