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E-learning has become a polarizing issue. Some say that it enhances accessibility to education and some say that it hinders it. While the literature on the subject underscores the effectiveness of the pedagogical frameworks, strategies and distance learning technologies, the firsthand accounts of students, parents and practitioners challenge the validity of experts’ assessments. There is a gap between theory and practice and between the perceptions of providers and consumers of online learning. Following a period of lockdowns and a transition to online learning during the recent pandemic, the prevailing sentiment toward a distance mode of instruction became one of strong skepticism and negative bias. The aim of the study was to examine why e-learning has struggled to meet stakeholder expectations. Specifically, the study posed two research questions: 1. What are the reasons for dissatisfaction with online learning? 2. What are the implications for future research and practice?

The study used a mixed methods approach to examine the reasons behind negative perceptions of online learning by comparing the firsthand accounts posted on social media with the literature. To this end, n = 62,874 social media comments of secondary and postsecondary students, as well as parents, teachings staff and working professionals, covering the span of over 14 years (2008–2022), were collected and analyzed.

The study identified 28 themes that explain the stakeholder’s discontent with the online learning process and highlighted the importance of user-centric design. The analysis revealed that the perceived ineffectiveness of distance education stems from the failure to identify and address stakeholders’ needs and, more particularly, from the incongruence of instructional strategies, blindness to the cost of decisions related to instructional design, technology selection and insufficient levels of support. The findings also highlight the importance of user-centric design.

To address dissatisfaction with e-learning, it is imperative to remove barriers to learning and ensure alignment between technology and learners’ needs. In other words, the learning experience should be personalized to account for individual differences. Despite its cost-effectiveness, the one-size-fits-all approach hinders the learning process and experience and is likely to be met with resistance.

Drawing from the extensive literature, the study offers an explanation for stakeholders’ discontent with e-learning. Unlike survey research that is prone to social desirability bias, the sample provides a rare opportunity to observe and measure the visceral reactions that provide a more authentic sense of stakeholders’ perceptions toward online learning. The authors offer recommendations and identify areas for future research.

EVERYONE interested in the British library movement will learn with sorrow and regret that one of its greatest friends and strongest champions has passed away, in the person of Thomas Greenwood, the kind‐hearted and generous advocate of libraries, who won the respect and regard of every English libiarian. From one of his own periodicals the following particulars are abstracted:—

THE title of this short paper is somewhat of a misnomer, as the German Volks bibliothek is not the same as an English Public Library. As Dr. Schultze says: “When we speak of an English Public Library we know exactly what is meant, but the German Volks bibliothek does not convey any definite impression. Too often it still means a very small collection of books, probably gifts which are accessible to borrowers at certain hours each week. As a rule, the revenue is so trifling that after paying the small working costs there is little or nothing left for buying books.” Taking, therefore, the term Public Library for the sake of convenience, we may assume that the first Public Library in Germany was opened in Hamburg, in 1529, as the result of Luther's recommendation (1524) “that good libraries, especially in the large towns, should be established.” At the beginning of the 18th century, a number of free libraries were established, these were usually connected with churches and schools, yet their very name “free” seemed an invitation to everyone to share the treasures they contained. These libraries were principally in central Germany and Saxony.

Books and periodicals on aeronautics: A buying list

GLASGOW was later by about one hundred and thirty years than some of the Scotch towns in establishing a printing press. Three hundred years ago, though Glasgow contained a University with men of great literary activity, including amongst others Zachary Boyd, there does not appear to have been sufficient printing work to induce anyone to establish a printing press. St. Andrews and Aberdeen were both notable for the books they produced, before Glasgow even attempted any printing.

THERE has quite recently occurred among professional and other periodicals a sort of epidemic of comparisons between the work of European and American libraries, some of which are more or less misleading and calculated to stir up national annoyance. The Transatlantic journals are particularly condescending in tone, and arrogant in their claims, and some statements in the New York Nation and Chicago Dial are not only written with a most lofty sense of American superiority, but are manifestly based on ignorance of library conditions in Europe. They are indeed typical of the attitude of the average American librarian towards library work outside the borders of the United States. With a few notable exceptions, American librarians are a somewhat narrow‐minded, self‐sufficient and wilfully‐ignorant class of public officials; but more especially the younger generation. They are eternally shutting their eyes to the accomplishments of other nations, and assuming that the last word on all library matters has been spoken in America. They are, for the most part, ignorant of European library literature, as none save the largest libraries ever purchase anything but American professional books. This is further proved by the absence of such works from their catalogues and from among the text‐books prescribed for the various library schools; while in all their select bibliographies or lists of “best” books the most notice‐able feature is this studied omission of European books. In the proceedings of British professional associations the work of American libraries is frequently referred to in the most appreciative and broad‐minded manner; but at similar meetings in America, European library work, if not entirely ignored, is most often casually mentioned as something quite obsolete, and a legitimate target for oblique criticism. It is difficult to understand why American librarians will not study library questions from both the historical and international standpoints, because it is such an obvious and interesting manner of freeing the mind from the fetters of a cock‐sure provincialism. That it is true no such attempt is made by the average American librarian to attain knowledge of foreign conditions, is proved by the universally accepted opinion in the United States, that there is no European library work worth attention, in comparison to the immensity of the American achievement in the same field.

THE following abstract in tabular form has been prepared by some junior members of the Islington Public Libraries staff for the use of candidates in Section V. of the Library Association Examination. It does not pretend to do more than set out the chief provisions of the various Public Libraries Acts in a clear manner, as an aid to the memorization of the principal powers and duties conferred upon library authorities. The whole of the Acts can be purchased through any bookseller for 1s. 4½d., and every student of librarianship is advised to procure them.

THE 31st annual meeting of the Library Association passed off very comfortably at Brighton, and if nothing particularly momentous occurred affecting librarianship, everybody enjoyed the various entertainments and the breezy weather. Brighton certainly deserved the title to breeziness which it claims, because it was stormy nearly every night or early morning during the run of the Conference, and members must be congratulated on the lucky manner in which it was found possible to dodge the showers.

IN making the suggestion, as some of my friendly critics have done, that the classes Fine and Useful Arts should be restored, as in Dewey, they rather miss the humour of the situation. The Subject Classification is not an amended Dewey or Cutter, but a humble attempt at an entirely new system, designed to meet the needs of popular libraries. It is not even a classification of knowledge, but, as experience has proved, a very practical and simple rearrangement of the factors of knowledge as set forth and preserved in books. The scheme is not indebted to any other system for aught but suggestions of main classes; all the details of the tables having been worked out independently, without reference to any classification save the Adjustable. It will be manifest, on reflection, that it would be fatal for the compiler of a new system to allow himself to be fettered or influenced by the schedules of other authors. I am one of those who decline to believe in the value of standardization of ideas or practice, save to a small degree in certain mechanical matters, and it would therefore be foolish to follow in the same rut as certain predecessors, simply because a longer existence has to some extent established their findings as settled conventions.

“WHAT a place to be in, is an old library! It seems as though all the souls of all the writers, that have bequeathed their labours to these Bodleians, were reposing here, as in some dormitory or middle state. I do not want to handle, to profane the leaves, their winding sheets… I seem to inhale learning, walking amid their foliage.” Thus wrote Charles Lamb, of the Bodleian Library, which is the largest library to bear the name of a private benefactor, and amongst British libraries, is second only in importance to the British Museum.