NYPL Releases Free App To Promote Open Access to Its Research Collections

"To coincide with the beginning of its centennial week, the New York Public Library launched its first app today. Paul LeClerc, the library's president, said the free app, "Biblion: The Boundless Library," will be transformative....The app, in development since November, is available through iTunes, and it is the first in a series of apps that the library is planning to release in the coming months. Biblion...essentially opens up the boxes in the library's esteemed research collections and places curated items at anyone's fingertips, literally....The first edition of the app features 700 items from the library's "World of Tomorrow" 1939-40 New York World's Fair holdings, which is one of the library's largest collections, spanning 2500 boxes or about 1200 linear feet of material. Exploiting the iPad's touch technology, the app presents users with a virtual map of documents, images, multimedia, and original scholarly essays that place the items in context and have been commissioned for this project...."