Did you know you can get books delivered to your residence hall, office or home BUT what if you need to get a book delivered to a different floor of the Library? Or an adirondack chair on the Mall? OR Goldy’s Game Room?

Who has time to wait for campus mail???? Not busy Gophers!

Based on the successful launch of MFood Co’s food delivery robots — we have recently written a proposal to get “book delivery” robots!

The robots would be programmed to deliver books to various floors of our large libraries like Wilson or Walter but also to other campus locations. We will use AI technology to help plan the routes and features. Students often need office supplies as they complete homework and projects so the robots would be able to deliver staplers, scissors, charging kits, tape and a 3 hole punch too! Also the robots may be able to give library research help or book recommendations.

“We want to meet the needs of students. Sometimes having to walk to a different floor of the library is too much — so the robot will deliver the book to the student,” said Phil Dudas, user experience coordinator, “the Libraries continuously look for ways to innovate in our spaces and on our website.”

We are exploring different companies that might be able to provide a library robot. We are also considering working with classes or student groups — like Robotics – as design partners. In terms of design, we want to be sure the robot matches the aesthetic of a library so we are considering library cat designs or a robot wearing a cardigan — as both are very popular in libraries.

We move books around to our 10 campus library every day but with the the M Food Co‘s Starship delivery robots as inspiration we want to bring that convenience to students. Just like students need to feed their bodies, our book robots will deliver books to feed the mind and souls of Minnesota Gophers.

Once the robots arrive they will go through extensive cart training with Dolly Carton and Cart2D2 two of our more experienced book carts.

The Libraries plan to host a future robot naming contest but some early names being considering are:

• Shelfie Express
• Page Runner
• Reading Rover
• Data Dash
• Biblio Buddy
• Dewey Deliver
• Goldy Gizmo
• Minnesota Maroon Mover
• Document Delivery 3000
• Turbo TBR
• Gopher Bookbot

Be sure to try all of our fun reading services including:

• Get started with the Libby app for fun ebooks, audiobooks and magazines.
• Search or browse Overdrive to see the UMN Collection on the Libby reading app.
• Fill out a short form about your reading life and our expert book matchmakers will email you a list of three books from the University of Minnesota libraries that match what you are looking for.
• Stop by our popular reading collections in Wilson, Walter and Magrath Library.
• Explore Guide for reading magazines, current news, commentary, and opinion
• Unexpected stuff you can check out like charging kits, button maker and more.

To learn more about this and all of our fun reading services go to z.umn.edu/funreading.

Happy April Fool’s Day!

Contact Kate Peterson (katep@umn.edu) and Lacie McMillin (mice0018@umn.edu) with any questions about this exciting April Fool’s announcement.