What’s the message here–That you can rap in the library? Or that the library is a cool place for you, a young person who likes hip-hop, to hang out? I’ll assume that they’re going for the latter, but then they have a problem, because they’ve failed to tell the viewer what he or she can do in the library, other than join the summer reading club. The summer reading club part is tacked on at the end and apparently unrelated to the music, which has a good (if obvious) point about knowledge and power. It might have been more effective to show a teen going into the library and learning about web design (knowledge) and then creating a site for her band (power), or finding out about voter registration (knowledge) and voting in an election (power).

As a showcase for the kids’ talents, I think this is pretty good, and I’m not even particularly bothered by the gyrating young lady, as she has the main speaking part. As an advertisement for the library, I think it’s neutral–neither enticing nor uncool enough to be damaging.

What I’m questioning is whether or not this is an effective and useful marketing tool. If video advertisement is to be an effective marketing tool for libraries, I find it hard to believe that this would be the best utilization of the media to start packin’ ‘em into the library. I have doubts about the usefulness of trying to so directly sell libraries as “cool” to kids or teens. I think they’re more sophisticated in their judgements on audio/video production than they are often given credit for being.

Library Loft from PLCMC created another video. The teens wrote and directed it. If the teens wrote and directed the video for Toedo then I would congratulate them.