I made the classic mistake. I bet against technology.

I predicted that books as we know them today -- ink on paper, bound volumes -- would endure for many reasons. But a key reason was that the resolution of type is many orders of magnitude superior to the resolution of fonts on a monitor.

Right now, computer monitor resolution stands at about 72 dots per square inch. Almost any commercially typeset book has about 1200 dots per square inch. I thought that gap was insurmountable.

In ancient Japan lived a wise old man. He had a son who grew up strong, handsome, and a good helper on the farm. His neighbors often told him, "How fortunate you are!"

"Maybe," the old man invariably replied.

One day, the son tripped over a root in the field and broke his leg. "How terrible!" said the villagers.

"Maybe," said the old man.

I need some advice.

As I've written before, the library is trying to buy enough new books to meet a minimum standard of two items per person.

But we have two problems. The first is that the population of Douglas County keeps growing. We bought twice as many materials last year as the year before. By the end of the year, we had fewer items per person than ever. Frustrating.

Institutional arrogance is the key characteristic of organizations that provide bad or indifferent service, are unresponsive to customer concerns or a changing environment. Typically, such organizations labor under autocratic leadership that withholds or stifles information both internally and externally.

Is your organization institutionally arrogant? Here are the 10 warning signs.

1. You never seek the advice of the people you serve.