Libraries in the Age of Information: What’s the point?
Print is dead. That’s a pretty commonplace phrase these days. Whether you’re looking at newspapers, books, magazines, or journals, there is no denying that the volume of printed writing has been significantly declining over the past ten years. With the introduction of the internet and widespread access to information, publishers have shifted their focus to providing their content through a new medium: the Internet. Although this internet accessibility is a phenomenal step forward in the goal of providing free and reliable information to all, this movement does not come without externalities. What I refer to, are libraries.
For thousands of years, libraries have consistently been the centers of civilization for the retention and sharing of information. The rows and rows of books have provided academics and the curious individual to immerse themselves in vast amounts of information ranging over virtually every subject. However, as information becomes more digitized the demand for this dynamic that libraries have relied upon for hundreds of years becomes less and less relevant. Why go to a library, learn the complex organizational system, search for a book, rent the book, and then search through the book for information when a quick Google search can provide almost the same attainment of information? This is not to say that libraries are unnecessary, however, there is an emerging necessity for libraries to evolve.
Libraries across the world must embrace this digitization movement and take the reigns of control. This has already been seen. Libraries have begun to provide vast amounts of eBooks, access to scholarly journal databases, and digitization projects which provide access to some of the rarest pieces of writing to the entire world. For example, take the Vatican Library Digitization Project at http://digital.vatlib.it/. This project is digitizing the entirety of the Vatican’s valuable manuscripts accumulated over the past 1000 years. This is fascinating to me. Thousands of years, hours on hours of work from countless scholars now accessible to all through a few quick navigations on an internet browser. Projects such as the Vatican’s highlight the necessity of libraries in the age of information. The incredible resource that is the internet shouldn’t be viewed as a death sentence for traditional print and other forms of sharing information, rather, as a opportunity for something new. I cannot say what libraries will look like 10, 20, or 50 years from now. What I can say is that in order to keep the perception of libraries as the center of knowledge is only obtainable through embracing the sharing of information through the internet. By continuing to invest in eBooks, databases and digitization projects, libraries will continue to be an integral part of society and reach their goals of spreading information to an unprecedented scale.
