Re: Death by Irony: How Librarians Killed the Academic Library
librarians were their own worst enemies... it's so easy to cast the blame elsewhere, but the truth is they shot themselves in the foot, then the leg, then the torso, then the heart... -bowerbird
Well, the librarians were by no means the only ones. From the mid-twentieth century on, the major advances in computing were missed. misread, mis-evaluated, mis-accommodated, and mis-exploited. I do not claim to be much better blessed with foresight than most; nor yet with 20/20 hindsight, so don't read this as coming with a superior sneer, nor yet an inferior one, but most applications to major IT and comms advances are analogous to using the internal combustion engine to brandish the buggy whip. The social dynamics of innovation are fascinating in their wasteful teleological inadequacy, and in their paradoxical Darwinian effectiveness, which rapidly is dissipated in the triviality of their application. Frankly, I am more and more unsure of what is happening. Humanity had better be heading for a order-of-magnitude leap, or the first social insect that achieves conscious intellect and effectual teleology will make mincemeat of us. Read Wells' "Empire of the Ants". In his creativity and thoughtfulness he still is the definitive leader in the history of science fiction. For all the good that did anyone... But he still makes good reading, which is more than you can say for most! On 2011/01/05 00:47 AM, Bowerbird@aol.com wrote:
librarians were their own worst enemies...
it's so easy to cast the blame elsewhere, but the truth is they shot themselves in the foot, then the leg, then the torso, then the heart...
-bowerbird
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Ah, the fickleness of society! We criticize those that warn that society is going down a dangerous path. Did librarians control the information they managed? Were they the masters of the information industry? Did they make money-making industry out of the information they had under thier control? No! They are casualties of the technological society. Are/were libraries ever an industry for making money? No! they are subsidize by society to aide society. We want free accessible information and want it at our finger tips and cheep. Yet, what are we really getting? We are getting inaccurate information, poorly cited information, precise information mix with false assumptions? We google, we wiki things, but how sure can we be that the information is correct? We get more and more links that do not point to what we are looking for! Sure we can refine our search and yet still have to look for the correct link. On another forum an authoritative person with knowledge mentioned a link to wikipedia as a reference. Yet, he was attacked because wiki is not all that accurate. His answer was that it was true that wikis are to be taken with a grain of salt, yet the information he pointed to was correct. He went on to mention that he has had his boughts with wiki to get information corrected. How are we taught to deal with the new information industry. Kids in school use to have classes teaching them how to use computers and the web. Now, my nieces are forced to do their homework with the internet. And why? they have to learn how to use this new media. But, are they taught search methods? are they taught to filter information? Are they taught how to decide what is good and bad information? NO! They are taught to google and wiki? DRM is another problem! I recently in a bookstore. they are pushing a relatively unknown e-reader. I was told I would need an account because of DRM and the publishers need to protect their investments. O.K. understandable. I could hold 10 thousand books on it. Yet, they could tell me If I could put my own books on it. Probably, not. Well, I was not interested in it anyway. On the other side. How many books have you lent to a friend? How many books have you lent from a library? I hate to mention all the books I have copied in my academic life because they were out of print or were copied for an entire class because they were out of print or so that everybody had the same edition. No! DRM is not here to truly protect an investment or rights. No, they are in place to control the flow of information and what information we are to receive. No, it is not the technology of today either. It is the lack of foresight in society that will be the demise of information. We need standards that will allow for e-books be available in 50 years. Who will have a device that can read the DRM protected e-books of today or will be able to convert them? No, librarians are subjects not masters? regards Keith. Am 04.01.2011 um 23:47 schrieb Bowerbird@aol.com:
librarians were their own worst enemies...
it's so easy to cast the blame elsewhere, but the truth is they shot themselves in the foot, then the leg, then the torso, then the heart...
-bowerbird
participants (3)
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Bowerbird＠aol.com -
Jon Richfield -
Keith J. Schultz