[648] in Public-Access_Computer_Systems_Forum
Librarians and the INTERNET
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (perkins m)
Wed Jul 1 12:29:47 1992
Date: Wed, 1 Jul 1992 11:24:10 CDT
Reply-To: Public-Access Computer Systems Forum <PACS-L%UHUPVM1.BITNET@mitvma.mit.edu>
From: perkins m <mperkins@ucselx.sdsu.edu>
To: Multiple recipients of list PACS-L <PACS-L%UHUPVM1.BITNET@mitvma.mit.edu>
----------------------------Original message----------------------------
I agree with Lee Jaffe regarding librarian's attitudes towared the INTERNET,
and second his clear and straight forward prescription for "easing" into
participation. I too have been surprised at times by my colleagues's indif-
ference toward the net. I learned about the INTERNET in much the way Lee
describes, in small, easy steps. Each bit of new information opened doors
and windows to something else, and my natural curiosity kept me coming back
for more and more until I was hooked.
I'd just like to add one more idea to Lee's reasons why it is worth the
effort to get into the INTERNET. In Neil Postman's latest book <<TECHNOPOLY>>
he takes a very critical look at how technologies change civilizations and
culture, and on the whole these technologies do not fare very well under Mr.
Postman's scrutiny. But in this book, and several other he has written on
the same topic, he makes one point very clear. Technologies such as that
represented by the INTERNET are not "additive," rather they are "ecological."
By that he means that they are not just some new tool our there, which you
can choose to use or not, they radically and forever change the landscape in
which we move. He states that after the printing press was invented you
didn't just have the old Europe with the addition of the printing press, you
had a whole new Europe. Telvision has done the same thing the the U.S. and
the rest of the globe.
The point I'm trying to make is that the INTERNET and the technologies it
represents are not things that we can take or leave as we choose. They are
radically changing the landscape in which we work, and we ignore them at our
peril. I don't think that libraries will be supplanted by this technology,
but they will be changed, and changed forever.
Libraries were caught off guard by CD-ROM and other high-tech products in
recent years, and now the market for these products is being driven, not by
our profession's careful analysis of client's information needs, but by the
slick marketing departments of large information corporations. The INTERNET
has not as yet been commercialized, but there are forces out there that would
like to, and if we don't take the steps to claim this technology for our own,
it may soon be too late.
+-------------------+---------------------+---------------------+
|Michael J. Perkins |University Library |INTERNET:mperkins@ |
|Business Librarian |San Diego State Univ.| ucselx.sdsu.edu OR |
|VOICE:(619)594-6743|San Diego, CA |mperkins@library. |
|FAX:(619)594-2700 |92182-0511 | sdsu.edu |
