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Well I guess you are right that comparing the entire Internet to a library doesn't make sense.

But if you're worried about quality, then the Internet does host sites that do give great information, whether general (dare I say it, Wikipedia), or specific. Although yes, I admit that information is still lagging behind, because much like the music and video industry, professional authors and publishing companies are generally yet to switch to offering information over the Internet. But this isn't entirely true: to counter your example, if you are willing to pay the price, you can get plenty of technical books to read online, complete with hyperlinks (or if you're lucky like me, your company will pay for it:)

And the breadth of books they offer far exceeds anything that your typical bookshop, and certainly library, has to offer.

(I'm also not sure why you ridicule fan"boi" sites. Whilst there's nothing better than a complete text by a professional author - offline or online - I've found sites like GameDev invaluable in finding solutions to those obscure or unexpected problems, that the authors of these books didn't forsee. Not to mention that I can search to find the information anywhere, and get it for free, which isn't possible with books unless you've bought everyone out there on the topic.)

On the other hand, if we compared the entire Internet, to all offline sources, then you also have to include all the trash published by the likes of the media, in particular the tabloids. Accurate? Don't make me laugh.

I'm a fan of books24x7 http://www.books24x7.com/. You get the searchable text of thousands of books. The cost of the service is modest if you consider what a good tech book can cost. I've found it to be a valuable resource, especially when I need a refresher on a topic.

You could try a service like books24x7 - it doesn't look cheap at $399 a year for an 'ITPro' but I have a corporate sub at work which I can use at home. It's pretty good.
Then there's safari from o'reilly. which starts at $180 a year. The O'Reilly service is limited to the number of books you can have available at once and how often they can be changed. With books24x7 you have access to all the books at once. I don't know which has a better range - I suspect O'Reilly has a slightly better range but I like the flexibility of books24x7.

If there's only a few of you I'd have thought that a group library of n x $400 would be enough resource to keep you reading for the year. Maybe about 8 people would have to club together.

Also libraries here in the UK will get books for you if you order them. They can order from other libraries or will buy if necessary. I think you have to pay a small fee to show willing. But it's small compared to the cost of buying the books.

The books24x7 thing sounds great for reference material (http://marketing.books24x7.com/browseabout.asp) but if you want to read something ...

Yeah, there's a company called Books 24x7 which my company, . subscribes to.

As far as my classes with Sun Microsystems, it has been almost rock-solid. The more advanced the course, the more advanced the teacher. It really has been a good experience.

My employer also offers a huge library of online training materials. Sometimes these take the form of flash or HTML documents and quizzes. Kind of good. But I like the "get it yourself whenever you want it" kind of thing. I can take any online course at any subject at any time.

One of the more progressive things they have done is signed us up with a membership at Books24x7. Basically, they've got a huge library of technical books (and management books, and basic office books) that you can read online, at your own pace. It'd be better if you could print it out.

But the "chase your own training" so really good for the kinds of people who will take advantage. But I think instructor based courses are the best. But since I don't live in a primary city, I almost always have to travel somewhere for training. And since travel costs more, the company is less eager to do it...

I got access through my employer. You might want to look into if you can talk your boss into getting the same deal for your workgroup (if you have one)

Jason

Books 24x7 has a subscription model for a great deal of technical literature on their site on many a subject. Perhaps you could persuade your publisher to pursue a deal with them .
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