As a librarian in a large research and reference library in Canada, I have seen the importance of "The Library" as part of the memory of a society, a city, a nation. Good collections and staff help facilitate access to information that otherwise would have been lost or overlooked. The destruction of easily accessible resources is akin to Alzheimer's: no one can "remember" what they can no longer access. We all thought the Internet would be a boon to research -- and so it is, to the savvy and well-trained researcher -- but I despair seeing a library patron sitting at an Internet terminal for a hour or so in front of me, obvious frustration writ upon their brow, who then comes to the desk with the question, "I can't find anything on my topic! Can you help?" What's the topic, I reply, maybe I can. "The decline of the cod fishery in the North Atlantic. I've searched for an hour and there's nothing." (I weep internally with deepest compassion.) Here, let me try. And a minute or so later I turn my screen around with a gentle smile: Well, here are 371 articles from a wide variety of sources, many from peer-reviewed journals, some from popular journals, most can be emailed to your email address, some are citations (but we've got most of those journals over there on those shelves), and the ones we don't have we can get for you via interlibrary loan. "How did you do that?!" the response comes back, "I couldn't find anything!" I smile more broadly. Librarians have their ways.
...we were persons and, being persons, we had a "Personnel" department. Then times changed, and now we have a "Human Resources" department. Non-humans and persons need not apply.
Slashdot Mirror
As a librarian in a large research and reference library in Canada, I have seen the importance of "The Library" as part of the memory of a society, a city, a nation. Good collections and staff help facilitate access to information that otherwise would have been lost or overlooked. The destruction of easily accessible resources is akin to Alzheimer's: no one can "remember" what they can no longer access. We all thought the Internet would be a boon to research -- and so it is, to the savvy and well-trained researcher -- but I despair seeing a library patron sitting at an Internet terminal for a hour or so in front of me, obvious frustration writ upon their brow, who then comes to the desk with the question, "I can't find anything on my topic! Can you help?" What's the topic, I reply, maybe I can. "The decline of the cod fishery in the North Atlantic. I've searched for an hour and there's nothing." (I weep internally with deepest compassion.) Here, let me try. And a minute or so later I turn my screen around with a gentle smile: Well, here are 371 articles from a wide variety of sources, many from peer-reviewed journals, some from popular journals, most can be emailed to your email address, some are citations (but we've got most of those journals over there on those shelves), and the ones we don't have we can get for you via interlibrary loan. "How did you do that?!" the response comes back, "I couldn't find anything!" I smile more broadly. Librarians have their ways.
...we were persons and, being persons, we had a "Personnel" department. Then times changed, and now we have a "Human Resources" department. Non-humans and persons need not apply.