1. Only 28 million of the 119 million items they have are books. "We have so much special format material that nobody has seen that it is more important to get those out." Not everthing can be easily transferred to the internet. Limited resources might be better used elsewhere.
2. The library of congress stores (and is primarily concerned with) primary references. The sort of things that are kept in climate and light controlled rooms. Scanning them in will just degrade the document further.
3. "It is dangerous to promote the illusion that you can get anything you want by sitting in front of a computer screen." He described this as "arrogance" and "hubris". Perhapse he is right.
While not an expert, it seems to me that Computers and Humans differ vastly (perhapse too much) in the types of data that they can store.
A computer would have no problem storing pi to several million places. Not even the most amazing human savant can acheive this. Conversly, Humans enjoy an ability to memorize diverse visual, audio, tactile, positional data. We can also remember feelings. While a computer can record the birth of your child, onlly a human can remeber that certain emotional intensity.
Also: A computer either knows something, or it doesn't. Human can half-way know something. While you might know the lyrics to every Zepplin song in existance (full knowledge), you may only be able to recognize a blurbs in the lastest Korn hit (partial-knowledge).
Slashdot Mirror
I remember hearing stories like this before the dotcom crash.
I suppose it means that money is too free, and I suppose the market will correct that.
Fusion . . . for home heating?? Bet it heats better than oil.
Isn't this kind of like a nuclear powered light bulb? As in, totally out of whack to scale?
1. Only 28 million of the 119 million items they have are books. "We have so much special format material that nobody has seen that it is more important to get those out." Not everthing can be easily transferred to the internet. Limited resources might be better used elsewhere.
2. The library of congress stores (and is primarily concerned with) primary references. The sort of things that are kept in climate and light controlled rooms. Scanning them in will just degrade the document further.
3. "It is dangerous to promote the illusion that you can get anything you want by sitting in front of a computer screen." He described this as "arrogance" and "hubris". Perhapse he is right.
While not an expert, it seems to me that Computers and Humans differ vastly (perhapse too much) in the types of data that they can store.
A computer would have no problem storing pi to several million places. Not even the most amazing human savant can acheive this. Conversly, Humans enjoy an ability to memorize diverse visual, audio, tactile, positional data. We can also remember feelings. While a computer can record the birth of your child, onlly a human can remeber that certain emotional intensity.
Also: A computer either knows something, or it doesn't. Human can half-way know something. While you might know the lyrics to every Zepplin song in existance (full knowledge), you may only be able to recognize a blurbs in the lastest Korn hit (partial-knowledge).