Managing the Library of the Future
Fascinating testimony from the Librarian of Congress on the challenges that the library faces in being a repository library when digital information is exploding.
In today’s digital environment, it takes only 15 minutes to produce an amount of information equivalent to the 134 million analog (physical) materials the Library of Congress has acquired in more than two centuries.
He emphasized that digital materials, contrary to some assumptions, are less stable than analog materials, because digital content is easily altered, corrupted or even lost. He noted that the average Web site’s life span is between 44 and 75 days and that important materials relating to Hurricane Katrina that are used by Congress, which were once available on the Web, are no longer there.
The Librarian suggested that the LoC will need to train its staff to be knowledge navigators – a lovely term that will remind older Slawers of the Apple Vision of what our desktops will look like. Click here for a vision of our future from almost 20 years ago.
Covered this last week, Simon: http://www.slaw.ca/2007/03/21/library-of-congress-and-digital-preservation/
What an awesome blast from the past! Apple was amazingly prescient in so many ways in this little video. I am humbled that you Canadian librarians also picked up the LOC piece. I am so glad I visited!
Sorry Simon, it was the Librarian’s testimony that I thought was new, rather than the digital strategy.
And hi to our readers in Buffalo