Librarians are on the front page of the NY Times again today in an article called, Old Search Engine, the Library, Tries to Fit Into a Google World by Katie Hafner. Some libraries are working with Google and other commercial search engines to make some of their amazing digial archives more accessible. While its so tempting to want to do all your research online and not go wading through the stacks anymore, the article reminds us how much stuff is still not available online (particularly through Google which only skims the surface of the web and does get into the "deep web" which is usually only available through databases and catalogs). Some quotes:
At the same time, many research librarians say that the new reliance on electronic resources is making their role as guides to undiscovered material more important than ever.and
"Although it seems like an apocalyptic change now, over time we'll see that young people will grow up using many ways of finding information," said Abby Smith, director of programs at the Council on Library and Information Resources, a nonprofit group in Washington. "We'll see the current generation we accuse of doing research in their pajamas develop highly sophisticated searching strategies to find high quality information on the Web," Dr. Smith said. "It's this transition period we're in, when not all high-quality information is available on the Web — that's what we lament.""
and
"You can think of electronic research as a more impoverished experience," Dr. Janes said. "But in some ways it's a richer one, because you have so much more access to so much more information. The potential is there for this to be a real bonus to humanity, because we can see more and read more and do more with it. But it is going to be very different in lots of ways."