I think the downtown Houston Public Library reopening is a perfect example of what the future of libraries is. It is so much more than a room of musty books where everything is muffled and quiet. The new library is a multipurpose building that provides a wide variety of resources to the public. It is alive and vibrant and ever changing. Libraries (and whoever makes up the collective "them" of librarians) have really taken the lead in making sure they remain relevant and essential. It is a hallmark of the freedom of speech and information in our country that allows and encourages such access to all of what the Internet and technology have to offer.
I enjoyed reading Web 2.0: Where will the next generation of the web it take libraries? I especially liked the discussion of getting away from the "just in case" backup collection that librarians feel compelled to keep. I can really relate to that hesitance to throw out the paper copies and just rely on the ability to retrieve documents from the cyber sphere. I think we all have stories of the Internet going down at a critical time or platform changes that made old data irretrievable. And what if somebody pulls "the plug" and there's no electricity? What will become of us if we don't have everything written down? And don't get me started on conspiracy theories of hackers or black ops government groups manipulating the data to make it say whatever they want it to. I've watched Total Recall and RoboCop and Conspiracy Theory !
I think subsequent generations will have less trouble with this reluctance to let go of the paper, but I don't know that I would ever want to.
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