John,
I think I agree with all this. There is a century's worth of experience
in librarianship of information retrieval, including the understanding
that the methods readers like and what is most efficient/effective are
not the same thing, but a lot of this seems to be ignored in favour of
the latest fads. The constant assertion that 'young people' know all
about how to use computers is often extended to a belief that they know
how to use them *effectively*, and that libraries should dumb down to
their level of ignorance rather than teaching them the truth - an
especially inappropriate belief for libraries in academic institutions.
My own betes noires concern 1) the 'Google fallacy' - that readers like
Google and think it is good (even though it is often staggeringly
inefficient), so libraries try to make their OPACs like Google, relying
on general-keyword searches when more specific searches, or list
indexes, would be vastly more effective; and 2) the whole idea that the
internet contains a significant part of the world's wisdom (it doesn't;
except for a few subjects, most is still available only in print).
Alan
==============================
Mr A.V. Exelby,
Systems/Databases Librarian.
The Library,
University of East Anglia,
Norwich, NR4 7TJ
Tel.: 01603 592432
E-mail: [log in to unmask]
================================
"Man, who'd have thought being a librarian could be so tough"
Seamus Harper, in 'Harper 2.0', "Andromeda".
>-----Original Message-----
>From: A general Library and Information Science list for news
>and discussion. [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of
>Lindsay, John M
>Sent: Tuesday, June 19, 2007 12:34 PM
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Find 0.0
>
>At an inaugural lecture last night, while the speaker was
>enthusiasing about Web 2.0 someone asked the question, or made
>the point, that searching isn't the point of the exercise,
>finding is, and showed the National Record Office as a case.
>
>
>
>By accident, unless a tinzle fairy organises these things, I
>had the catalogue for Internet Librarian International land on
>my table the same day.
>
>
>
>This seems to me to be full of Web 2.0 stuff with just about
>nothing obvious on the traditional skills and professional
>competences which made libraries libraries.
>
>
>
>Is the plot being lost?
>
>
>
>In Librarians for Social Change I argued we had to improve the
>political, historical, philosophical, cultural, aspect of our
>competences, not throw them out entirely.
>
>
>
>With the computer industry forcing grep and search upon us,
>with social tagging and social networking, it seems now that
>re-asserting the essential competences is more important than
>ever, but the profession is remarkably silent, like it has
>given up, yet the ILI is badged with CILIP.
>
>
>
>Perhaps we need to reform the library association?
>
>
>
>Incidently, sorry for the 20= etc which appear in messages in
>digest mode, I know it makes text almost unreadable, but is
>beyond my control and imposed I think by the digesting software?
>
>
>This email has been scanned for all viruses by the MessageLabs Email
>Security System.
>
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