Now that the episodes have been broadcast I feel I can comment, but back
in April Alison McNab wrote: 

> In the Year of
> Reading, it is good to see that the new series of Doctor Who (which
kicks 
> off on Saturday) features two episodes set in a library and one
episode which 
> features Agatha Christie's ten-day disappearance and provides viewers
with the opportunity to 
> "spot how many titles of Christie novels are hidden in the
dialogue".

Mixed feelings here in our library about the quality of that episode
(some loved it, some hated it), but all enjoyed playing spot the title.


> A two-part story Silence in the Library and River's Run

I think the 2nd part was called 'Forest of the Dead'.  [OK, have just
been looking on Wikipedia and found it's name was changed late in the
day].

> apparently promises "an abandoned library, moving shadows, the
gruesome
> Nodes, and the horrifying Data Ghost" - the Radio Times reviewer says
the
> latter is "possibly the most spine-chilling scene I've ever seen,
> anywhere".   

The promises were right!  Of course I only watch to keep my 13 year old
daughter company :-)   but they were quite spine-chilling.  Not quite as
terrifying as 'Blink' with the stone angels IMO - but then I avoid out
and out horror films so I have a low 'scary' threshold!


> Can't help feeling there is scope for Friday afternoon lis-link
musings on 
> Data Ghosts and digital preservation.......


I know it's not Friday yet but the library planet was interesting for a
few reasons:

First, it's sheer *scale*.  It made Asimov's citywide planet Trantor
look positively parochial - ISTR it had a library but only as a part of
the city.

Second, it was curious in that although I think the Doctor said it had
every book ever written wasn't it said that they were *reproductions* of
the originals?  So it hinted at digital preservation working in that the
masters must have existed to produce the reprints, but that readers
would still prefer to read hard copies.  The question arose in my mind
as to what happened to print on demand?!  

Looking at some of the shelves in the library, it did appear that a lot
of books were reproduced with standardised bindings which would be a
loss.  But to be fair we saw so little of the entire Library we may just
happened to have seen some series  or sets or some such.

Thirdly, the 'hard drive' at the core of the planet reminded me a lot
of the giant city sized computers of science fiction from the 50s and
60s.  (Asimov again and Multivac for example).  Do I take it the
miniaturization we see at present doesn't continue to the 51st century?


And no prizes for knowing library staff with less life than the data
nodes...

tc