The book. A set of pages, with printing on them, bound together. A container of information or imagination. Its basic design, appearance, and purpose have remained unchanged for a thousand years. Simple to make and easy to care for. Durable. But bulky and expensive to print.
Modern media has a great many advantages. Fantastic amounts of information can be stored in very small spaces. Vast amounts of information can be filed, sorted, manipulated, sent, received and recalled in very little time. The price per word or picture stored is negligible compared to the printed page. And it does audio!
But books have one distinct advantage over newer media. Books do not require an interface. Most other methods of information storage and communication neccessitate a computer, dvd or cd player, tv, telephone, radio, or mp3 player to retrieve the information inside.
A book requires a reader.
The necessity of an interface device would not be so worrisome if not for the fact the complicated devices are always changing. Rapidly. As soon all the data is transferred to the "new media" it is time to adapt to the new "new media".
Libraries are increasingly repositories of the new media and a hub for Internet access. And they are increasingly being pushed out of government budgets. But libraries have an advantage over the competition, they contain books. As more and more books are being digitized having a repository of printed matter is essential. Keeping our libraries vital will help keep a vast realm of knowledge safe.
OWL
Sept. 23 2009
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