Internet "collection development"

[Paul Neff]

>...Perhaps the ideal _index_ to the 
>internet would be like an encyclopedia.  The good encyclopedias 
>have cross references to related articles (internal links), 
>bibliographies (external links), time lines (alternative 
>visioning tools), yearbooks (what's new? what's old? what's hot? 
>what's cold?), etc.  But the internet itself is much more than 
>"just" an encyclopedia.

One of the reasons the Web was originally built as it was by Tim Berners-Lee
et al was to exploit the power of hypertext to contextualize information.
Unfortunately, it's apparently easier to build search engines than to
develop readable, navigable hypertext.  Which is a shame.  If librarians
thought more like content providers than they do (and if content providers
and search-engine developers thought harder about context) than maybe we'd
be closer to your ideal than where we are.


  Paul Neff
  _______________________________________________________________
  Technology Services Manager, Arlington Heights Memorial Library
  847/506-2652 :: 500 N. Dunton Ave., Arlington Hts IL 60004-5910
  pneff at nslsilus.org   ::   Not an official communication of AHML