Why we won't be here in 20 years-NOT

[Roy Tennant]

I almost let this go past without comment, and perhaps I still should 
have, but I feel feisty today.

I've heard this line of reasoning a lot; heck, I've used it myself. But I 
think the time has come to stop saying it. The danger is that it tends to 
make us sit back and feel smug while we await the puzzled masses who will 
surely troop up to our door any day now and beg us to help them find what 
they want in that mess called the Internet. Meanwhile, nothing could be 
further from the truth. 

The Internet is nothing if not empowering. It is empowering because 
whether I am in Ploesti, Romania or Berkeley, California, anytime day or 
night, I can enter a search in [name of favorite search engine here] and 
often quickly find what I want. Just this past week my wife mentioned she 
needed to go to the library to get the lyrics to "Puff the Magic Dragon". 
You guessed it. A matter of seconds later I had pulled it off the 
Internet, reformatted it slightly, and printed it out. She sang it that 
night to our children. That is empowering. And until we acknowledge that, 
*really* acknowledge it, we will definitely be in danger of extinction.

The over-emphasis of any deficiencies in using the Internet as an 
information source can be more self-serving than enlightening. The real 
truth is that the Internet is often a useful, and yes, accurate source of 
information. Sure, it can use a lot of help. But I'm tired of people 
saying that we are the ones to do it and then not do anything. If we are 
the ones to do it, then we'd better do it or shut up about it.

We librarians also need to break out of our insular world. We need to 
learn from what other professions have to teach us. We need to teach 
other professions what they can learn from us. We need to take risks. We 
need to kick butt and take names. And we need to talk to Jane Q. Public 
in her own terms, on her own ground, about how we can help her do what 
matters to her. Then, and only then, will we be assured of being around 
in 20 years.

Roy Tennant

John Goldsmith said:
>It's my hope that even the most purile netizen will soon realize that
>without some sort of order and organization, the Net as an information
>source is virtually useless. And, who are the people who can bring order
>out of chaos and leap tall buildings at a single bound - TA DA - us,
>librarians!
>
>Maybe I'm dreamimng but I think there is both a great task ahead and a
>great future for librarians and information specialists and I have every
>confidence that we will not only be around in 20 years but that we will
>also have the respect and admiration which we deserve.