Nicholson Baker takes on Microfilm

[Susan Hensley]

Although this is not strictly a web-related topic, I suspect I am not the
only one of my colleagues who will be interested to read Nicholson Baker's
new piece in this week's *New Yorker* [July 24, 2000, p.42] on the
replacement of original newspaper collections with microfilm.

He is making an argument similar to the one he made in his essay on
the "loss" of card catalogs - that the format provides needed context in
historical research.

Even in the web era, I think the format/context question is still with
us...I'd be interested to hear what folks think - especially in light of
the trend toward selling chunks of books as "pieces" for download.

Susan Hensley
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Sonoma County Library
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