Where are we going?

           Yesterday in my 511 class the question was brought up whether a library could exist without a community. Also brought up was the idea that it was the librarian that made the library, and not necessarily the room with books. The general consensus in the class seemed to be that the physical library could exist; however, its purpose would not be served since there was no community. Therefore there would be no real need for the librarian. This brings up the question: can the librarian exist without the library? Does this mean we are moving towards completely digital libraries?

            According to our professor, David Lankes, our mission as librarians is to improve society through facilitating knowledge creation in our communities. Our increasingly digital age certainly gives us a new definition of community. It could be as small as the 2000 person town I come from or as large as the world itself.  However, does this mean we are moving away from the room with the books completely? Yes, we need to change and adapt to the technological world, and though much of a librarians tasks may now take place on the internet. Take me for example, I was averse to adopting twitter and blogging (despite being a writer, there was just something about blogging that didn’t feel quite right for me, perhaps it was the lack of going through rewrite after rewrite) and here I am at Syracuse tweeting and blogging away. Okay, maybe not that much but something exists where it didn’t exist before. Beyond all this technology though, I do not believe that physical libraries are dying, we will always have community members that would rather read a book that sits in their hands, that get the tactile enjoyment out of hold a book and turning its pages, than reading it off a screen. In fact I am one of those people. And personally I feel it would be a disservice to the community, and though it may not necessarily be a detriment to society, it would not be an improvement and would be working towards a dangerous future. I feel I have gone off a rant that has nothing to do with the class though so I will end this here.

            If anyone has suggestions on how to improve my blog, they are welcome, as long as they are reasonable.