I suspect computers will deviously chew away at libraries from the inside. They’ll eat up book budgets and require librarians that are more comfortable with computers than with children and scholars. Libraries will become adept at supplying the public with fast, low-quality information. The result won’t be a library without books – it’ll be a library without value.
Predictor: Stoll, Clifford
Prediction, in context:In his 1995 book “Silicon Snake Oil,” writer Clifford Stoll shares his take on the Internet’s future implications for libraries:”When we don’t protect our treasures, the loss echoes for ages. But that’s not how our public libraries will end. No, I don’t worry about the bookless library, an efficient, money-saving edifice that’s utterly empty, housing only shiny banks of modems, disk drives, and books that talk to each other. A place without vistors, children’s story hours, or librarians. Nor will our books end up warming our bathwater or carefully scanned into a six-inch cubic monolithium-fluoride crystal. Instead, I suspect computers will deviously chew away at libraries from the inside. They’ll eat up book budgets and require librarians that are more comfortable with computers than with children and scholars. Libraries will become adept at supplying the public with fast, low-quality information. The result won’t be a library without books – it’ll be a library without value.”
Biography:Clifford Stoll was an astrophysicist who also wrote the influential books “Silicon Snake Oil” (1995) and “The Cuckoo’s Egg.” A long-time network user, Stoll made “Silicon Snake Oil” his platform for finding fault with the Internet hype of the early 1990s. He pointed out the pitfalls of a completely networked society and offered arguments in opposition to the hype. (Author/Editor/Journalist.)
Date of prediction: January 1, 1995
Topic of prediction: Getting, Sharing Information
Subtopic: Libraries/Databases
Name of publication: Silicon Snake Oil
Title, headline, chapter name: Wherein the Author Considers the Future of the Library, the Myth of Free Information, and a Novel Way to Heat Bathwater
Quote Type: Direct quote
Page number or URL of document at time of study:
Page 216
This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Tencer, Elizabeth L.