Contoversy over Increased Technology in Libraries - Posting for 6/2/07

The idea of increased technology and its impact on libraries and librarians has been of interest to me lately.

There is a controversy over how much information (books, newspapers, magazines, etc.) should be accessible through a library's website. One concern about this was made by Andrew Brown who writes for a British newspaper The Guardian. In an article by Judith M. Umbach entitled "Librarians Online" on the Canadian Library Association's website, Brown "fears for libraries because technology increasingly makes available electronically what used to be printed material... and fears for authors because materials on the web are usually free to readers." Brown concludes "that the most valuable role for libraries in the electronic age is for libraries to pay for the right to distribute electronic texts...."

The other side to this controversy is that patrons can have access to resources 24 hours a day 7 days a week without having to go to the library. In an article in the New York Times by Patricia Weiss entitled "A Public Library in the Palm of Your Hand" states that libraries in Connecticut experimented with e-books. The participating public libraries allowed patrons to virtually check out books via the Internet and download them to their computer for 24 hours.

I think that there should be information available to everyone on the Internet through a library's website. However, libraries should have to pay a fee for this information so that it is fair to the authors of the resource.