Bad is Good for Librarians

I think if everything bad is good for you then this actually bodes well for libraries. I think it might be accurate to say that not everything bad is bad for you. I get really annoyed at folks who look down their noses and declare, “I don’t have a television.” Certainly as technology advances and information finds other ways into our minds there will be a natural inclination to declare that anything new is rubbish.

There’s a not-too-serious group of folks out there who believe that Francis Bacon actually wrote plays under the pseudonym “William Shakespeare”. Part of their reasoning is that Bacon was a barrister, and frivolous writing was seen as beneath his station. When motion pictures made their way into our culture they were seen as a foolish fad, but think of some of the great movies out there that have inspired you and you see where this leads. Everything new is bad—or is it?

So here’s where I think this all bodes well for libraries. As people begin to migrate more and more to the cyberworld, there is a need for all of the world’s history to make that transition. Books, movies, art—they’ll all need to have a presence online. How will all of this be organized? By librarians and the libraries that house these collections. There is now more than ever a need for innovative thinking and creativity in the library world, maybe more so than at any time in the history of the profession.