toc


304 College & Research Libraries July 2001

Editorial 

Oversimplified Speculation on 
the Demise of Libraries 

“The wave of the future is coming 
and there is no fighting it.” 

~Anne Morrow Lindbergh 

A few years ago, prognosticators were 
saying that the digital movement would 
drive libraries out of business. Well, those 
who thought such was going to happen 
overnight must be terribly disappointed. 
Only a small percent of the world’s in­
formational resources have been digi­
tized. Digital resources, however, are a 
wonderful complement to the print col­
lections; they have improved access to 
information significantly and also have 
proved to be an asset in the preservation 
of the human record. 

The latest phenomenon driving the 
predictions of soothsayers about the de­
mise of libraries centers on the efforts of 
some vendors/companies to place a large 
collection of books online. If students can 
buy access to 250,000 titles of books placed 
online to support an undergraduate cur­
riculum, why would one need a library? 
The issue of how well balanced the online 
collection is for support of the respective 
curriculum must not be forgotten. 

Having the Right Answers 
When a college library director is en­
gaged in a budget discussion with the 
administrator responsible for the li­
brary, it should not be too far-fetched to 
expect a question such as: Because stu­
dents can now buy online access to thou­
sands of books, and based on the 
library’s site licenses to access several 
hundred online journals, why do we 
need to continue spending an increas­
ing amount of money year after year 

for paper collections? Or a 
not-too-informed official may simply 
ask: Why do we need a paper-based 
collection any longer? If the library is 
chock full and a new building is neces­
sary, be prepared to answer: Because 
everything is now online, why do we 
need a new library? Notwithstanding 
their naivete, these questions deserve 
correct, documented, compelling, and 
convincing answers. Commercials and 
advertisements have predicted that the 
complete Library of Congress will soon 
be available online. We must dispel 
these exaggerated and untruthful state­
ments. And the people promoting them 
should be held legally responsible. 

Impact of Alternative Sources 
Access to online resources will continue 
to flourish, and its impact on traditional 
library services will be overwhelming. 
Community and four-year college librar­
ies will be transformed more by the digi­
tal environment than the larger research 
university libraries will be. Some com­
munity college libraries have doubled 
their collection size by acquiring e-books. 
It will be several years before some of the 
books held by research universities ap­
pear in digital format. As more rare and 
special collections are digitized, there 
will be greater access to these once-some­
what-inaccessible treasures. In a sense, 
the once-great collections will be a bit less 
great owing to their online availability. 

Falling Figures 
In recent years, we have witnessed de­
clining circulation figures in American 
academic libraries and likewise can be 
said for the number of reference transac­

304 



 

 

Editorial 305 

tions. As more students have the ca­
pacity to access via Internet enough 
resources from their homes and dorm 
rooms to complete their term papers, cir­
culation and reference figures will fall 
even more. Students want convenience; 
if they can find enough resources via the 
Internet without coming to the library, 
why make the trip to the library? An 
unfortunate aspect to obtaining online 
resources for term papers and other li­
brary-related projects strictly via the 
Internet is that many times students can­
not access the older materials; subse­
quently, they use what they can find 
online and ignore the historical, and in 
some instances more important, re­
sources. 

Working with Faculty 
A key variable in the successful survival 
of the academic library hinges on an ef­
fective working relationship between li­
brarians and teaching faculty. Faculty in­
stigate most of the use of libraries by 
students, especially undergraduate stu­
dents. Prior to the online environment, 
faculty, of course, knew far more than stu­
dents about the paper-based collections 
in their respective disciplines. Now it is 
not surprising to learn that students know 
more about search engines for accessing 
and the availability of electronic re­
sources. Librarians must become more 
active in educating faculty about how to 
find and properly use the online re­
sources. We can no longer wait for fac­
ulty to come to us, but we must go to 
them. 

Research Opportunities 
The transformation of the traditional li­
brary to the electronic library offers 
many opportunities for research. In 
nearly every issue of College & Research 
Libraries published in the past five years, 
at least one article is related to the use 
of technology in academic libraries. 
This issue of C&RL, for example, con­
tains three articles on Web-based ser­
vices. 

Unquestionably, research is necessary 
to advance academic librarianship. More­
over, we need more emphasis on analyz­
ing and synthesizing problems and issues 
to establish a theoretical foundation for 
our practices and services and to create a 
solid base on which we can “invent the 
future.” 

Conclusion 
Simplified or not, speculation on the fu­
ture of academic libraries will magnify as 
evolving technology becomes more so­
phisticated. My opinion is that the future 
for librarians is both bright and intrigu­
ing. We must establish our role on our 
respective campuses as the one group that 
best knows how to access, select, filter, 
and customize information for users. The 
day for our role as knowledge navigators 
has come. In a nutshell, a positive attitude, 
a strong service orientation, and exper­
tise in both the paper-based and electronic 
environments, despite all the negative 
predictions, will result in an exciting and 
productive future. As Ruth Benedict 
stated, “Our faith in the present dies out 
long before our faith in the future.”

 DONALD E. RIGGS
 Editor, College & Research Libraries 

















<<
  /ASCII85EncodePages false
  /AllowTransparency false
  /AutoPositionEPSFiles true
  /AutoRotatePages /All
  /Binding /Left
  /CalGrayProfile (Dot Gain 20%)
  /CalRGBProfile (sRGB IEC61966-2.1)
  /CalCMYKProfile (U.S. Web Coated \050SWOP\051 v2)
  /sRGBProfile (sRGB IEC61966-2.1)
  /CannotEmbedFontPolicy /Warning
  /CompatibilityLevel 1.3
  /CompressObjects /Tags
  /CompressPages true
  /ConvertImagesToIndexed true
  /PassThroughJPEGImages true
  /CreateJobTicket false
  /DefaultRenderingIntent /Default
  /DetectBlends true
  /DetectCurves 0.0000
  /ColorConversionStrategy /CMYK
  /DoThumbnails false
  /EmbedAllFonts true
  /EmbedOpenType false
  /ParseICCProfilesInComments true
  /EmbedJobOptions true
  /DSCReportingLevel 0
  /EmitDSCWarnings false
  /EndPage -1
  /ImageMemory 1048576
  /LockDistillerParams false
  /MaxSubsetPct 1
  /Optimize true
  /OPM 1
  /ParseDSCComments true
  /ParseDSCCommentsForDocInfo true
  /PreserveCopyPage true
  /PreserveDICMYKValues true
  /PreserveEPSInfo true
  /PreserveFlatness false
  /PreserveHalftoneInfo true
  /PreserveOPIComments false
  /PreserveOverprintSettings true
  /StartPage 1
  /SubsetFonts false
  /TransferFunctionInfo /Apply
  /UCRandBGInfo /Preserve
  /UsePrologue false
  /ColorSettingsFile ()
  /AlwaysEmbed [ true
  ]
  /NeverEmbed [ true
  ]
  /AntiAliasColorImages false
  /CropColorImages false
  /ColorImageMinResolution 151
  /ColorImageMinResolutionPolicy /OK
  /DownsampleColorImages true
  /ColorImageDownsampleType /Bicubic
  /ColorImageResolution 300
  /ColorImageDepth -1
  /ColorImageMinDownsampleDepth 1
  /ColorImageDownsampleThreshold 1.10000
  /EncodeColorImages true
  /ColorImageFilter /DCTEncode
  /AutoFilterColorImages true
  /ColorImageAutoFilterStrategy /JPEG
  /ColorACSImageDict <<
    /QFactor 0.15
    /HSamples [1 1 1 1] /VSamples [1 1 1 1]
  >>
  /ColorImageDict <<
    /QFactor 0.15
    /HSamples [1 1 1 1] /VSamples [1 1 1 1]
  >>
  /JPEG2000ColorACSImageDict <<
    /TileWidth 256
    /TileHeight 256
    /Quality 30
  >>
  /JPEG2000ColorImageDict <<
    /TileWidth 256
    /TileHeight 256
    /Quality 30
  >>
  /AntiAliasGrayImages false
  /CropGrayImages false
  /GrayImageMinResolution 151
  /GrayImageMinResolutionPolicy /OK
  /DownsampleGrayImages true
  /GrayImageDownsampleType /Bicubic
  /GrayImageResolution 300
  /GrayImageDepth -1
  /GrayImageMinDownsampleDepth 2
  /GrayImageDownsampleThreshold 1.10000
  /EncodeGrayImages true
  /GrayImageFilter /DCTEncode
  /AutoFilterGrayImages true
  /GrayImageAutoFilterStrategy /JPEG
  /GrayACSImageDict <<
    /QFactor 0.15
    /HSamples [1 1 1 1] /VSamples [1 1 1 1]
  >>
  /GrayImageDict <<
    /QFactor 0.15
    /HSamples [1 1 1 1] /VSamples [1 1 1 1]
  >>
  /JPEG2000GrayACSImageDict <<
    /TileWidth 256
    /TileHeight 256
    /Quality 30
  >>
  /JPEG2000GrayImageDict <<
    /TileWidth 256
    /TileHeight 256
    /Quality 30
  >>
  /AntiAliasMonoImages false
  /CropMonoImages false
  /MonoImageMinResolution 600
  /MonoImageMinResolutionPolicy /OK
  /DownsampleMonoImages true
  /MonoImageDownsampleType /Bicubic
  /MonoImageResolution 1200
  /MonoImageDepth -1
  /MonoImageDownsampleThreshold 1.16667
  /EncodeMonoImages true
  /MonoImageFilter /CCITTFaxEncode
  /MonoImageDict <<
    /K -1
  >>
  /AllowPSXObjects false
  /CheckCompliance [
    /None
  ]
  /PDFX1aCheck false
  /PDFX3Check false
  /PDFXCompliantPDFOnly false
  /PDFXNoTrimBoxError true
  /PDFXTrimBoxToMediaBoxOffset [
    0.00000
    0.00000
    0.00000
    0.00000
  ]
  /PDFXSetBleedBoxToMediaBox true
  /PDFXBleedBoxToTrimBoxOffset [
    0.00000
    0.00000
    0.00000
    0.00000
  ]
  /PDFXOutputIntentProfile ()
  /PDFXOutputConditionIdentifier ()
  /PDFXOutputCondition ()
  /PDFXRegistryName ()
  /PDFXTrapped /False

  /CreateJDFFile false
  /Description <<
    /ENU (IPC Print Services, Inc. Please use these settings with InDesign CS4 \(6.x\). These settings should work well for every type of job; B/W, Color or Spot Color. Contact Pre-press Helpdesk at prepress_helpdesk@ipcprintservices.com if you have questions or need customized settings.)
  >>
  /Namespace [
    (Adobe)
    (Common)
    (1.0)
  ]
  /OtherNamespaces [
    <<
      /AsReaderSpreads false
      /CropImagesToFrames true
      /ErrorControl /WarnAndContinue
      /FlattenerIgnoreSpreadOverrides false
      /IncludeGuidesGrids false
      /IncludeNonPrinting false
      /IncludeSlug false
      /Namespace [
        (Adobe)
        (InDesign)
        (4.0)
      ]
      /OmitPlacedBitmaps false
      /OmitPlacedEPS false
      /OmitPlacedPDF false
      /SimulateOverprint /Legacy
    >>
    <<
      /AddBleedMarks true
      /AddColorBars false
      /AddCropMarks true
      /AddPageInfo true
      /AddRegMarks false
      /BleedOffset [
        9
        9
        9
        9
      ]
      /ConvertColors /ConvertToCMYK
      /DestinationProfileName (U.S. Web Coated \(SWOP\) v2)
      /DestinationProfileSelector /DocumentCMYK
      /Downsample16BitImages true
      /FlattenerPreset <<
        /ClipComplexRegions true
        /ConvertStrokesToOutlines true
        /ConvertTextToOutlines true
        /GradientResolution 300
        /LineArtTextResolution 1200
        /PresetName ([High Resolution])
        /PresetSelector /HighResolution
        /RasterVectorBalance 1
      >>
      /FormElements false
      /GenerateStructure false
      /IncludeBookmarks false
      /IncludeHyperlinks false
      /IncludeInteractive false
      /IncludeLayers false
      /IncludeProfiles true
      /MarksOffset 9
      /MarksWeight 0.250000
      /MultimediaHandling /UseObjectSettings
      /Namespace [
        (Adobe)
        (CreativeSuite)
        (3.0)
      ]
      /PDFXOutputIntentProfileSelector /NA
      /PageMarksFile /RomanDefault
      /PreserveEditing true
      /UntaggedCMYKHandling /LeaveUntagged
      /UntaggedRGBHandling /UseDocumentProfile
      /UseDocumentBleed false
    >>
    <<
      /AllowImageBreaks true
      /AllowTableBreaks true
      /ExpandPage false
      /HonorBaseURL true
      /HonorRolloverEffect false
      /IgnoreHTMLPageBreaks false
      /IncludeHeaderFooter false
      /MarginOffset [
        0
        0
        0
        0
      ]
      /MetadataAuthor ()
      /MetadataKeywords ()
      /MetadataSubject ()
      /MetadataTitle ()
      /MetricPageSize [
        0
        0
      ]
      /MetricUnit /inch
      /MobileCompatible 0
      /Namespace [
        (Adobe)
        (GoLive)
        (8.0)
      ]
      /OpenZoomToHTMLFontSize false
      /PageOrientation /Portrait
      /RemoveBackground false
      /ShrinkContent true
      /TreatColorsAs /MainMonitorColors
      /UseEmbeddedProfiles false
      /UseHTMLTitleAsMetadata true
    >>
  ]
>> setdistillerparams
<<
  /HWResolution [2400 2400]
  /PageSize [612.000 792.000]
>> setpagedevice