Reading Report #3

"The Future of Libraries"
Thomas Frey, FuturistSpeaker.com
November 2006
http://www.futuristspeaker.com/2006/11/the-future-of-libraries/

This article discusses the future of libraries, beginning with an anecdote about Leonardo da Vinci's collection of paintings and libraries roll in maintaining his great body of work. Then Frey gives a short history of the development of libraries. The transition that libraries face is one of information access and availability. Whereas before information was scarce and hard to find, today information is often in abundance to the point of overload, and free. Frey gives ten trends that outline the what lies in store for libraries across the world, and how they can adapt to this new world.

In my Disney class today we were talking about how Disney represents foreign cultures, and something I continue to see in many of our discussions is a general lack of perspective from non-Western cultures. In the class, our textbooks talk about the amount of power Disney wields over the shaping of popular culture and children's culture, which I do not ignore. However, they also almost completely disregard the input of demographics other than white, middle America into the development of "culture". Indeed, I open with this because I feel like the beginning sections of this article gloss over the fact that the idea of libraries goes much further back than the book "jails" of backward medieval Europe. The idea of libraries has been alive since we first painted on cave walls, like the documentary we watched showed. Before paper was invented, our elders were our libraries, filled with a wealth of knowledge about the world and free to any with an ear to listen. I feel like the article approaches the subject from a distinctly European perspective, and that is something that should be acknowledged.

With that, the trends presented in the article are very interesting. The first five trends were very applicable to today for an essay that was written in 2006. Trend 6 - transitioning to a verbal society - was something that I've never thought about but makes me excited. It's interesting to note that there are people who think that the technology today (videogames, instant messaging, social networking sites, etc.) will lead to a breakdown in face-to-face communication. It was exciting to see an argument for the other side. Trend 9 was also interesting - I imagine movies like "Minority Report" (but again, hopefully not as sinister) when I think of an interactive, keyboard-less world. I think that these last trends almost make up for the emissions of the opening sections. The future of libraries is indeed bright and optimistic.