LIBRARIES WIRED & REBORN Öffentlichkeit Deposited
The E-Sylum: Volume 7, Number 17, April 25, 2004, Article 15
LIBRARIES WIRED & REBORN
On April 22, 2004, The New York Times published an
extensive and interesting article on the effects of the Internet
on libraries, and the results may be surprising to many.
The article, "Libraries Wired, and Reborn" describes how
many libraries have become very active community centers
as a result of the draw of Internet access, and the new funding
provided by governments and private foundations to support
computers and communications nationwide."The transition has come quickly. In 1996, 28 percent of all
libraries had PC's for public access to the Internet. Now, 95
percent of libraries offer Internet access. The Gates foundation
accelerated the trend. There are now more than 120,000
Internet-connected PC's for public use in municipal libraries
nationwide. Since 1998, the foundation has installed or paid
for more than 47,000 PC's. ""And Internet-connected computers are clearly bringing more
people into libraries. A year after computers are put in libraries
that do not have them, visits rise 30 percent on the average and
attendance typically remains higher, according to a study led by
Andrew C. Gordon, a professor of public policy at the University
of Washington. Over the last six years, visits to the nation's
16,400 public libraries have increased more than 17 percent, a
trend that can be partly attributed to the spread of computers
with Internet access.""The computers are put to all manner of uses. E-mail, Mrs.
LeBoeuf said, is perhaps most common, from messages to
friends elsewhere in Louisiana to those to relatives in the
military stationed in Iraq. One local woman who was adopted
found her biological parents by searching on the Internet,
Mrs. LeBoeuf said. But most of the uses are more workaday
inquiries, like looking up prices on the Web before haggling
with merchants.""Mrs. LeBoeuf walked through the bustling new library as
mothers with toddlers gathered for story time, the staff
stocked shelves with books, and people of all ages sat at
clusters of flat-panel PC's. Computers and the Internet are
changing libraries irrevocably, she said."Books are never going away, but the future of libraries is
much more as community centers," Mrs. LeBoeuf observed.
"I worked here for 22 years and never thought we'd have
something like this."- 2004-04-25
- 7