The age of information, the age of foolishness

摘要

When Don Riggs offered me the opportunity to write a guest editorial for College & Research Libraries, I began to reflect on the contrasts and paradoxes of the academic library contemporary scene. I briefly considered a series of "good news, bad news" vignettes or playing on the theme of my ACRL presidency, "Celebrating Our Successes, Confronting Our Challenges." For a fleeting moment, 1 shamelessly considered borrowing the overused first line of The Tale of Two Cities. However, the second line is much more appropriate to our times ("It was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness"). Far be it from me to attempt to improve on Dickens, but the reader might more readily agree that this is the age of "in- formation" rather than "wisdom" (we librarians like to think we know the differ once between the two). As for the age of "foolishness," well, that is the point I want to make in this editorial.