Gone are those days when the significance of something of importance depends on its physical form. That was the glory led my the analogue world but here we are, in a world where everything has been made less complex and more accessable.
The authenticity and credibility of a material is not based on its hard form, it is defined by accessibility and quality. It is quite strange how over time the concept of visibility has changed, is it not the reason why we used to go around carrying heavy books at hand?
If eventually, libraries and librarians becomes nearly extinct, and there is just one left standing, I wouldn't be surprised because it wasn't something that occured overnight, it was a gradual process.
We now have all sort of materials online, that could be accessible to anyone at any moment, in so doing, it has reduced the need of having hard copies of materials.
Development is indeed astonishing but it also possess a great threat to existing structure, in this case it is the library. An old structure from the old world that is gradually becoming extinct in our society but to an extent it relevance still remains.
In the olding days when Information was less accessible, one of the primary source of information and knowledge for everyone was library. A structure put in place to house all sort of books and materials to provide people with knowledge.
What challenge will the last librarian face? I believe it is the obvious one. It is not just the end of an individual but the end of a profession. In today's environment, with the value of done profession diminishing due to job scarcity, if there exist one librarian on earth, it means such person will work round the clock with no replacement. Who would want to study a course in a time there is just one library and one librarian left, it doesn't seem like a good career choice.
As fulfilling as the existence of library was, one of the greatest disadvantage of it, is that, its significance lies in its physical existence. In those days scholars who are in need of specific material had to travel to the location where such material is being held, either in a public or private library, just to have access to the information. Which makes the process of acquisition of knowledge less efficient.
With the emergence of innovations of technology comes the internet, a ground breaking phenomenon that reshaped the world and the way we perceived it. The internet being a space with unlimited supply of information, slowly diminished the importance of traveling thousands of miles just to access a book, when you can easily get hold of it online.
Knowing this, humans focus shifted away from the relevance of library and opted for a more accessible means of information. The existing structure that has once reign supreme began to shrink in number, popularity and relevance.
What effect will this have on us? It means some of our history that exist without a digital copy will be forgotten. Due to copyright issues or some policy regarding the disclosure of some materials, not all materials exist on the internet especially the vintage ones.
Library continues to be one of the only place where such materials can be accessed. It is quite evident that some materials lack soft copies because some of these materials were not created using a computer, some were handwritten or through a typewriter. Even if lot of content creators and authors have tried to transcribe most of this relics by providing a modern version of it, not all can be accounted for online.
This write-up was inspired by week 61 episode 1 - SciFi multiverse prompt titled "The last library" in SciFi multiverse community.
