Wednesday, May 13, 2015

Robert Darnton closes the book

Robert Darnton closes the book. Corydon Ireland. Harvard Gazette. May 11, 2015.
Article about his retirement. Notes:
  • He and others discussed how to harness the Internet to create a digital library that would “get our cultural heritage available to everyone” for free, leading to the DPLA
  • The goal of the free digital library “was a dream of philosophers of the Enlightenment. We can do what Jefferson only dreamed of. We have the Internet, and he only had the printing press.”
  • Of digital and print: "Both are complementary means of knowledge dispersal and both are thriving."
  • For libraries to prosper requires advancing on two fronts, analog and digital. “We must acquire everything important in all fields of scholarship" along with “electronic outputs of all kinds, partly in cooperation with other libraries.”
  • The future of libraries will require “being connected, and cooperating on a very large scale” regarding acquisition, preservation, and storage.
  • The library still pumps intellectual energy into every corner of campus.

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