They
offer Internet surfing as well as the opportunity to read
the daily papers; you can find computer workstations and you
can have research carried out using professional online databases.
Libraries
are ready for the digital age. Most library catalogues are
available on the Internet and trainings to help becoming familiar
with search techniques are offered in many places. These are
always very popular. However, promoting reading has not been
forgotten.
Libraries’
target audiences are every bit as varied as the range of items
on offer. Libraries cater for students seeking material for
school projects as well as small businesses needing information
for a tender document. Information centres offering this range
of services are also part of a community’s economic
well-being.
| Four
tasks are now central to the activities of a library:
seeking, finding and evaluating global information;
making
material available in all |
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formats;
enhancing information skills; remaining a cultural centre and
a place for encountering literature.
Libraries which operate
in this way do not need to worry about their popularity. The
StadtBibliothek Köln, the public library of the city
of Cologne, has over 100,000 members and is visited daily
by more than 8,000 people. This amounts to over 2 million
visitors annually. Even the Cologne football stadium cannot
match these figures. In the past, libraries were important.
But they have acquired a new key role with the flood of information
created in today’s information society.
Interview with Dr Horst Neißer, director of the
StadtBibliothek Köln, published in ”Die Welt”
on 3 March 2001.
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