"Information Navigation 101" by Andrea L. Foster. Chronicle of Higher Education (3/9/2007)

Reading Report #5

Seth Smithwick

This article starts by telling the reader that technology, communication, and research of information have changed throughout the past years. Technology is being used constantly in peoples everyday lives. They are able to communicate and contact information through mobile phones Internet, ipods, etc. The growth of electronic information is unbelievable how advanced it has become in just the past decade. "The explosion of electronic information is fueling students confusion, say Librarians. The use for libraries is so much less of a need now to people. The librarians talked about when they were in school the only source of information they had was to go to the library. Now anyone ca find out any information they need about a subject over the Internet. Many colleges now are making it mandatory for students to use library sources for research on subjects. This is to help students not loose that desire to research for information like it was done 10 or 15 years ago. People today are becoming too dependent on the Internet for gaining information. Technology is pulling people away from the traditional way of studying and researching. "All of us are now going to the Internet because it's convenient," said DianaG. Oblinger, a vice president of Educause. "Whether this is the world we wanted or not, this is the world we live in, and it's important to help people develop research skills to be effective. I do see how this can effect the way on studies and effects there research skills but in the world we live in, the average college student could probably care less about there researching skills, and would rather use the easy and convenient world wide web to gather and gain there information.

Reading Response # 3

"The Infodiet: How Libraries Can Offer an Appetizing Alternative to Google" by Steven Bell. Chronicle of Higher Education (2/20/2004).

Are libraries vital places, with information, or tools for the participants of the scholarly level and academic setting? Google is now making many(experts) start to question if there is even a need for Libraries.

In the Article “The Infodiet: How Libraries Can Offer an Appetizing Alternative to Google” The website Google is staring to make many question if there is even a need to have libraries. According to this article Libraries biggest source of competition is Google. Advanced technology and advancements in research are unfortunately making these original search engines less used and depended on. In the past decade libraries have started becoming less used. James Morris in the article defines “Infobesity” as the process of gathering fast, overwhelming amounts of low quality information. He relates this word to the search engine Google. He talks about how the libraries are funded to give persons the best quality information and books but Google is still more favorable amongst people researching. He stresses that librarians and professors make there students more information literate and less dependent on Google.

I think that it is amazing how powerful Google really is. Google will be around for a while and is only going to get more advanced with time. I do feel that I do depend way more on Google and other search engines than I do using the Library. I do think that Libraries are a much better source of information than Google. When I was younger I went to the library all the time and checked out books for reading and researching. Now with the advancements with technology I can’t tell you the last time I checked out a book for school; Not that I don’t read books, I have just been able to find all the information over the internet using search engines such as Google. I would rather use information form Libraries than Goolge, but it is much easier and convient for me to search the internet than go to the Library.