What can the Cootess say? Having wasted chunks of Her own precious youth on Ms. Pac Man and inane electronic chatter about hairstyles and boys, The Cootess certainly sees the appeal of gaming and social networking. Fortunately, We (oh yes, that is the royal "we") also spent some of our days cultivating a little sumpin' sumpin' called "interior life" and what the kids call "meaningful interpersonal relationships". The way The Cootess sees it, Web 2.0 is like drugs: it can be helpful to maintaining a healthy quality of life, but, if abused, it can be just as destructive. Certainly this was the case with exterior narratives and mechanized communication long before the advent of the Web (The Cootess, though a progressive sort, still frets that movable type may have stolen the soul from the Written Word), but it's a horse that deserves beating because the heart of the Public Library has always been expressed by the equation FULFILLING INTERIOR LIFE + FULFILLING PERSONAL INTERACTION = FULFILLMENT OF HUMANITY and you don't want to be coming up with a goose egg on that one. This whole Web 2.0 assignment has taught me that while She's helping folks with Second Life, The Cootess must always be cautious not to divert energy and resources from First Life because here at the Library, humanity is job one. This sounds easy enough for a librarian, but for The Cootess, the siren song of cyber-realms is always threatening to suck the life out of Life.
P.S.
I'm gonna start a "Libraries: we're not just about machines anymore!" campaign to off-set the "Libraries: we're not just about books anymore!" slogan I keep hearing. Who's with me?
Quotable Quote:
"Humanity comes not from the machine but from the heart."
--The Late Delightfully Crusty Coot, Joseph Campbell
I agree whole-heartedly with the letter and spirit of the Cootess' latest post. Social networking should be engaged in by people who have had real experience, in real life, with real people in real-time, face-to-face (as archaic as that may be)situations. If,as a poet hath written, TV promised to be a vast wasteland, then what unsocialized beast cyberslouches towards virtual Bethlehem to be born?
ReplyDeleteRock on, Cootess! "Libraries--they're not just for computers anymore!" Reminds me of the comic linked to Unshelved last week that touted the amazing new hand-held technology for reading that did not require batteries or electricity, has page-like tactile interface, and low cost. You guessed it--its called a "book."
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