Librarians

There are at least two ways you can look at them: either you consider them as mysterious hags from another world looking viciously at you causing the slightest sound in the halls of silence. Or: you rather see them as truly devoted lovers of human emancipation through knowledge and subsequently as the workers at the forefront of the evolving information society. I increasingly tend to the latter perspective on librarians. First of all, it must be tough to be a librarian these days. Information technology changes so fast that it seems like that you have to become a computer scientist, before you can be a librarian. Beyond the struggles it must also be very exciting since this is the place where ancient modes of information acquisition collide with top-notch technologies.

I stumbled upon those thoughts while browsing a German blog by and for librarians, that featured my entry on the catalogue of Magdeburg’s library, which caused some more feedback.