We live in a world where information is easily accessible for many. Search engines, like Google will tell you everything you need to know, with hundreds of sources and reviews. It’s become a common reflex and response to anything you want to know or learn, just “google it”.
It’s a basic tool in our day-to-day lives, but where did Google come from?
Back to Land
In the sixties, in the midst civil-rights movements and the Vietnam war, there was a rise of a counterculture that favored individual empowerment and self-sustenance. With this came the “back to the land” movement, where people moved to communes, with the goal of slowing down and simplifying life. At the heart of this movement was Stewart Brand’s publications of the Whole Earth Catalogue.
The Whole Earth Catalogue
In 1967, a NASA geostationary weather and communication satellite captured the first colour photograph of the whole earth. People’s perspective of the earth changed, and for the first-time people could see the earth not as the world we live in but as the planet we live on. The earth was no longer our entire world, it was a thing of its own, both finite and delicate. It was a powerful symbol; regardless of who we are and where we were, we all lived on the same planet, and with that we share a common future and destiny. Brand used this picture of the whole earth as an icon for his publications, an icon he used to help shape people’s views and way of thinking to see the earth as a finite entity that needs to be protected.
The contents of this publication were catered towards people who were involved with the “back to the land” movement. It was a paper database of the skills, tools, and information they needed to survive and succeed, all within the pages of a few catalogues. It was meant to empower individuals who were tired of the government and big corporations and wanted to shape their environment and future.
To access this knowledge, you needed the physical catalogue. There was no internet, libraries were restricted to their size and television content was limited. The catalogue was a new concept, a place where anything you needed to know find and learn about on a single topic or idea was in one place. It was regularly updated and changed as they received reviews and feedback, just like the search engines we know today.
The Digital Age
Unlike the catalogues, which we can see in physical space filled with a finite quantity of knowledge, Google exists in an infinite digital plane of the internet. We cannot see or even begin to understand all the information it can hold. It has no physical form, it is a space we cannot physically see or touch. It is designed with computer code, using algorithms and sequences, to pull the information we are searching for from that infinite digital space. Today, the way we get our news, communicate with one another, and share knowledge on the digital plane. It is no surprise that the way we collect data and search for information happens the same way.
Information Overload
With unlimited access of information, come an overload. The abundance of information has created difficulty in understanding an issue and making decisions around the issue, largely in part with the uprising of “fake news”. 21st Century Libraries are evolving from books on shelves to the self-proclaimed role of “fake news debunkers”. Some modern libraries are also developing programs they call design thinking to promote creative processes for problem solving, and helping their clientele to develop the skills needed to process information in this “overload” condition. Unlike the days of the Whole Earth Catalogue, libraries have gone from transactional to relational interactions with users. Libraries are no longer a place where users simply come to consume information, it has also become a place where they come to create their own content.
Described by Steve Jobs as the “paper back Google”, the Whole Earth Catalogue gave rise to the way we access digital information today. Understanding how the knowledge you are receiving has been designed and disseminated is arguably as important as the knowledge itself.
This is why libraries are so critical to our communities. They are bastions of democracy, making sure that the development of critical thinking and creation are available to all.
