Guest lecture given to Sri Lanka Library Association (SLLA) and National Institute of Libraries and Information Science (NILIS), University of Colombo, on 11 March 2013

1. Surviving Info Tsunami:
How Can Librarians Help?
By Nalaka Gunawardene
Science Writer, Blogger & ICT Watcher
nalakagunawardene.com
Twitter: NalakaG
Talk to Sri Lanka Library Association (SLAA)
Colombo, 11 March 2013

2. Coverage…
 My Quest for info & knowledge
 As science writer & journalist
 As Quizkid turned Quizmaster
 ICT-enabled info researching in SL: origins
& evolution (late 1980s todate)
 Changing info habits of our society
 Many challenges of Information Society
 Value addition by Librarians?
 Must you become ‘Cybrarians’?

3. Info Tsunami  Deluge inevitable
Our Choice: Do we sink or swim?

4. Info Tsunami  Deluge inevitable
Our Choice: Do we sink or swim?

5. How can Librarians help us?

6. My premise…
 Librarians trained as info
navigators & info managers
 Such skills are needed by
ALL in today’s Info Society
 Librarians can show us how
we can all SWIM, not sink
 BUT today’s info needs:
personalised, customised
 One facility can’t serve all

7. Larger context:
Old & New co-exist in Sri Lanka…
 Analog info technologies
& media still strong in SL
 Digital media uses rising
and consolidating
 Also: Hybrid media types
 ICTs racing ahead, but...
 Society, culture & govt
policies still catching up…
 Tensions/ apprehensions
normal in such situations!

8. My Life is Full of Questions!
 As a science journalist &
broadcaster, I ask many
questions – often without
knowing answers…
 As a quizmaster, I ask
questions for which I have
verified all answers…
 BOTH involve quest for
info & knowledge!

9. My Knowledge Quest
in Quizzing
 Quiz Kid (1980 – 1986),
engaged in inter-school
general knowledge contests
 Quiz Compiler & Quiz
Master (1990 – todate)
 Both require:
 Authentic,accurate info
 Trusted sources
 Knowing where to look

10. Searching for information
in pre-Internet 1980s & 1990s…
 Relying on private & public sources:
 Newspapers
 Local magazines
 Int. news magazines
 Almanacs
 Encyclopaedias
 Other reference books
 Itwasn’t easy, but hard quest was
part of the fun…an obstacle course!

11. British Council Library in Colombo has served Lankans since
1949. This photo was taken in 1967

12. Lanka’s Original ‘Search Engines’:
Two senior journalists!
Tribute to 2 ‘giants’ who
accessed, distilled &
shared global knowledge
in local languages
 Edwin Ariyadasa (left)
 Percy Jayamanne (right)
Far more effective than
official encyclopaedias!

13. There WAS Life before the web…

14. My own search for info/knowledge,
as powered by ICTs: 1987 - 2013
 FirstWave: CD-ROMs running on
early PCs; no Internet
 Second Wave: Narrowband
Internet; limited search
 Third Wave: Broadband & mobile
Internet; greater use of search;
multimedia content online
 Fourth Wave: Rise of social media:
blogs, twitter, Facebook, etc.

15. First ICT Wave:
CD-ROMs
 From early 1990s
 Compact
 Text + images +
audio + video
 Machine-
searchable!!!
 Sign of oncoming
info deluge…
Photo by Louie Psihoyos, www.psihoyos.com

17. Second ICT Wave:
Narrowband Internet
 Commercial Internet services in
Sri Lanka: April 1995 
 First few years: dial-up
connections, slow & mostly text
 Early search engines: keyword-
enabled quest for info
 New skill for searching, i.e.
knowing WHAT to ask & exactly
HOW to ask!

18. Third ICT Wave:
Broadband & mobile Internet
 Broadband Internet in SL: from
around 2003 on…
 Always-on, no more dial-up!
 Faster speeds  multimedia
content access possible
 Video online: picks up from
2006 (YouTube & other)
 Internet telephony: Skype &
other services

19. Internet Use in Sri Lanka (1996-2012)
http://www.trc.gov.lk/statistics/statistical-overview.html

20. Mobile phone subscribers in
Sri Lanka: 1991 – 2012
 This is the way
http://www.trc.gov.lk/statistics/statistical-overview.html

21. Fourth ICT Wave: Social Media
 Broadband Internet: from
around 2003 on
 Always-on, no more dial-up!
 Faster speeds  multimedia
content access
 Video online: picks up from
2006 (YouTube & other)
 Internet telephony: Skype &
other services

22. What are Social Media?
Online media based on:
 conversations
 interactions between
people.
May involve:
digital words/sounds/images,
video/combination

23. Confessions of a Digital Immigrant
 I grew up & started working before digital age
 Had to learn & adapt to digital early-career
 Don’t claim to be an expert, but:
 New media watcher & commentator since 1996
 Blogging since early 2007
 Tweeting since mid 2009
 Dislike Facebook (shallow end of social media?)
 I’m a Digital Immigrant: still figuring things out…
 Raising a Digital Native at home, now 16…

24. My Life in 2 phases…
 BG = Before Google (birth -- 1999)
 AG = After Google! (1999 – todate)

25. No Longer Just a Search Engine…

26. What does all this mean for
Libraries & Librarians?
Your Options:
Accept
Adapt
Redefine
Reposition
Realign
AND…
Innovate!

27. Nice try! Keep on trying…

28. Libraries & info access:
Changing User Expectations…
PAST (until 15-20 yrs ago): NOW/ON-GOING:
 Users visited a defined  Access from anywhere
location to access  Access anytime (24/7)
 Service was limited to  Human interface no
opening/working hours longer central, but…
 Can still be v. helpful in
 Human interface
specialised quests
essential or central
 Relationships?
 Relationships  trust
 Trust needed, but of a
 Nurtured sub-cultures or
different kind
own ecosystems  Virtual communities

29. How Librarians & Cybrarians
Can Save Us All
 Book by Marilyn Johnson,
(Harper, 2010)
 Former writer for LIFE
magazine & author
 In praise of libraries &
librarians
 Looks at their continuing
relevance & challenges
 www.marilynjohnson.net

30. Excerpt from Marilyn Johnson
“A library is a place to go for a
reality check, a bracing dose of
literature, or a ‘true reflection of
our history,’ whether it's a brick-
and-mortar building constructed
a century ago or a fanciful
arrangement of computer codes.
The librarian is the organizer, the animating
spirit behind it, and the navigator. Her job is to
create order out of the confusion of the past,
even as she enables us to blast into the
future….”

31. Adaptation with changing times:
How did other industries handle it?
 Until around 1900:
 no personalised time-keeping
 Public places displayed time
 Clock towers & large public clocks
 Then: personal clocks (elaborate) for
wealthy people to carry
 Then: watches – personalised,
affordable & portable!
 Now: mobiles tell us date + time +++

32. Time keeping devices,
then and now…

33. Where do you go from here?

34. Get used to it?
Again, sink…or swim!

35. Sir Arthur C Clarke:
Humanity will survive info deluge…
“There are many who are genuinely
alarmed by the immense amount of
information available to us through the
Internet, television and other media.
“I suggest that they put themselves in
the place of their ancestors at the time
the printing press was invented. ‘My
God,’ they cried, ‘now there could be Sir Arthur C Clarke
as many as a thousand books. How will In 2003 interview
we ever read them all?’…” with Nalaka
Gunawardene

36. Humanity will survive info deluge…
Clarke quote, contd.,
“Strangely, as history has shown, our
species survived that earlier deluge of
information, and some say, even advanced
because of it. I am not so much concerned
with the proliferation of information as the
purpose for which it is used. Technology
carries with it a responsibility that we are
obliged to consider.”
Full interview at:
http://archive.oneworld.net/article/view/74591

37. Future of the Library:
As seen by Chanuka Wattegama
• No ‘brick and motar’ libraries. All ‘brick and
click’ or ‘click only’. Brick Library = Museum
• Librarian’s role will change: Robot librarians
instead of humans?
• Libraries will not become CD lending shops or
tele-centers/cyber-cafes CDs will die with
books
• Everything will be on the ‘cloud’…
Adapted from: Presentation to Sri Lanka
National Conference on Library & Information
Science, Colombo, June 2012

38. Beyond Knowledge Navigation?

39. Who can/will ‘colonise’ the web
with our own content?
“When the web came around in the early
1990s, it was first seen as a place for
geeks, paedophiles and military. We had
to go in and ‘colonise’ it -- to show what it
could do for social justice & development.
Now web 2.0 is also being dismissed by
some as a place where geeks and
paedophiles frequent. Maybe. But we just
have to go in and reclaim it!”
- Anuradha Vittachi, co-founder,
OneWorld.net
http://uk.oneworld.net/article/view/113231

40. If WE don’t ‘colonise’ Wikipedia
with our own content, who will?

41. Example:
Wikipedia in Sinhala
 Content is currently limited in topics diversity,
depth of entries, information accuracy, etc.

42. Captured on 11 March 2013

43. Captured on 11 March 2013

44. From my
Ravaya
column, on
10 July 2011
http://nalakagunawardene.com/ravaya-column/

45. From Knowledge Navigators to
Knowledge Creators/Facilitators?
 Can librarians play a role in enriching
Wikipedia content
 In English, on Sri Lanka related
entries?
 In Sinhala, on locally impt topics?
 In Tamil, the same?
 Wikipedia has strict guidelines,
supervision & quality control
 But possible to do it with focus,
discipline & persistence

46. What else does the Future hold?

47. Information Society:
Resolving new issues/questions
 Who OWNS products of collaborative
content creation (e.g. Wikis)?
 What safeguards for data protection?
 How to ensure proper digital archiving &
indexing (to enable easier searching)?
 What to do with past analog content?
 Technology standards, inter-operability
 Machine translations or human mediated?

48. A Choice of Futures…
 Alarm & Despair: loss of cultural
identity; invasion of privacy; data
mining by corporations; rise of
authoritarianism, death of
Anonymity, etc. -- OR --
 Cautious Optimism & Hope:
always-on, networked world
presents many opportunities to
spread knowledge and serve the
public interest.

49. Thank you!
Email:
alien@nalaka.org
Blog:
nalakagunawardene.com
Twitter:
twitter.com/NalakaG
Thanks to: Chanuka Wattegama
All images used in good faith, non-commercially.

50. Some discussions unfold at…
http://nalakagunawardene.com/
ravaya-column/