Digital Libraries vs. Physical Libraries, Essay Example

As the world has become more digital, libraries are also evolving. The concept of a physical library as a huge building with endless shelves of paper books and scientific journals does not reflect the true image of a contemporary library anymore, as masses of scholarly materials are getting increasingly digitalized. The process relates to turning the print materials into a digital format and is also accompanied by the creation of digital-only research materials, available only through online data search and retrieval.

Arms (2001) defined a digital library as a “managed collection of information, with associated services, where the information is stored in digital formats and accessible over a network” (p. 2). Digital libraries offer systematically organized digital library collections where researchers can easily locate the materials of their interest by year, the author’s name, title, keywords, and even the place of publication. As Fox and Marchionini (1998) put it, digital libraries are some of the most complex and advanced forms of information systems that specialize in digital document preservation, perform database management, and allow seamless information retrieval either in an isolated library network or via global Internet access.

The main driver for digital library emergence has been the growing use of personal computers and the Internet in traditional, physical library facilities to speed up and simplify the process of the needed print item search. By means of thorough book and journal cataloging, librarians could help students locate the needed materials within minutes without endless searching on the bookshelves. Besides, the digitalization process was encouraged by the academicians’ drive to disseminate valuable information and make it accessible to the global community via the Internet. Previously, a researcher had to come to the library that had a copy of the needed material or purchase it and wait for its arrival by regular mail to access the recent research findings, thus slowing down the research progress. Nowadays, as the digital availability of research publications across global digital libraries grows, so does the pace of valuable research studies and progress.

When comparing physical and digital libraries, Fox and Marchionini (1998) pointed out that digital libraries can extend and augment the capacity and outreach of their physical counterparts. They achieve these objectives by providing new resources for problem-solving and intellectual expression as they amplify the existing library resources and services. As a result of Internet accessibility, libraries can grant new levels of access to broader audiences from all corners of the globe. This way, digital libraries become the present day’s major contributors to the global information exchange, research results sharing, and global research efforts.

Based on the presented evidence, one may conclude that digital libraries are not necessarily substitutes for physical libraries. These two forms of research resources can co-exist and complement each other, with many digital archives and catalogs established on the basis of existing libraries. Therefore, the move towards greater informational digitalization and broader access to the global body of research is a great step forward in worldwide research efforts, partly made possible with the help of digital library resources.

References

Arms, W. Y. (2001). Digital libraries. MIT Press.

Fox, E. A., & Marchionini, G. (1998). Toward a worldwide digital library. Communications of the ACM, 41(4), 29-32.