Conversation

Notices

1. Embed this notice
   kottke.org (kottke@mastodon.social)'s status on Thursday, 24-Oct-2024 05:07:01 JST kottke.org

   Before Google, reference librarians answered questions via telephone. “We learned not merely how to find information but how to think about finding information. Don’t take anything for granted; don’t trust your memory; look for the context…” https://hedgehogreview.com/issues/the-varieties-of-travel-experience/articles/the-department-of-everything

   • Embed this notice
     powersoffour (powersoffour@mastodon.social)'s status on Thursday, 24-Oct-2024 05:07:00 JST powersoffour

     in reply to

     • Jessamyn

     @jessamyn @kottke When I was a kid, I played a text adventure game called Supernova. (One of the original Apogee games.) One of the early challenges was that you had to enter coordinates for another star system.

     I called the library. They looked up astronomy coordinate systems and called me back and explained galactic coordinates, naming systems, etc. Of course I didn't understand that the puzzle solution was in the game.

     Decades later, I got my PhD in astronomy. I think about this a lot.

   • Embed this notice
     Jessamyn (jessamyn@glammr.us)'s status on Thursday, 24-Oct-2024 05:07:01 JST Jessamyn

     in reply to

     @kottke That was adorable, but also a lot of people still answer reference questions by telephone they just don't have huge armies of people whose only job is to do it.

   • Embed this notice
     powersoffour (powersoffour@mastodon.social)'s status on Thursday, 24-Oct-2024 09:17:55 JST powersoffour

     in reply to

     • Jessamyn

     @jessamyn @kottke just as two additional pieces of info that sound too conveniently quaint to be true: I'm now in a School of Information Sciences, where I work with librarians on ALA-funded projects and the one time I ever talked to the guy who wrote the game (Scott Miller of Apogee) he told me he always thought that puzzle was too hard. :)

   • Embed this notice
     Jessamyn (jessamyn@glammr.us)'s status on Thursday, 24-Oct-2024 09:17:56 JST Jessamyn

     in reply to

     • powersoffour

     @powersoffour @kottke I'm glad I read that story today, thank you.