How the Information Infrastructure Has Changed in the Digital Age - Evolving Global Information Infrastructure and Information Transfer - page 83

The evolution of high-speed computers and sophisticated programming has
permitted the information user to use her own vocabulary in the search process,
and the librarian who in the past assigned subject headings has been bypassed.
The Internet now enables a searcher to cross disciplines in a search for informa-
tion, and sophisticated search engines suggest terms that can be used to locate
information that might be found on Web sites, in databases, in books, or in journal
articles.
The Internet has allowed the retrieval of information to reflect characteristics of
the emergent paradigm—it is not fixed; there is no stability. The Internet evolves
as new technologies and needs evolve. It is a process sometimes called “coevolu-
tion.” Systems no longer stand alone; the complex parts interact. The complexity of
the Internet reflects the complexity in the digital world. Because of this complexity,
we have combined the information transfer processes “bibliographic control” and
“organization by discipline” into “organization of information” to reflect the trans-
formation of information transfer in the emerging paradigm.
Diffusion: How It Is Central in the Digital Age
In Chapter 4 we acknowledged that it is the mission of organizations and pro-
fessionals in various fields to diffuse information—to help individuals understand
information and to make sense of it. The ultimate purpose is to enable learning to
improve one's life and to effect change. Diffusion of information is the critical func-
tion whereby people make sense of information so that it can be put to use. The
transition from an emphasis on dissemination to an emphasis on diffusion is paral-
lel to the move from the old to the emergent paradigm as well as from the biblio-
graphic paradigm to the user-centered paradigm in libraries.
Changes in the Learning Technologies
Educational institutions engaged in the diffusion of knowledge, as well as a vari-
ety of organizations, now have a wide variety of communication channels to utilize
in their educational missions. Technology applied to education has removed the
barriers of distance and time; education can be offered at a distance through video-
conferencing and use of the Internet and telephone for real-time and asynchronous
exchange of ideas. Assignments, whether papers, oral reports, video productions,
or a combination of media, can be submitted for immediate viewing or review by
the instructor and students. The classroom can be simulated with students who are
many miles apart from each other and the instructor; however, the effective use of
these new media requires both instructors and students to think differently about
the learning experience and to adapt to effective use of these media.