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knowledge, it was not a reasonable way to find answers to specific
questions. Thus, libraries performed an exceptionally important service
to the world of scholarship by creating proxy records that allowed
scholars and casual researchers alike to zero in quickly on those
documents that might answer their questions or satisfy particular
research needs. However, in an overwhelmingly digital information
environment both the utility and the cost-effectiveness of proxy record
creation are open to serious question. It has always been an extremely
expensive and time-intensive strategy, one that relied heavily on the
attention of a few highly trained librarians. In the print era the world of
scholarship had little choice but to rely on librarians and their methods.
In the digital era the world has moved very quickly past them.
In the 21st century, Google has effectively taken over the document-
finding role from libraries. It was not very long ago that a researcher,
when wondering what kinds of books might be available on the subject
of Florentine sculpture, would have no real choice except to start her
search with a library catalogue. No rational researcher would do so
today, because a library catalogue will not answer the question
effectively. She may find ten books on the subject in her library, but will
not know whether more and better books exist elsewhere; she may find
no books on the subject in her library, but will not know whether this
means that no such books exist or simply that the library does not own
any. The rational researcher will begin by searching as widely as
possible, rather than within the artificially limited confines of any
particular library catalogue. This may mean making a Google search; it
may mean making a search on Amazon.com or on a similar bookselling
site; in some cases it may mean making a search on a large online union
catalogue such as WorldCat - but few researchers will think to look
there, and those who do will still be left wondering whether the
holdings of WorldCat's participant libraries really represent everything
that is technically available.
Libraries - the crisis of the collection
When Google took over the searching and finding function from
traditional libraries, it left one of the library's most essential functions
fully intact: that of third-party broker for expensive, high-quality
documents such as research journals and scholarly monographs. While
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