Several weeks ago Richard Frank, president of Walt Disney Studios, highlighted some of the insensitivity to consumer convenience by replicating a computer program for ordering pizza. Selecting the size, toppings, and method of payment took more than three minutes. He then picked up the phone and ordered a pizza in seventeen seconds. Since the major driving forces of the new information environment anticipate consumer services and products, the educational world will need to be very aggressive in order to keep its interests visible. However, it may be useful to look at the university library as an illustrative example of factors that influence higher education.
Libraries tend to reflect the dominant mode of production and use of educational information.
As early as 1962 in an exhibit at the Seattle World's Fair, the U.S. library community demonstrated its concept of the library of the 21st century. That exhibit ran from April to October in Seattle and then moved to New York City, where it ran for two similar six-month periods. The exhibit included a traditional collection of books for adults and children. However, it featured several new technologies that were not commonly known to the public at the time. Photocopying on plain paper was demonstrated in a machine designed to copy from books.