The abandonment of card catalogues is a symbolic symptom of the threat faced by our paper and print-based civilization. The incorporation of Information Technology into the Teaching and Learning equation poses several problems, not the least of which is its very considerable volatility. Not surprisingly, the difficulties we have in pinning down such dizzying growth leads to a myriad of extravagant, often contradictory claims. Information searches on the information highway are a joke. They are slow, use incomprehensible search techniques, and are ludicrously incomplete.
Most communication is mindless babble.
The true costs in time and money are enormous, and are largely hidden. The majority of you have completed the transition from typewriting to word processing. The changing nature of demands being made on university secretarial staff confirms this. At Scarborough College in the University of Toronto, secretarial services have been almost entirely removed, leaving academic staff to do their own wordprocessing. A quick glance at the university phone directories shows that the move to e-mail is rapidly becoming generalized.