How exactly would you know ‘electronically’ what was or wasn’t a good source on some topic like the development of the Christian Church?

Assuming no knowledge at all, the non-electronic route is not all that different from the electronic one and not that much harder. I’d probably start, in the paper world, with an encylopedia entry. From there I might move on to a journal. I can probably look up reviews of the individual 15 books to determine the merits and flaws of using them.

Now if this was just a high level type of undergraduate ‘write a summary of’ type project you’re probably right that electronic sources are faster. But if you were doing something deeper you’d probably tap a physical library. You’d probably ask the help of a reference librarian, you may need to physically examine actual rare sources etc. So yes I think even in the fully electronic age libraries will exist for the ‘power researcher’.

But for the casual person libraries still are pretty powerful places. The ‘new books’ shelf of my library is basically exactly what you’re saying you want. I’m seeing somebody else’s selection of books to buy and feature for the library. In my county there’s multiple libraries and even though they are all under the same system each one clearly has its own flavor (I find Barnes and Noble bookstore are like that as well, to a lessor degree).

Even in the case of what you proposed, 15 books on the development of the Christian Church? That’s a pretty manageable set to make a choice from. The entire Amazon catalogue is probably not. The physical library is it’s own type of filter. Maybe the absolute best book on the development of the Christian Church wasn’t purchased and stocked in the library, but if your interest is casual then at least a few of those 15 will be good enough for your needs. If you become more of a ‘power researcher’ your library probably has the tools to help get for you the books it didn’t stock, at no cost to you. Amazon won’t do that for you, as great as they are.

It seems to me that people who think ebooks will “kill off” libraries betray an extremely simplistic understanding of what a library is and what it does.

A library — especially a public library — is not simply an organized collection of books. If that were all they are, then ebooks could indeed replace them.

But a library is a lot more things: It’s a space for dedicated study. It’s a facility for combining various disparate types of information together. It’s a source of expert assistance in finding and evaluating information. It’s a community hub and an expression of the public value of free knowledge.

I could go on: It can be a refuge from dysfunctional schools, or a place for homeschooling families to connect with their community, or a way for the poor to better their situation through job searching.

Physical books are there, yes, and they’re important. But a library is a rich and complex institution, never reducible to simply the items it lends out.

Sometime in the late 90′s, a young girl in this city took a bullet to the brain and nearly died as a result of a gun being shot off a couple of miles away on New Year’s Eve. She was at a downtown First Night celebration, the shooter was at home in a neighborhood literally known locally as The Hood. They actually traced the bullet and prosecuted and convicted the shooter on, I believe, endangerment. This isn’t something my brother’s cousin’s uncle told me — it was big news around here at the time. Unfortunately, my local paper keeps their archive behind a pay wall.

I find this a very depressing idea. I just got a Kindle and I love it, although I see its limitations. It’s trying to lock you into only Amazon’s books. The ‘whispernet’ is a bit big brotherish (for example, the story about Amazon yanking books off of people’s Kindle’s automatically when they accidently released a book a few days too soon). But there’s plenty of free stuff and give it some more time and it will be very impressive in ten years.

But at the same time the library is cool in its own way. The books exist as time capsles, look in a section like politics and you’ll see the fads of ten, twenty, thirty or more years ago. Open up a book and you realize that 40 years ago someone last looked at it, maybe even jotted a note in it! Unlike digital copies, the cover art, reviews on back and so on give you a sense of what this book was presented as back then (an authority from on high? A crank with a self published manuscript? ) The ‘new books’ section more than once has gotten me to read a book that I thought about when reading a review but never got around too (for example The Emperor of Maladies, a history of cancer).

I have only touched the libraries other goodies. One experience I recall from college was falling in love with The New Republic so I started reading old issues from the end of WWII through the 70′s on microfilm. I remember on a boring day just going through microfilm of The New York Times when I was taking a class on the Civil War….I looked at the headlines about a NY draft coming up knowing that I knew a massive riot would follow.

If electronic books really do ‘kill libraries’ I’d be very depressed. It is probably a good argument for a gov’t subsidy of print to some degree. Think about it, in a world of ‘electronic libraries’ only a single huge EMP is all that’s needed to wipe out all knowledge. There’s a sci-fi story concept free for anyone who wants to take it and run with it.