图书馆与互联网
使用图书馆的十个好理由
So, you have to write a paper on the pros and cons of capital punishment or immigration reform. 你以前总是上网，用谷歌来查找信息。 为什么要使用图书馆资源呢？ 这里有十个很好的理由：
1. 不是所有的东西都在互联网上。
网上有很多有用的信息。 Unfortunately, this often leads to the misconception that everything you need to know can be found online. This simply isn’t true. There are tons of published materials (books, articles, videos, music, etc) that you won’t find using a standard search engine like Google or Yahoo. 即使你找到了他们，你的访问也可能是有限的（见下面的第2条）。
2. 不是互联网上的所有东西都是免费的。
Much of the web consists of subscription services that make you pay if you want to
get into their website or download their stuff. Before you go and spend your hard-earned
money on these services, check out the library’s website. We’ve already paid for many
of these services so you don’t have to.
3. 互联网不是很有组织。
How many times have you searched for something on the web and got a list of 1.5 million web pages? 你要怎么理解这一切？ Does searching the web feel like looking for a needle in a haystack? Well, library resources, unlike the web, are organized by topic and broken down into different types of information (books, articles, databases, etc.) 图书馆 resources have been organized by real people, not by search engine robots.
4. 在互联网上没有质量控制。
互联网上充满了谎言、误解和半真半假的事实。 Almost anyone with a computer can put up a website, and they don’t have to know what they’re talking about. Some sites will deliberately mislead you in order to get your money, change your opinion on a controversial issue, or just to pull your leg. Hoax sites are all over the place, and they often look real. 图书馆 resources, on the other hand, have mostly been through editors and fact-checkers who make sure you’re getting (relatively) reliable information.
5. 互联网上的消息来源可能更难核实。
当你写一篇论文时，引用你的资料来源是很重要的。 Some web pages make it difficult to figure out who’s telling you what and where they got their information. 图书馆 resources, even those on our online databases, will tell you exactly where the information came from.
6. 互联网对某些事物来说太新了。
你在找从你出生那天起的新闻报道吗？ How about speeches from World War I? The web is relatively new, and most sources of information over 10 – 15 years old have not been digitized or placed on the web. If you’re looking for information on older events, you’ll have better luck checking out the library’s resources.
7. 图书馆的在线资源是全天候可用的。
如今，图书馆里除了书还有别的东西。 The library’s online databases, e-books collections and other online resources can be accessed 24/7 through the library’s website. Although you access these resources through the internet, they are not “internet sources”. They are every bit a part of our library’s collection as the books on our shelf. The articles and books you find in our online databases and e-books collections are reprinted from real live print sources.
8. 互联网有一英里宽，一英寸深。
So you’ve found 40 websites on a particular topic, but they all give you the same four or five facts without very much detail. How do you stretch that out to a five-page paper? For a varied and more in-depth analysis, try some of the library’s books or article databases.
9. 你已经付了图书馆的钱了。
你的学杂费可以用来支付图书馆的费用。 为什么不让你的钱物有所值呢？
10. 现实生活中的人可以帮助你使用我们的图书馆。
Nice, eager, friendly, highly-trained librarians are standing by, waiting to help you find the information you’re looking for. Don’t spend hours in vain looking for information on the web. 利用我们的服务为您指明正确的方向。
This list is adapted from Mark Herring’s “10 Reasons Why the Internet Is No Substitute for a 图书馆,” which originally appeared in American 库, April 2001, p. 76-78.