Access to Research Online: Technology, Trends, and the Future

Background

The days when research was conducted exclusively in the library with a select few academics sitting amongst admirable piles of books, are gone. The world is hungry for knowledge and quickly producing researchers of varying calibre who are less dependent on the physical space than ever before. This presents a number of challenges to librarians, out of which issues related to technology stand out prominently. How can the library pave roads to curated digital content and make it easily accessible from any location? How does it remain relevant in the age of Google, Wikipedia, and sophisticated piracy as well as the open access movement? To find answers to these questions, one must courageously indulge in the understanding of existing and upcoming technologies. Why so? A wide sample of librarians the author had the privilege to speak to believe that in the world of technological revolution and the generation of the digital native users, this is what the future of the library will depend on, its ability to continuously innovate itself in ways of knowledge delivery to those who seek it.