That's right. Yet ANOTHER perk of being part of the second largest library in the country (second only to those Hah-vud Bunnies): We have access to glorious laser discs.
(And, it's the CRITERION COLLECTION, y'all!!!!)
A student group is doing a project on 2001: A Space Odyssey. They are reading the book by Arthur C. Clarke, and they want to view Kubrick's movie as well. The student in charge of getting the movie accidentally requested the LASER DISC instead of the DVD. Well, that meant I got to do a little joyous happy dance this morning when I got in.
I instantly had flashbacks to watching films on laser disc at my friend's house when I was in high school...and having to wait while her dad flipped the disc over to the other side. Her dad is somewhat of an amateur movie nut, and he also belonged to the Columbia VHS/Record/CD club. She would always have the latest and greatest movies at her house before anyone else. (And, her CD collection was outta this world thanks to those Buy 7, Get One for a Penny deals).
Anyway...I digress. The point is: Libraries are awesome. We are curators of artifacts both timely and historical. I know not many people use VHS or laser disc anymore, but it's cool to think if one really needs either of these items they can turn to their library for help in gaining access to them. This is why I fear libraries becoming totally virtual. Until it can be proven everyone is out of their VCR's or laser disc players or cassette players, maybe, juuuuuuuuuuust maybe, libraries should still be responsible for helping out the members of their community who still want access to these seemingly outdated technologies.
No comments:
Post a Comment