Sceptics Column: Jim Smith

This section will feature the views of individuals who are sceptical of the value of the Net as a whole, or some particular aspect of it. In this edition Jim Smith finds that the Internet is no place to do research

or most of us, whether researchers, academics, information professionals, or even curious members of the public, the Internet appears to hold out incredible promise: all the knowledge of the world lies in wait for us, if only we know where to look. At our fingertips awaits a bounty of information, the wisdom of the globe, the tree of knowledge. The vision is misleading, a phantom that (unfortunately) may never possess substance. There are very great differences between conducting on-line and 'traditional' research and, for the moment, the old ways still appear to be best.

It must be stressed first that this criticism is neither Luddite diatribe, nor technophobic rant. As an academic, I like the Internet. I enjoy being able to access UN Daily records and Security Council Resolutions from the comfort of my home. I appreciate the wealth of on-line data on everything from the Aristotle to Zebra mating habits. Thus, what I argue is out of concern for making the Internet a useful research tool, and not out of spite or fear.

Having noted that, let us turn first to perhaps the most important difference between on-line information and the occasionally-dusted shelves of our traditional libraries: quality. Internet only rarely has a peer review process, and the documents found there can range from solid academic work to the worst kind of hate-mongering and unsupported accusation. Some argue in favour of this lack of review on the basis that it gets information out quickly, and avoids peer review politics and unscholarly sniping. While this may be true, the trouble is that it can sometimes be difficult to tell the difference between solid scholarship, polemic and propaganda. Due to the way things like the World Wide Web are organized, the packaging is basically identical and it may be the flashier documents on the Net, the ones with graphics images and lots of buttons to push, which may end up getting the most attention. Library material, on the other hand, has most often gone through a rigorous process of peer review, editing, and scholarship. There is bad material as well as good in this setting, too, but it is the proportion which counts in the libraries' favour.

* See The Times Higher Education Supplement , 13 October 1995.

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