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The Internet: A Solution to Your Information Needs or Media Hype?

The Internet, also known as the "Information Superhighway", has captured the public's attention. In conversations one often hears that "everything" (meaning all information) is available on the Internet. This is incorrect at present and is likely to remain so for the foreseeable future. Much information is still made available to the public in print, due to our long history as a print-based society and the fact that much information is controlled by publishers and other key players in the information industry, for whom information is a saleable commodity.

Examples of Internet-based information:

• Electronic mail, which allows you to communicate one-on-one with others around the world and to monitor and participate in discussion groups. E-mail discussion groups have been established on many subjects, ranging from professional and scholarly concerns to news and current issues.
• Selected types of government information, including U.S. congressional bills, laws, regulations, United Nations Security Council minutes, and some historic documents.
• Library catalogs and selected information databases. Note that databases are often licensed to allow access only to users within a particular domain. For example, many databases listed on the University Libraries web site are available only in the UNR computing domain and off campus to students, faculty and staff who have properly authenticated.
• Large, searchable databases of magazine and journal articles, although many are restricted as described in the bulleted item above.
• Informational, promotional and gateway web sites for companies, universities, cities, etc. Most print and broadcast news networks and publishers now use the Web to report news and promote their programs, magazines and newspapers. The same is true of the entertainment industry. Companies advertise their products on the Internet and provide information to current and potential investors. Colleges and universities are also marketed on the Web, providing online tours, course catalogs and much more.

Some limitations of Internet-based information:

• It is not possible to conduct a complete search for information on a given subject.
• You cannot view and download the text of most published books. Access to magazine and journal articles is most often limited to subscribers (UNR subscribes to several thousand online magazines and journals).
• Much information on the Internet is presented without editorial review or control. You cannot automatically assume that information found on the Internet is accurate or authoritative (in varying degrees this is also true of information from other sources).

The "best" solution: Although it does not provide access to all information, becoming familiar with the Internet will better enable you to use it appropriately. Librarians and other public service staff at the UNR Libraries can offer time-saving suggestions for using the Internet and printed sources to conduct research on many topics. Becoming "information literate" involves learning when and how to use a variety of sources, rather than being limited to information provided by particular technologies, whether print or electronic.