Library vs.

internet
Intro:
(Brief definition of library and Internet)
The internet and the library, both are the considered to be a big depository of
information.
Library can be defined as A collection of literary documents or records kept for
reference or borrowing. While Internet is defined as An electronic network
providing access to millions of resources worldwide.
OR
A library is a place where there are a lot of books, educational magazines, journals
and newspapers and so on for people to borrow or read to gain information. The
internet, on the other hand, is a computer network where students can get any
information just by opening the network
OR
(Detailed definition of lib and internet)

Library:
A library is an organized collection of sources of information and similar
resources, made accessible to a defined community for reference or borrowing. It
provides physical or digital access to material, and may be a physical building or
room. A library's collection include
books, periodicals, newspapers, manuscripts, films, maps, prints, documents, CDs,
cassettes, videotapes, DVDs, audiobooks, databases, e-books, and other formats.
Libraries range in size from a few shelves of books to several million items.
A library is organized for use and maintained by a public body, an institution, a
corporation, or a private individual. Public and institutional collections and
services may be intended for use by people who choose not toor cannot afford
topurchase an extensive collection themselves, who need material no individual
can reasonably be expected to have, or who require professional assistance with
their research. Libraries often provide quiet areas for studying, and they also often

offer common areas to facilitate group study and collaboration. Libraries often
provide public facilities for access to their electronic resources and the Internet.
They are extending services beyond the physical walls of a building, by providing
material accessible by electronic means.

Internet:
The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks. It is an
international network of networks that consists of millions of private, public, academic,
business, and government networks, linked by networking technologies. The Internet
carries an extensive range of information resources and services, such as the interlinked hypertext documents, the infrastructure to support email and file sharing
Internet has been widely used by academia since the 1980s. Internet use grew rapidly in
the West from the mid-1990s to early 2000s and from the late 1990s to present in
the developing world. In 1994 only 3% of American classrooms had access to the
Internet while by 2002 92% did. Newspaper, book, and other print publishing are
adapting to website technology. The Internet has enabled and accelerated new forms of
human interactions through instant messaging, Internet forums, and social networking.

Overview:
Finding information for academic assignments, is part and parcel of a students
life. Students need a lot of reliable information they can get for use in academic
written work in order to excel in their studies.
Time tick and pass in a blink of an eye. From the era of flipping thru the pages of
books and articles from the library till the era of using the latest technology;
internet to search for any information with a click 24/7 from a digital gadget,
theres been a huge difference between both elements in term of expect and uses
for the student.
Therefore which one of these two is a better source of information for students?
There compare and contrast between the library and the internet are as follows:

Why Internet?
Firstly, looking into internet; online database, that is commonly used by people
even student to help with their need, work, finding relevant information and
homework. the ability to work from any location with the a simple click on the
search tap on the electronic gadget that we have, the information being available
all in one place, the diversity of resources provided, and the availability of
resources that would they would not have access to otherwise.

1. Easy to use:
Nowadays, people prefer to use the internet over books because it is more
accessibly. You only need a computer and an internet provider. It is easier and
faster to find your topic. You just have to type a certain keyword in any search
engine and it will give you a list of websites that are related to your topic. Hence,
people use internet for an easy and fast research.

2. Quick Search:
Finding information in the library requires more time and energy. This is because
there are hundreds, sometimes thousands, of books in a library. Students need a lot
of patience in order to get the book that they want. There is a book catalogue for
students in every library and it sometimes might be very helpful in helping students
to find the book they want easily. However, knowing how to use the book
catalogue may be a difficult task for some students and they have to get help from
the librarians. Using the book catalogue also is a little time consuming. The
Internet is an incredibly powerful research aid. The internet, on the other hand,
requires lesser time in order to get information. Therefore, students can get
information very quickly. Students just have to type what information they want in
a portal and the information will appear on the page. There will be lots of
information appearing as well so students can choose which one they prefer.

3. Online tools for assistance:

The tools available for college students online include multiple thesaurus,
dictionary, grammar and study guides, research databases and search engines of all
kinds. Email is widely used across universities to communicate with
teachers. Social media has also been utilized in education.

4. Accessibility:
Libraries have harder accessibility. This is because libraries are not open all the
time. . Furthermore, not every book in the whole wide world can fit into a library.
Therefore, sometimes students cannot get to find the book that they want because
that particular book is not found in that particular library. The ability to access the
very latest information. Library books take time to order, accession and be
available on the shelves. On the other hand, the internet has much easier
accessibility. Students may find it frustrating at times. Students can access the
internet 24 hours a day wherever they are. They can find information using the
internet in the wee hours of the morning, night and even midnight.

5. Internet is up to date:
Books that are in the library might not be up to date. Books take about a year to be
published and therefore the information might be not be accurate anymore.
Moreover, everything about the world and what is happening in the world can be
found on the internet. Besides that, the information that is found in the internet is
much more recent and updated compared to the books in the library.

6. Online help from Experts:

Being able to communicate directly with subject experts by email. Whilst students
can phone local experts, or write to distant ones, electronic communication allows
fast, and cheap, answers to questions. Some Internet sites provide lists of subject
experts who have indicated that they will answer these types of questions from
students.

7. A better overview:
Not only that, students believe electronic resources does provide a good overview
of what is available on any particular topic, and more up-to-date resources and
improve the quality of their papers by allowing them to spend less time in the
research phase and more time in the writing phase, time frame wise is reduce as a
click on the search tab is easier to browse thru the thick book in the library as
online database seem more convenient and less intimidating than the library.

Why Library?
Library, a place where all the books are placed in shelves and usually group
according to genres and relevant topic. Since related topics are shelved near each
other, you can easily find books or journals with relevant articles when a student
needs it. The Internet is not a substitute for the library, but a search tool to be
used in addition to traditional sources in the library.

1. Everything Is Not On the Internet:

The Internet consists of a small percentage of whats published. Search engines
such as Google, AltaVista, and Yahoo access are limited. Only 8% of all journals
and even fewer books are on the Internet. The most reliable scholarly information
is available in books and journals. A virtual library cannot replace the traditional
library. Two California libraries (Monterey and California Polytechnic University)
attempted this method, only to find out first hand that it cant work. They found out
that everything is not on the Internet.

2. The Internet Is Not Organized

There is not a system that catalogues and organizes all resources on the
Internet. A search on the Internet is similar to searching an unclassified
catalogue. When you use any of the search engines, youre searching only part of
the Internet. Searches are not always relevant to your topic and can cause a lot of
wasted time, frustration and confusion

3. The Internet Doesnt Have Quality Control

Quality control isnt easy to achieve on the Internet. Open Source information on
the Internet is quite common and easy to get misinformed information. Anyone
with access to the Internet can publish a Website. Where as Books are published
with authenticated and authorized publisher.

4. Accuracy and Reliability:

Before information reaches a library, it is filtered in three ways:
(a) It is written and/or issued by an authoritative source such as the federal
government or a reliable organization;
(b) It is authenticated as part of an editorial or peer review process by a publisher;
(c) It is evaluated by experts, reviewers, or subject specialists/librarians as part of
collection development.

Reliability is very important for students so that the academic works they produce
have correct information and it is not plagiarized. Books found in the library have
very high reliability and are often written by very well-known and expert authors.
Many journals and research papers found in the library also have high reliability.
On the other hand, Information on the Web has no evaluation criteria has a lower
level of reliability compared to libraries unless the websites are authentic and valid

5. Library Online Resources are Available 24/7

Modern libraries online databases can be accessed 24 hours a day 7 days a week
from the librarys webpage. These databases are in the librarys collection and can
be accessed on campus and remotely with your University ID via the Internet. This
is not to be confused with searching the Internet.

6. Tuition and Fees Pay for Library Use

Library resources are paid for with your tuition and fees, so take advantage of
it. Libraries provide free access to scholarly books, journals, newspapers,
encyclopaedias, and other print reference sources. A lot of information on the
Internet is FREE, except scholarly materials. A paid subscription is required to
access.

7. Trained Professionals Available For Assistance

Knowledgeable and friendly librarians are available to assist with locating
information in person, chat, e-mail or telephone. Request assistance at the
beginning of your research and spare valuable time spent on the Internet.

8. E-books are Available

E-books are full-text and searchable. Text can be searched automatically, and
cross-referenced using hyperlinks. Dictionaries, reference works, and some
textbooks, benefit from search and cross-reference capabilities. Content is
available 24/7.

9. The Internet Has Fewer Archival Materials

The library has older materials than the Internet. Digitalization that goes back more
than 10-15 years can be difficult to locate on the Internet. The Internet provides
more timely information, and is constantly updated.

10. Sources on the Internet are harder to Identify:

Information on the WWW is hard to tell whos telling you what and where is the
location of the information. When you use information in your paper from the
Internet, its important to print it out and cite your sources. Information taken from
the Web can change overnight. Information taken from the library or databases in
the library gives the exact location. Facts and figures should always be crossreferenced with other resources.

Facts and Figures from researches:

For library:

Educationally-valid research on this topic has been ongoing for over a

decade, with results compared over 3 continents so far. The findings
prove conclusively that academic achievement - how well students
perform at school - has a direct correlation to the quality of a school's
library services.
Research has shown that developing good library services - even in
economically disadvantaged areas - improved students' achievements in
standardised tests.
Direct observation, supported by anecdotal evidence, has witnessed a
plethora of students undertaking research via the Internet, without any
reference to print-based resources. However, classroom teachers have
noted that the "quality" of the information has decreased with an
increase in access to the Internet.

There are over 4 billion unique, publicly accessible websites

Only 6% of these have educational content
The average life of a webpage is 75 days
Google, the largest search engine, has indexed less than 18% of the
available pages
A great deal of the Internet is not able to be indexed by traditional
search engines, and remains hidden from them. This is known as the
Invisible, or Deep, Web.

For Internet:

Many college student today have not once checked out a book from the
library for school research in their entire college career. Is that sad, or just
changing times? Of course they read books for good literature, but when it
comes to studying, they rely solely on the internet (thanks, Google).
When students have group projects that require heavy research, we all meet
at the library, but not as they used to, with a stack of books in front of
us. All of us meet up with a laptop/tablet in hand.
The classes in colleges have Facebook groups where the teacher posts
interesting links/ materials for the course, while students comment and
collaborate within the group.
According to Ciscos report, 55 percent of college students and 62 percent of
young employees say they could not live without the Internet.
According to a study done in 2002 by Steve Jones, 73% of college students
say they use the internet more than they us the library for information
research, while only 9% say the opposite.

In a Nut Shell:
However, the Internet and the Web should not be disregarded as valuable research
tools. With proper training and cross-referencing, both can be highly effective and
efficient means by which students locate information. As computers are becoming
more common in schools and homes, students and teachers are becoming more
computer literate and Internet literate.
In exemplary school libraries, the teaching program includes instruction in the use
the Internet. However, this is not restricted to merely "finding" web sites, but also
how to evaluate the quality of the information found. Students also learn how to
quickly access the best possible information, from facilities such as directories and
databases.
Theres always good and bad in all aspect and element so is library comparing with
internet, an online database. Which side of the coin to flip to is always depending
on the need of a student in working on the task given? Therefore, greatly believe a
choice is always on the hand of a person. What do you think?