ancient history

[owlmoose]

So I'm taking advantage of a quiet night in the library to do a little weeding. And I'm coming across books about the Internet from 1996.

Books. About the Internet. From 1996.

And my superiors wonder why I feel the need to get rid of at least two thirds of the collection?

Comments

[peachespig.livejournal.com]

Whoa! Do they have historic value? Or at least comic potential? Do they gratuitously use the word "Information superhighway"?

[owlmoose.livejournal.com]

I haven't looked that closely to be honest; I just saw the copyright date and tossed them aside in disgust. But I would guess the answer is yes, to the two latter questions at least. Considering that one of them advertises itself as being written by the same person as "The Internet Yellow Pages."

[peachespig.livejournal.com]

Hee! Yes, the Internet Yellow Pages! Because the right way to catalog what's on the internet is to write it down and publish it in a book!

[coco-keesses.livejournal.com]

yeah, actually, you have to tell people about new media using old ones. Funny, huh?

[coco-keesses.livejournal.com]

OH DUDE!! That's history!! Aren't those titles fetching good $$ on ebay? or belong in an internet museum?

K has the book Voodoo dos (way old) which he can sell for $30 or something...

[owlmoose.livejournal.com]

These are stupid books, though. Like "the Internet for Dummies" type books, although none that bear that title. "Let's pretend that the Web is a piece of software that we can learn to use by reading a manual!" I would probably have advised against buying them when they were new. Although I suppose that's hindsight talking, at least in part. I wonder if anyone would have guessed in 1996 what a moving target the Web was going to be.

Still, you're right, I should check. You'll never know what someone thinks is going to be a collectable.