Musing lazily about library science and the web

I’ve been digging around the works of S.R. Ranganathan for some time now, triggered by reading David Weinberger’s Everything is Miscellaneous just over a year ago (as reported here).

Regular readers may remember Ranganathan’s Five Laws of Library Science:

  1. Books are for use.
  2. Every reader his or her book.
  3. Every book its reader.
  4. Save the time of the reader.
  5. The Library is a growing organism.

Well, regular readers may have remembered them, but I didn’t. For some strange reason my mind blanked out on the first one, I could only remember four. So I did what anyone would do, and looked up Wikipedia. Found what I wanted. Loitered languorously in the area without intent. And came across this, by Alireza Noruzi:

Application of Ranganathan’s Laws to the Web: “The Five Laws of The Web”

  1. Web resources are for use.
  2. Every user his or her web resource.
  3. Every web resource its user.
  4. Save the time of the user.
  5. The Web is a growing organism.

Read the rest of Alireza’s paper, as he explains why he thinks the way he does. It’s worth it. More later.

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