This post is a reflection of the changes in technology that have occurred since I graduated from library school, as well as musings about how things will shake out in the future with AI. I’ve been a librarian for 16 years and have worked mostly in academic libraries. In 2009, the Kindle and iPhone were still fairly new, and the iPad hadn’t been released yet. Social media was dominated by Facebook and Twitter (now X). Second Life was a thing; I even took a virtual communities class in library school that met in Second Life. It is weird to look back at how much more information and communication options we have in 2025 compared to then. It is also interesting to observe how different technology and library instruction trends we thought would stick ended up just fading into the background.
In light of all of the changes with AI, I got to thinking about how much libraries have changed, and how much our core goals still remain the same–Cite your sources, people! Our pathway to those goals look a lot different now with the onslaught of information from the internet, not to mention fake news. AI adds a new layer by pulling its own information from questionable sources.
In my experience, there’s always been a disconnect between library database and catalog search methods, and the real world Google searches that we’re all used to. They are getting closer though, recent updates to some databases show that they’re now trying to use language that we’re used to such as “filters” instead of “limiters” to refine search results, or “share” to share the article or book link. Searching library databases now is not too different than searching Amazon at this point. I also did a presentation recently about features in library databases that now offer the user multiple reading options (text, audio, printable PDF, text enlargement) for their content. These features will be especially helpful for people with disabilities who need to adjust their reading experience.
As we continue to figure out AI’s role in our careers and personal lives, the ability to do background research to understand the sources of information you share will become increasingly important. Google’s AI search provides summaries at the top of a Google search. It is pulling from the same questionable sources that we used to run into ourselves because it only has access to freely available information. There are a couple of AI-powered tools that I recommend. Semantic Scholar is a scientific literature database that pulls its sources from reputable publishers. PubMed is one example. Research Rabbit helps find papers and offers the ability to create collections and visualizations of how the papers relate to each other. The researcher will still have to use their own judgement to some extent for the credibility of the papers provided since they’re freely available online, but it is more intentionally curated to include scholarly information rather than a free for all.
Librarianship is a constantly evolving field and I hope that we can continue to build the bridge between intentional, scholarly research and day to day Google information seeking by making the databases easier to navigate. We adapted to the rise of the internet and information overload and our roles will continue to evolve with the growth of AI tools.
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