Or you had an encyclopedia and a variety of assorted reference books on your shelf at home. This is not really as much about information technology as it is about laziness and lack of curiosity. The same thing is a widespread phenomenon today, even with the internet.
The problem with those home encyclopedias was they were mostly a decade or more out of date. And only provided a very limited amount of information. Generally only a few paragraphs or a page at best. Reference books suffered the same problems of not being current. Turns out books cost money and knowledge ain’t cheap.
The only reference book that I own that is even remotely up to date is the last Machinery’s Handbook I bought. And even that is multiple issues behind now.
History doesn’t go out of date. The speed of light doesn’t go out of date. Sure, a lot of things happened since it was published so it doesn’t have the latest stuff but that doesn’t invalidate the information they have, and if a new regime decides to erase or rewrite parts of history you still have it in black and white.
Or you had an encyclopedia and a variety of assorted reference books on your shelf at home. This is not really as much about information technology as it is about laziness and lack of curiosity. The same thing is a widespread phenomenon today, even with the internet.
The problem with those home encyclopedias was they were mostly a decade or more out of date. And only provided a very limited amount of information. Generally only a few paragraphs or a page at best. Reference books suffered the same problems of not being current. Turns out books cost money and knowledge ain’t cheap.
The only reference book that I own that is even remotely up to date is the last Machinery’s Handbook I bought. And even that is multiple issues behind now.
History doesn’t go out of date. The speed of light doesn’t go out of date. Sure, a lot of things happened since it was published so it doesn’t have the latest stuff but that doesn’t invalidate the information they have, and if a new regime decides to erase or rewrite parts of history you still have it in black and white.