It’s enough to make a booklover smile and cry at the same time.
In Sunday’s New York Times Magazine, Kevin Kelly wrote about the contemporary quest for the “universal library” – a collection of all the works ever created – now made possible through the use of digital media. He writes:
- “From the days of Sumerian clay tablets till now, humans have `published’ at least 32 million books, 750 million articles and essays, 25 million songs, 500 million images, 500,000 movies, 3 million videos, TV shows, and short films, and 100 billion public web pages. All this material is currently contained in all the libraries and archives of the world.