Libraries, data and the fourth industrial revolution (Data Deluge Column)

The World Economic Forum held in Davos, Switzerland, in January 2016, brought together leaders from the areas of science and technology, business, health, education, government and other fields as well as representatives from the media. A key theme of the forum was what has come to be known as the “fourth industrial revolution”.

News reports and blog posts about the forum gave the impression that this new “revolution” would bring unprecedented advances in science and medicine as well as would hold the potential for a future dominated by intelligent robots and massive levels of unemployment.

For example, on January 24, 2016, Elliot of The Guardian reported that the “Fourth Industrial Revolution brings promise and peril for humanity”. Sensational headlines and sound bites are good at attracting attention but they are not very effective with regard to communicating what this revolution is about and what it could mean for our lives, communities, governments and our workplaces in the near and distant future. The snippets of information reported here and there give the impression that robots, artificial intelligence, cloud-based computing, big data and a combination of other technologies are gradually merging to create a new reality which has the potential for revolutionizing our way of life.

This installment of the Data Deluge consists of an exploration of the fourth industrial revolution, what role libraries might play in this revolution and how our information environment could be forever changed.