Librarians are like the keepers of truth, and libraries are helping people navigate a world where information has never been easier to find…or harder to trust.
South Africa (23 October 2026) – Sabinet, an organisation that supports libraries, has shared how the role of the library is changing with us.
The library used to be where you went when you needed an answer. You’d go in hoping the book with the information you needed was there.
Now all the answers live in our pockets. We type a question into our phones and get thousands of results in seconds. The difficult part is no longer finding information; it’s knowing which of it you can trust. The internet is helpful, but it is full of noise.
Librarians have become like the keepers of truth.
“For researchers, finding information is only part of the process. They also need to know whether a source is relevant, how it fits into a wider body of knowledge and whether it can support their research.” Sabinet shares.
“This is where the expertise of librarians remains essential. Their understanding of users, collections and information resources enables them to guide people through increasingly complex information environments.” it adds.
Libraries have essentially evolved to help support people through the whole research journey, and technology is a part of that, but it can’t do the thinking for us.
“Technology can help libraries respond to these changes by simplifying workflows, improving discovery and extending access to resources. But technology does not replace the professional expertise that helps users assess the relevance, credibility and context of the information they find.”
Sabinet supports South African libraries with tools that help people find what they’re looking for, and that let libraries borrow from one another’s collections when something isn’t on their own shelves. It works with a global library network called OCLC to connect them to collections further afield.
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“As the information environment continues to evolve, libraries will remain trusted partners in education and research. Their value lies not only in the information they provide, but also in their ability to help people discover, understand and use credible information with confidence.”
The library has grown from handing us answers to helping us trust them.
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