The poet wrote long back the line water, water everywhere, but not a drop to drink to convey the helpless plight of the thirsty sailor in the wilderness of the sea. If the poet were to describe the present state of the world, he is justified in modifying the above line as information, information everywhere, but... Having mentioned water with its abundance in the oceans and the seas (accounting for three-fourths of earth’s surface) along with information also, with its piling up into the proportions of the universe itself, we are prompted to take on two all-too-familiar sources of information namely Encyclopaedia and Internet, the latter being a far more versatile avatar of the former. Encyclopaedias have existed for around 2,000 years and evolved considerably during several centuries on counts of language, size, perspective, readership and so on, including the technologies employed for their production, finding prominent place in libraries, schools and other academic institutions. The appearance of digital technology has vastly expanded the content of this source of reliable information leading to the emergence of the global system of interconnected computer networks familiar to the literati as the Internet, origins of which dates back to the 1960s. The beneficiaries of this ubiquitous facility comprise the entire humanity keen on learning, not to sideline the students being groomed in schools and colleges.
Given the imperatives of life’s long journey of learning, first by acquiring information selectively and then getting empowered with info-driven knowledge needed for progress of civilised society from one generation to the next, the young in the population owes it to the elderly, acting as mentors, to reach the perfect mould.
