The Early Information Society

'Like all good historians, Black, Muddiman and Plant bring to vivid life what has passed out of current memory, in this case a number of startling developments in information management in Britain in the first half of the twentieth century, long before computers emerged on the scene. The stories they tell are fascinating. Their analyses are subtle, crisp and provocative. Their scholarship is impeccable. This highly original work raises profoundly important questions about the relationship between society, industry, the economy and regimes of information management that take us far beyond the slick formulas of today’s pundits of the information age. A must read!' W. Boyd Rayward, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, US 'The enormous imperative of now leads us to ignore history. Inhabiting the new Information Society, the pressing need is to adapt so that we may prosper. The past scarcely seems relevant. If you think that, then you need this book. Things aren’t so novel when scholars look carefully at where we’ve come from. The Early Information Society traces the origins of the Information Age in Britain, the real history in which a national information infrastructure was established between the late 19th and the 1930s, when information professions came into being, and when deep gender divisions held sway. What is this novelty, the Information Society? Reading this history book will surely provoke questions about the here and now'. Frank Webster, City University London, UK 'I am sure that this book should find its way to every library serving librarianship and information science or similar departments.' Information Research, Review no R297, 2008 '...this book is a useful and valuable resource for both the study of the history of information professions and the history of the emergence of the information society.' Libraries & the Cultural Record, Issue 43:3, 2008 'The authors of The Early Information Society combine both the skills of the hi