ABSTRACT
Occasionally in library literature, someone writes something that you wish you had written. In a recent issue of College and Research Libraries Dan C. Hazen of Harvard College Library has given me the pleasure of seeing in someone else’s words something I’ve thought for years, but never had complete enough insight to say. His article “Collection Development Policies in the Information Age” claims that collection development policies “… are exercises in obsolescence that cater to nostalgic longing for order, precision and prescription.” 1 They are described in the article as “monuments of defensiveness” and “enshrinements of obsolescence” or when they are accurate as “codifications of decline.” His point is that the “stream of new materials” that selectors grapple with “increasingly cross(es) traditional boundaries of format and discipline.” He is absolutely correct.
