ABSTRACT
A majority of users cited this as a major positive attribute of the Internet. Only a small minority of librarians considered overload a problem associated with the Internet. ‘Library lunch’ seminars have also taken place, introducing journalists to information issues surrounding the Internet. Even the negative comments we received about overload were largely made by heavy Internet users, and often then only after the topic of ‘information overload’ had been raised by the interviewer. For some, principally non-users, the basic problem was simply, ‘there is too much information on the Net’. After all, popular perception is that the Internet is riddled with poor quality, unauthenticated and subjective data. A minority of both the librarians and journalists who considered overload a major impediment to Internet use mentioned Web search engines. There was some consideration of information overload in a wider context, both with regard specifically to the Internet, and to information systems and dissemination generally, all of it being negative.
