Angela Anthony already gave the perfect answer. The library isn't just books! There are a lot of children's activities at our local library. They do arts and crafts, have speakers come in and provide a safe environment for students to do their homework. Our public schools have gotten rid of their school libraries and provide students tablets to read from. I personally miss the smell of the old books that the library always had. The next generation will probably never know it.
Libraries are still open because not all books are available on electronic devices....and libraries offer more than books, internet access, movies, music, children and adult programs. Sometimes it's nice to read a regular book.
In addition to the answers already given ... Libraries are not necessary for those who wish only to use electronic information.
However ... Libraries are a VITAL form of information storage. Were all electronics to be rendered inoperable (a VERY real possibility due to either natural or manmade EMP) ... Without the physical copies of information stored at libraries, it would take hundreds of years to rediscover and rebuild our level of technology.
If all you are seeking is information, the content is usually more important that the form in which it arrives.
On the other hand, objects and methods and their forms are sometimes important to the total experience of "learning" and sometimes to the phenomenon of "memory."
You have heard of the Great Books of the Western World. The Syntopicon (volumes 2-3 of the set) is an index of 100 fundamental concepts that built the Euromerican mind and cultural vision. After this introductory essay, there follows an index of virtually every significant reference to that idea in every author in the set; you are given page numbers within this set of books.
I purchased a set right after graduation. The page number reference system (which was more detailed than that phrase implies) was so useful that I adopted it for myself, and there are things that I find easier to remember because I can associate the text with its position on the page. (My primary method of learning is visual so it dovetails nicely into my individual gifts.)
Another example of form vs content can be found at:
http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/digital-versus-analog1.htm
And then there is personal preference---and I have never developed a love for ebooks.
(My third paragraph comes from the first review on the amazon website for purchasing the "Great Books." I could not have improved on that review.)
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