New words compliments of the Internet

Earlier this year, I signed up for the Merriam Webster word-of-the-day service. It's a free service that sends you a different word each day along with a definition, use-it-in-a-sentence, and a word history. I originally signed up for the service in the hopes that it would help me on the GRE vocab section (I'm not convinced it's done me much good on the test or in everyday life) but I never signed off of the service because it has some fun words sometimes.

Today's word is cybrarian which apparently is "a person whose job is to find, collect, and manage information that is available on the World Wide Web." It sounds so corny to me but apparently the word has been in use since 1992. In general, I think it's funny that the web has had so much influence on new words that almost always sound so corny.

"Librarian" combines "library" (itself from "liber," the Latin word for book) and the noun suffix "-an," meaning "one specializing in." When people wanted a word for a person who performed duties similar to those of a librarian by using information from the Internet, they went a step further and combined "cyber-," meaning "of, relating to, or involving computers or a computer network," with "librarian" to produce the new "cybrarian."

Just like we've seen all semester, I feel that things, once they are moved online, change in interesting and not necessarily positive ways. You go to the library to get a book and ask the librarian questions, but apparently if you want information or help with online information, you ask the cybrarian. I'm not sure about everyone else, but I have a hard time taking terms like this seriously.