The Mundaneum’s Version of Google
First Published March 5th, 2021
In 1934, Belgian Paul Otlet (pronounced ot-LAY) wrote how information could be attained over a global network using “electric telescopes.”
He envisioned people having the means to search and browse through millions of interlinked images, documents, video, and audio files.
Otlet called it a “réseau,” a French word meaning network.
He described a networked world where “anyone in his armchair would be able to contemplate the whole of creation.”
Today, Otlet’s vision turned into a reality, as anyone sitting in their armchair can contemplate the whole of creation.
Paul Otlet’s pursuit of connecting people to the world’s knowledge started in 1895 when he met fellow Belgian Henri La Fontaine.
La Fontaine shared in Otlet’s vision of developing one primary bibliography center containing the entire world’s published knowledge. They held many discussions on the subject.
Otlet persuaded the Federal Government of Belgium to support their project and provide a building for their collection and business operations.
The building space became called the Mundaneum pronounced (mun-da-NAY-um), which comes from the French word mondain, meaning “worldly” in French.
Otlet then set out and began to stockpile the published photographs, articles, statistics, and other data from every printed book, newspaper, magazine, illustration, poster, and pamphlet.
Paul Otlet undertook quite a challenge.
Starting with 3-by-5 index cards to organize the Mundaneum’s growing collection of printed knowledge, he went on to create an enormous paper database called a “universal catalog of all that had been written.”
This universal catalog grew to contain more than 17 million entries.
Thousands of index cards inside wooden cardholder drawers lined the inner walls of the Mundaneum.
In 1904, Otlet implemented a new Universal Decimal Classification procedure to organize, categorize, and cross-reference the massive amount of paper documentation and manage the escalating information overload.
He also hired library catalogers to help with organizing the Universal Bibliographical System index cards.
By 1910, Otlet established a fee-based research service whereby anyone in the world could submit a question to the Mundaneum via postal mail or telegraph.
People from all over the world contacted the Mundaneum, submitting requests to research specific subjects.
As the Mundaneum operations grew, the building began to be overwhelmed by the massive amounts of paper documentation being collected and stored.
At the start of the 1920s, Otlet visualized removing the physical need for housing such a massive amount of paper altogether.
Documentation was not stored electronically during the 1920s, and so Otlet began to study this method.
By 1934, Otlet’s research led to his publishing a book called “Monde,” meaning “world” in French.
His book describes electronic data storage as a “mechanical collective brain” containing a universal catalog of all the world’s information.
He says this information is accessible anytime, from anyplace using a worldwide telecommunications network — remember folks, this is 87 years ago.
His book’s terms included “web of knowledge,” “link,” and “knowledge network” in describing a central repository containing all human knowledge.
Otlet believed creating an efficient method to organize and distribute knowledge would make a better world.
Just when the Mundaneum had become a global documentation center, the Belgian government withdrew its support, forcing Otlet to move out of the building.
Due to financial difficulties, Otlet had to relocate the Mundaneum to a much smaller building and employ fewer people.
Otlet’s Mundaneum operations came to an end when the German Nazi army marched through Belgium in 1940, a year after World War II began.
Sadly, the German army demolished the Mundaneum building’s interior.
They removed and destroyed paper documents and thousands of boxes filled with Otlet’s 3-by-5 index cards.
Art from Nazi Germany’s Third Reich filled the Mundaneum.
Paul Otlet, called the “father of information management,” died Dec. 10, 1944, at 76.
How would Paul Otlet respond to today’s internet and instantaneous global access to the growing amount of information?
“Otlet would be rejoicing at the creation of the internet and the web, although he would be terribly upset about the lack of organization on it,” said 1975 Paul Otlet biographer W. Boyd Rayward.
Today in Paul Otlet’s hometown of Mons, Belgium, stands the non-profit Mundaneum museum.
The museum’s inner walls hold some of Otlet’s original index cards inside the small wooden drawers. There is also an ever-growing paper knowledge depository which includes a collection of Paul Otlet and Henri La Fontaine’s papers.
The museum curators continue to locate and return lost documents and artifacts removed from the original Mundaneum.
Nowadays, many of us begin our search for information using Google; however, let us not forget Paul Otlet and his Mundaneum used to collect, store, and share the world’s published knowledge.
A 1998 video biography of Paul Otlet with English narrations by W. Boyd Rayward is at http://www.archive.org/details/paulotlet.
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