# Who here has had a job that doesn't exist anymore?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-here-has-had-a-job-that-doesnt-exist-anymore/735574>\
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion\
**Created:** [October 23, 2015, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-here-has-had-a-job-that-doesnt-exist-anymore/735574 "2015-10-23T20:54:41Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 6

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**Author:** ![peedin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peedin/32/14095_2.png) [@peedin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/peedin)\
**Post date:** [October 29, 2015, 1:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-here-has-had-a-job-that-doesnt-exist-anymore/735574/101 "2015-10-29T13:14:06Z")

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> [@hajario](#):
>
> I had a job for several months in the 80s that certainly no longer exists. I was given a list of journal articles every morning via a primitive fax type machine. I’d go to the local university, find the journals in the archives, photocopy them and then send the papers to a place on the other side of the state via courier.
> 
> Of course, everything is digitized now so there is no need for this service.

Baloney. I’m a medical librarian so I know of what I speak. The majority of journals are available online from around 2000-forward. The biggies like JAMA, NEJM, BMJ do go wayyy back (BMJ is available online from 1840). But there are SCADS of journals who have not digitized their archives. Interlibrary loans from journals prior to 1990s-2000s most often arrive as a scanned PDF, but a human had to scanned the articles. So while the job of delivering the articles the articles via courier no longer exists, someone still has to do the job of scanning.

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**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\
**Post date:** [October 29, 2015, 1:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-here-has-had-a-job-that-doesnt-exist-anymore/735574/102 "2015-10-29T13:45:11Z")

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> [@peedin](#):
>
> Baloney. I’m a medical librarian so I know of what I speak. The majority of journals are available online from around 2000-forward. The biggies like JAMA, NEJM, BMJ do go wayyy back (BMJ is available online from 1840). But there are SCADS of journals who have not digitized their archives. Interlibrary loans from journals prior to 1990s-2000s most often arrive as a scanned PDF, but a human had to scanned the articles. So while the job of delivering the articles the articles via courier no longer exists, someone still has to do the job of scanning.

Obviously, someone has to scan it in the first place. Once scanned the job is done. I photocopied it and sent a physical copy. If someone else needed the same article a week later, I had to do it again. What about my post was baloney?

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