It is now nearly a decade since the current Director of Aslib rocked the somewhat complacent debating chambers of the information profession with his paper ‘There won't be an information profession in 2000 AD’. At the time, the IT world was developing a view of the paperless office brought about by heady dreams of electronic libraries, common networks and end‐user searching. The day of the intermediary was drawing to a close, or was it? With the passage of time, experience brings with it a realisation that nothing is black and white, but a rich texture of shades of grey. As we enter the ‘Information age’, those with the capability to exploit information effectively will be the winners. The advice ‘to change or be changed’ was never more apt than it is today.