The Role of Information Intermediaries in the Post-Industrial Knowledge Economy

Every time you search a database, ask a librarian for a journal article, or rely on a market research report to make a decision, you are depending on an information intermediary. These are the people and systems that stand between the vast ocean of recorded knowledge and the person who actually needs a specific piece of it. As economies have shifted from making goods to processing information, the work of these intermediaries has moved from the margins to the centre. This post explains who they are, why a knowledge-based economy made them essential, how their roles have changed, and the challenges they face today.

The knowledge society and its information needs 🔗

The starting point for understanding information intermediaries is a major shift in how economies are organised. Sociologist Daniel Bell described this transition in his 1973 work, The Coming of Post-Industrial Society. He argued that advanced economies were moving away from manufacturing goods and towards producing and using services, information, and theoretical knowledge. Bell was among the first scholars to recognise that the production of information and knowledge would eclipse manufacturing in developed economies.

Bell drew a careful distinction between data, information, and knowledge. For him, information meant the storage, retrieval, and processing of data, while knowledge meant an organised set of facts or ideas that carried a reasoned judgement and was communicated to others. The defining feature of the post-industrial society, in his view, was the codification of theoretical knowledge and the new relationship between science and technology. In simpler terms, knowledge stopped being a background resource and became the central engine of economic value.

This idea was reinforced by the work of Marc Porat, who in 1977 studied the United States economy and added an information sector to the traditional three of agriculture, industry, and services. His research showed that more than half the workforce was already engaged in information-related work. The post-industrial society is therefore also called the knowledge society, because intellectual capital and the ability to apply research and development became the basis for competition.

Why information access became harder, not easier 🔗

One might assume that as more information is produced, finding what you need becomes simpler. The opposite has happened. The same forces that created the knowledge economy also created a problem of scale. Research output, scientific literature, business data, and digital records grow faster than any individual can track. This is the condition of information overload, where the sheer volume of available material makes it difficult to locate, evaluate, and use the right piece at the right time.

The Indian experience makes this concrete. The economic reforms of 1991 unleashed the country’s services sector, which began to grow at rates of 8 to 9 percent per year, with the IT and business process management sub-sector taking off rapidly. With over 76 crore citizens now connected to the internet, the country hosts one of the world’s largest online populations, supported by the Digital India Programme. More information flowing to more people does not automatically mean better decisions. It raises the value of anyone who can filter, organise, and interpret that flow. That is precisely the role of the information intermediary.

What information intermediaries do 🔗

An information intermediary is a person or system that bridges the gap between information producers and information users. The key function is to supply the right information to a user as quickly as possible to meet a defined need. To do this, intermediaries identify relevant sources, search and retrieve material, evaluate its quality, and repackage it into a form the user can act on.

In economic terms, intermediaries reduce what would otherwise be high search costs. Consider the alternative: if every researcher, manager, or student had to personally locate, verify, and synthesise every source, the cost in time and effort would be enormous. The intermediary absorbs that cost on behalf of many users. According to a ScienceDirect overview, one model of intermediation involves collecting information about products or quality and then supplying it to consumers who would otherwise have to search on their own.

This bridging function explains why intermediaries persist even when products are complex. In industries where goods or services require expert knowledge, intermediaries remain crucial because they provide the guidance that raw access to data cannot.

Intermediary roles in the post-industrial world 🔗

The roles of information intermediaries have changed significantly under the pressures of globalisation, digital technology, and information overload. The traditional picture of an intermediary was someone who captured, sorted, organised, and disseminated documents. That description still holds, but it is no longer sufficient.

From custodian to analyst 🔗

A study of scientific information work in pharmaceutical firms captured this shift clearly. It argued that information professionals must move from capturing and organising literature to analysing resources and leading educational initiatives. In the internet era, the same study noted, professionals need additional skills in resource analysis, communication, knowledge management, and outsourcing. The intermediary is expected not just to hand over a document but to understand the user’s expressed and unspoken needs and offer a solution.

The question of disintermediation 🔗

A common fear is that technology will make intermediaries unnecessary. If a researcher can search a database directly, why involve a librarian at all? This removal of the middle layer is called disintermediation. It is a real trend, but it is not inevitable across all fields. Where products or questions are complex and require expert judgement, the intermediary remains essential.

What has actually happened in many sectors is re-intermediation: the appearance of new kinds of intermediaries rather than the disappearance of the function altogether. Search engines, recommendation systems, data aggregators, and specialised analysts are all forms of intermediation suited to a digital environment. The internet did not abolish the middle layer; it reshaped it. A useful way to think about it is that intermediation is the bridging of incompatibilities between two sides of a market, and those incompatibilities have not gone away.

Types of intermediary workers 🔗

Information intermediaries are not a single occupation. They form a broad category of workers who can be grouped by the kind of value they add to information. Marc Porat’s framework offers a clear way to organise them, dividing information workers into producers, processors, distributors, and transaction handlers.

Information producers 🔗

These workers create new information and knowledge. Porat’s grouping includes scientists, engineers, information gatherers, and authors. In the knowledge economy, this also covers researchers and analysts who generate original studies, reports, and data.

Information processors and managers 🔗

This group includes administrators, managers, and computing staff who organise and control information flows within organisations. The information manager or knowledge manager belongs here. Their work involves building systems that store and retrieve organisational knowledge, and ensuring that the right information reaches the right people. Knowledge work is distinguished by the fact that value is added through mental activity, the thinking is creative rather than purely linear, and knowledge is used to produce more knowledge.

Information distributors 🔗

Distributors move information from those who hold it to those who need it. Porat’s framework places educators, librarians, consultants, and market coordinators in this group. This is where the classic library and information professional sits, alongside teachers who transmit knowledge and consultants who interpret it for clients.

The many job titles of one function 🔗

Because the work is so varied, intermediaries go by many names. The same person performing the bridging function might be called an Information Counsellor, Reference Librarian, Technical Information Officer, Knowledge Manager, Information Analyst, or Documentation Officer. Technical salespeople also act as intermediaries when they translate complex product information for buyers, and extension workers serve the same role in rural and agricultural settings, transferring practical knowledge to farming communities.

Invisible colleges 🔗

Not all intermediaries are formal professionals. Informal networks of researchers and specialists who share ideas and information among themselves are known as invisible colleges. Members of these groups act as intermediaries on an interpersonal level, passing along useful findings within their field long before that knowledge reaches formal publication. Employees within organisations play a similar role, since information is widely dispersed within firms and staff often have privileged access to value-relevant information that they distribute through their professional networks.

Challenges and opportunities 🔗

The demand for tailored information is growing across business, education, and research, and this creates both pressure and possibility for intermediaries.

Business intelligence 🔗

Organisations increasingly compete on the quality of their decisions, and good decisions depend on good information. A knowledge management framework helps a firm scan its environment, remove information overload, and make faster, more consistent, and better-informed decisions. The intermediary who can deliver focused business intelligence, rather than a flood of raw data, becomes a strategic asset. Indian enterprises are prioritising data analytics, cloud computing, and artificial intelligence as part of their digital transformation, which raises the value of professionals who can manage and interpret these information resources.

Education and research 🔗

In education and research, the intermediary’s task is to connect users with reliable, relevant sources amid an overwhelming volume of material. As the knowledge economy expands, the restructuring of education becomes necessary, since most knowledge-economy roles are knowledge-oriented and demand higher information literacy. Academic libraries are being asked to move beyond simply providing access to formal sources and towards active knowledge management that supports learning and discovery.

The opportunity in new skills 🔗

The clearest opportunity lies in shedding routine tasks. As automation handles the mundane work of cataloguing and basic retrieval, library and information professionals can spend more time improving services and offering analysis. The challenge is that this requires continuous reskilling. Intermediaries who treat disintermediation as a threat may struggle, while those who acquire skills in analysis, communication, and knowledge management can reformulate their professional identity and remain indispensable. The function of bridging the gap between knowledge and need does not disappear in the knowledge economy. It becomes more valuable, provided the people who perform it keep evolving.

What do you think? If automation continues to take over routine search and retrieval, which human skills will keep information intermediaries valuable in the next decade? And in your own field of study or work, who plays the role of intermediary between you and the information you need?

References

1. https://www.amazon.com/Coming-Post-Industrial-Society-Venture-Forecasting/dp/0465097138
2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marc_Porat
3. https://www.dnaindia.com/analysis/column-india-can-become-a-knowledge-economy-2645721
4. https://www.ibef.org/industry/information-technology-india
5. https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/economics-econometrics-and-finance/information-intermediary
6. https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-94-011-4621-0_30
7. http://web.simmons.edu/~chen/nit/NIT'92/175-hay.htm
8. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/327160620_INFORMATION_SYSTEMS_FOR_KNOWLEDGE_WORKERS_SUPPORT
9. https://epgp.inflibnet.ac.in/epgpdata/uploads/epgp_content/S000021LI/P000099/M001939/ET/1483075885P04_M-24.pdf
10. https://sites.duke.edu/thefinregblog/2022/09/14/the-role-of-employees-as-information-intermediaries-evidence-from-their-professional-connections/