A symbolic print-to-electronic media bridge system facilitates information flow across a computer network. Such a system can include a printed publication containing a print media instance with a printed symbolic key representation; a system agent with a media database having an electronic version of the print media instance stored therein; and a bridge agent having an output device and an optical input device to optically capture the printed symbolic key representation to provide a primary key. After such a capture, the bridge agent sends the primary key to the system agent, which references the electronic version and sends the same to the bridge agent for storage and subsequent output via the output device.