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The Librarian\u27s Rote in Building the Virtual Library
No full textWe are entering a virtual age. The signs have been visible for over a decade. When my children were growing up I watched with concern as they preferred to interact with soccer balls on the computer screen rather than with neighborhood kids in our backyard. I imagined that a reduction in interaction with human playmates would create adult misfits in the real world. Only now, when they are adults, do I understand that the time they spent with joystick in hand was preparing them for their virtual future. My children and the wave of people behind them are ready for virtuality before it is ready for them
A Critical and Skeptical Overview of Electronic Publishing and Librarianship: Notes from the United States
No full textElectronic publishing presents the most fundamental challenges to the practice and the values of librarianship. If there is to be a meaningful partnership between electronic publishers and libraries in future, then librarians as professionals need to critically review our previous experiences with electronic resources. Such assessments however, have been in short supply because of the enormous hype of the \u27Information Age\u27 and pressure to bring libraries into this new era.The United States is perhaps the best case study to highlight and review the issues raised by electronic publishing and libraries. It is the country which has invested both broadly and deeply in electronic resources in libraries. Research libraries in the United States are advancing the research on and projects of electronic publishing and document delivery, and smaller libraries are counting on these systems to expand access after years of constrained budgets. The United States is also the country which has promoted - through both the public and private sectors - the idea and image of an information revolution. In short, libraries and electronic publishing in the United States are seen to have the same future. In this environment, problematic issues concerning electronic resources on libraries are generally not raised or actively discussed by library professionals. Only in the last few years have a small minority of scholars and librarians begun to actively raise practical and theoretical questions concerning electronic resources in libraries. A critical review of those issues concerning the nascent electronically-published products (e.g. e-journals, CD-ROMs, remote databases) currently in United States libraries includes:1. Preservation. Libraries traditionally collect and preserve the scholarly and documentary record of publishing. Electronically-published materials required a new approach to document security since digitally-edited records are much more difficult to trace in their changes (unlike print). Further, individual libraries which purchase \u27copies\u27 of electronically published works will be required to convert those documents to new systems, or maintain old hardware to provide access to them.2. Economic issues. Budgets are not swelling, yet information outlets (and the demand for those products) are. Price and fee structures of electronically-published works are different for libraries. The end result of different collecting patterns and the imposition of fees have broad consequences for equity of access and the skewing of content in libraries.3. Print resources. Electronically-published texts are intellectually different than printed sources, and those differences will critically affect how patrons approach information, how libraries organize it, and how it is packaged and promoted. The paper concludes with recommendations for librarianship in approaching forthcoming initiatives in electronic publishing
Intelligent Arbitrator Associate for Electronic Commerce
No full textGrowing businesses and the large number of transactions involved in conducting a business tend to give rise to conflicts among the parties involved in a transaction. Human society has evolved in a way to cope withthese disputes by creating law and order bodies. An Intelligent Arbitrator Associate (IAA) that works with and helps the law enforcement and law adjudication authorities to resolve disputes that arise due to commerce conducted over the Internet is presented in this paper. The infrastructure over which the IAA operates, the architecture, and the protocols involved are described in this paper. Some of the architectural pieces include monitoring systems for copyright infringement and currency fraud, information extraction systems to predict and map crime, and access revocation systems to punish principals involved in illegitimate transactions. The IAA sends out intelligent agents with warrants to gather information from the various entities involved in the transaction. The social and legal issues and difficulties involved in deploying such systems into the real world is described in the paper
The Image Directory, Electronic Publishing, and the Changing Socio-Economic Position of Art Museums
No full textIn late 1997, Academic Press will launch the Image Directory, an online union catalog of information about art images. Based on descriptions provided by museums and image owners all over the world, the Image Directory will be an ever-growing union catalog which will provide item-level and collection-level access to data and low-resolution images. The project isanalogous to Books in Print in that it collects data from many sources and places them in a uniform format, thus facilitating search strategies and promoting standardized descriptive vocabularies. There is nothing novel about the concept: Books in Print began shortly after World War II, building upon a book cataloging tradition that extends backward to hundreds ofyears. What distinguishes the Image Directory-the reasons a union catalog of art images has been impossible to create until now-is inextricably tied to the rise of electronic publishing and changes within the museum community
The Role of Electronic Distribution and Publishing in the Development of International Standards
No full textThe International Organisation for Standardization (ISO) is responsible for the production andmaintenance of tens of thousands of International Standards, covering almost every aspect of twentieth century life. 85 countries are currently full members of ISO, with a further 26correspondent and 9 subscriber member countries Although the detailed structure of the Organisation varies slightly in different areas, the production of an International Standard always involves three main stages
Roles in the new information age: the evolution of the super-agent-library partnership
No full textLibraries traditionally have relied on their subscriptions agents to assist in the acquisition process for scholarly journals, multi-media titles, and recently even CD-ROMs. This relationship should be no different when the product desired is an electronic journal. Although some academic and research libraries have begun to incorporate the world of electronic publishing into their collections, many public and college libraries are just beginning to approach this challenge. As a result, the role of the subscription vendors is evolving to assist as needed. Vendor databases and services now provide the help needed to handle all aspects of electronic journals - from access to licensing issues. [1] This presentation win focus on: 1) the traditional agent-library relationship; 2) the new, integrated agent-library relationship; and address 3) possible models for the future. In the first part of the program, these issues will be presented through a live, scripted role-play between an academic librarian, Trisha Davis of The Ohio State University Libraries and an agent, Susan Wilson of the Faxon Company. The actual dialogue will help to 1) define new roles; 2)demonstrate use of appropriate communications for mutual benefit; 3)identify collaborative strategies; 4) show how the existing library-agent can gain new value in the electronic publishing world. The presentation will help both parties 5) understand new needs and expectations in the acquisition of electronic publications; 6) address the issues of negotiating and licensing issues; and will 7) discuss the use of new technology. The second half of the program, will formalize the discussion and make specific recommendations on the evolution of this relationship. As the publishing community offers more selectivity in the electronic world, agents and libraries must expand boundaries and establish new methods for working collaboratively. Access issues, licensing, and complicated pricing schemes add a level of sophistication to the process of acquiring these journals. As a result, the subscription agents must expand their role to work hand-in-hand with the library
Subscription Agents, Libraries and Others Involved in the Information Dissemination
No full textAn information revolution is underway around the world. More than 108 million people world-wide have access to the Web and some 1.9 million homepages provide a wide variety of information. The move to electronic information formats is changing the processes and methods for conducting business. Timeliness is more important than ever and the focus is on easy access to information. Those of us who are in the business of providing access to information are changing with these demands and technologies. Journals, serials, newspapers and other periodicals are becoming \u27electronic,\u27 and we still have to find ways to provide access. The major players are the same in this \u27electronic age\u27 -- libraries, publishers and subscription agents --and the need to work together is far greater now than ever before. Changes in the roles and the functions of information professionals are apparent. The creation of the serial by the publisher remains the same, but now there are choices in formats. Whether electronic or paper, the serial is still published and circulated but how does an \u27electronic\u27 or \u27online\u27 serial get \u27circulated?\u27 For years, libraries have found it easy to work with subscription agencies to order numerous paper-based periodicals. With many serials available, both online and in paper formats, ordering and circulation become more complex, especially since electronic formats are expected to become more commonplace. Publishers, agents and libraries are turning to the World Wide Web to distribute information and are working together to provide users access to this information. Subscription agents can provide such online services as searching, ordering and claiming. Online services give librarians immediate access to databases at various subscription agencies, offering fast, accurate sources for locating online journals and other electronic serials. As more publishers begin to offer online serials, subscription agents will develop services to make access to those and traditional serials easier, while maintaining a traditional role as subscription management organisations. What we see as the future today-may change tomorrow, however. Thus the traditional role of the library is changing. Many libraries are forming or joining consortium groups, pooling their resources with others to provide their users with online materials efficiently. This is one solution that is beneficial for everyone involved. There are many concerns related to production of online journals, including cost, archiving and cataloguing. To find solutions, traditional boundaries will change -- formats, access methods and services. To keep up with changes, investments in technology, resources and strategies are required. The World Wide Web has provided the information industry with the best tool yet for fast access of information over the broad spectrum of users and library patrons. this valuable tool must be thoroughly utilised to manage information in the Information Age
Putting Renaissance Women Online
No full textSince its inception in 1986 the aim of Brown University\u27s Women Writers Project (WWP) has been to bring to much wider attention the extensive body of pre-Victorian women\u27s writing in English. In an initiative funded by a grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the WWP is creating "Renaissance Women Online" (RWO), a collection of SGML-encoded transcriptions of works in English by women writers of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. This full-text database or "textbase" will be integrated into a Web site designed to help teachers and students access and appreciate these long-neglected works. This undertaking has three main aspects: preparing the electronic texts, organizing access to them, and presenting them in a way appropriate to the target audience. Preparing the texts involves both transcribing them and encoding them in a manner conformant with Standard Generalized Markup Language. The WWP has a close association with the work of the Text Encoding Initiative and has adopted its Guidelines for Electronic Text Encoding and Interchange as the Project\u27s encoding scheme. The advantages of the TEl scheme for the WV/P he in its breadth of application, its flexibility, and its widespread adoption among other humanities text-encoding projects. To offer wide access to the RWO materials, the WWP will publish them on a dedicated Web site. In preferring this option over CD-ROM, flexibility is again a prime consideration. A textbase like RWO gets revised and updated with a frequency which would make the timely distribution of update discs burdensome and impractical. Also, RWO has some material which is available to anyone, and some which can only be accessed with the payment of a licence fee. A Web server can easily offer different levels of access to different users of a single site. The RWO site will not be simply a passive resource. While it does have archival value, it aims to be pedagogically useful and proactive. The design of the site must help students read the works, literally and critically. For the first, RWO uses the DynaWeb interface. Its ability to exploit documents\u27 SGML encoding while serving them to a Web browser offers readers easy navigation through, and searching of, the textbase. To help students and non-specialist readers understand and critically approach what they read, supplementary materials specially written by scholars in the field introduce the works and explain the ideas and issues of concern to the women writers represented in the textbase. Publishing the Renaissance Women Online electronic resource is a crucial step for the Women Writers Project progress in fulfilling its aim, and not just because a Web site offers the chance of truly widespread distribution. For the WWP to continue its work it must move from grant-dependency towards financial self-sufficiency. RWO represents the Projects first large-scale effort to market its most valuable product, its textbas
Roles in the new information age: the evolution of the super-agent and the library partnership
No full textMost of us have relied on familiar ways of handling the acquisition process. The process has included using a third party, or subscription agent, to act as the clearing house, or consolidator, for journals, books, and a variety of other materials. Agents have also handled electronic publication formats, such as microfiche and CD-RUMs. With the advent of electronic publishing and the shift from purchase to lease, the familiar models that we have relied upon no longer work as effectively as they once did. Libraries often turn to their subscription agents in the acquisition process for scholarly journals, CD-ROM titles, or newsletters. For libraries the acquisition of electronic journals should be no different
