News
| Pages | 439-446 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/eb045410 |
| Published date | 01 May 1995 |
| Date | 01 May 1995 |
| Subject Matter | Information & knowledge management,Library & information science |
News
The electronic library
scene
A
market survey of libraries in the USA
has confirmed that database site licens-
ing is all the
rage.
No fewer than
28%
of
public and 39% of academic libraries
have adopted it, and spending on it has
risen by
67%
within a year.
Defined as locally loaded tape leases
or access to remotely stored host serv-
ices,
site licensing has caught on for
several reasons, it is suggested. In par-
ticular 'escalating patron demand for
the full content of virtually anything
electronic' has coincided with new cli-
ent/server computing technology and
telecommunications options. As a re-
sult, 'what was the domain of the largest
and
most sophisticated academic library
just two years ago is now often the most
practical and cost-effective service
choice for even small and medium-
sized publics.'
So,
at any rate, says Information
Access Company, which commis-
sioned the survey and was pleased to
find that it had 54% of this market. A
sample of
880
survey subjects was cho-
sen to represent the distribution of
budget and library types for all US pub-
lic and academic libraries with book
budgets above $10 000. (This is a uni-
verse of some 9000 libraries.) Site li-
censing growth is still not preventing
more spending on CDROM, the survey
also found. However, this rose by only
5%
during the same period.
Most of us live in countries where
there is legal deposit of new books and
journals, ensuring that at least one copy
of everything is preserved. But as more
and more publishing takes place on disc
or online instead of in print, this system
becomes decreasingly adequate.
In the United States, a draft report on
this problem has just been published by
the Task Force on Digital Archiving,
formed 10 months ago by the Research
Libraries Group and the Commission
on Preservation and Access. Follow-
ing feedback received by
31
October, it
will reconvene as soon as possible to
agree the final version.
A
key point made
is
that many digital
media are inherently fragile, but that
technological obsolescence is an even
greater worry. So rapidly are new de-
vices,
processes and software replacing
each other in the market-place that
'even the most fragile media may well
outlive the continued availability of
readers for those media.'
In the short-term, the task force reck-
ons that action is urgently needed to en-
sure that items which 'document the
early digital age are preserved before
they slip irrevocably away.' There
should be a cooperative pilot project to
address this matter.
More generally, the report suggests a
US national system of digital archives
to guarantee safe long-term storage.
(This is distinct from a system of digital
libraries, which collect and provide ac-
cess to digital information but may not
necessarily be able to archive it.)
The report suggests that copyright
holders should have the initial responsi-
bility for archiving their 'information
objects.' In cases where, for any reason,
this does not happen and the material is
judged to be 'culturally significant,'
then suitably certified archives should
be given the legal right 'to exercise an
aggressive rescue function.' Without
such 'a fail-safe mechanism, preserva-
tion of the cultural heritage in digital
form will likely be overly dependent on
market-place forces,' the Task Force
reckons. And the trouble with the mar-
ket-place is that it 'may value informa-
tion for too short a period and without
applying broader, public interest crite-
ria.'
The task force reports that 'there is
little good experience yet in storing in
digital form massive quantities of mate-
rials traditionally regarded as culturally
valuable, such as books and serials.' On
the other hand, there are some existing
large digital archives of census data, re-
mote sensing satellite imagery, weather
data, and insurance or medical records.
The task force suggests taking steps to
learned from experience in these areas.
To read the full report see
http://www.rlg.stanford.edu/ArchTF/.
The first vendor
has
signed up for the
WebDOC project which
is due
to run for
the whole of 1996, and then beyond if
all goes to plan. A consortium of Dutch
and German academic libraries is coop-
erating with commercial publishers to
offer their end-users electronic
access
to
journal articles. SGML-headers of
arti-
cles containing bibliographic data and
abstracts will be delivered to the Pica
Centre for Library Automation in
Leiden, and cumulated into a catalogue.
This will link to full text articles also
stored at Pica, or on local servers main-
tained by the information providers.
Kluwer Academic Publishers, the
first to commit to WebDOC, will in-
itially offer journals mainly in the fields
of mathematics, information science
and economics/business information.
According to the publisher's choice,
journal pages will
be
distributed in Post-
Script, Acrobat PDF, HTML or TIFF
image form. Kluwer has opted for PDF
files.
Documents will be made accessible
via standard WWW browsers to end-us-
ers who are registered at one of the par-
ticipating libraries. Access will be un-
limited or pay-per-view, according to
whether there
is
a library subscription to
the particular journal. Pica is building
the technical infrastructure to arrange
access to the catalogue and document
servers, including the accounting ar-
rangements. Twelve major libraries are
the initial participants: seven Dutch and
five German, including the Royal Li-
brary in the Hague and Die Deutsche
Bibliothek, Frankfurt.
Free trial access has become avail-
able to the first phase of Project LIRN,
which stands for Library Information
enquiry and Referral Network. It is de-
signed to help answer the question:
'where should
I
start searching for busi-
ness information?' The eventual idea is
a thesaurus-based directory of useful re-
sources within libraries and information
The Electronic Library, Vol. 13, No. 5, October 1995 439
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