A number of libraries in Europe are involved in the development of Internet subject gateways--services that aim to help users find high quality resources on the Internet. Subject gateways such as SOSIG (Social Science Information Gateway) have been available on the Internet for some years now, and they offer an alternative to Internet search…

The Telecommunications Act of 1996 expanded universal support to eligible schools and libraries. To administer the universal service program for schools and libraries, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) directed the creation of the Schools and Libraries Corporation (Corporation). As a start-up operation, the Corporation has had to develop…

The phrase, "digital divide," has been applied to the gap that exists in most countries between those with ready access to the tools of information and communication technologies and the knowledge that they provide access to, and those without such access or skills. This gap may be because of socio-economic, geographical, educational,…

This paper addresses two key issues related to the disciplinary role of journals in library and information science (LIS). The first issue is the nature of knowledge as communicated through public mechanisms such as journals. The second issue is the set of attributes that characterizes a portion of the content of LIS journals. In order to complete…

Based on an informal survey of 26 small national library associations, this paper examines "twinning" (i.e., a formal substantive collaboration between two organizations) between library associations in general and with particular emphasis on the small associations' experience. It examines their characteristics and discusses the…

Digital materials are vulnerable to a number of different kinds of failures, including decay of the digital media, loss due to hackers and viruses, accidental deletions, natural disasters, and bankruptcy of the institution holding the collection. Digital archives can best survive failures if they have made several copies of their collections at…

Following the 1999 IFLA (International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions) Conference, the Executive Board established an Advisory group to examine issues that were raised concerning Division 8, specifically the recommendation to mainstream Section 8 activities with the other seven divisions, thus dissolving this division. This…

The Handle System is a distributed computer system that stores names, or handles, of digital items and can quickly resolve those names into the information necessary to locate and access the items. It was designed by the Corporation for National Research Initiatives as a general purpose global system for the reliable management of information on…

Research libraries are increasingly supplementing collection counts with perceptions of service quality as indices of status and productivity. The present study was undertaken to explore the reliability and validity of scores from the SERVQUAL measurement protocol (A. Parasuraman and others, 1991), which has previously been used in this type of…

The number of books by and about blacks has increased, but there has been no corresponding increase in the publication of reviews and indexes for these new books. Among other things, librarians should pressure reviewing media to index and review more books by and about blacks. (JB)

The development of special-purpose information products for clients of the LEADERMART information retrieval system is described. (9 references) (RS)

The BIBCON file management system, designed for use on IBM 360 system equipment, performs two basic functions: (1) it creates MARC structured, bibliographic records from untagged input data; (2) from these records it produces page image output for book catalogs. (7 references) (Author)

Experimentation with a flexible week schedule at the University of Florida Libraries is described. (4 references) (SJ)

The two problems which pose a grave threat to the open classroom technique in both England and the United States are: (1) the fad psychology of education reform and (2) the tendency to confuse the open classroom freedom with mere chaos'' and neglect of children. (21 references) (Author/NH)