310 lines
16 KiB
Plaintext
310 lines
16 KiB
Plaintext
_Current Cites_
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Volume 7, no. 8
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August 1996
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The Library
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University of California, Berkeley
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Edited by Teri Andrews Rinne
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ISSN: 1060-2356
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http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/CurrentCites/1996/cc96.7.8.html
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Contributors:
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Campbell Crabtree, Terry Huwe, John Ober,
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Margaret Phillips, David Rez, Richard Rinehart,
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Teri Rinne, Roy Tennant
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Electronic Publishing
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Dietz, Steve & Margaretta Sander. "Unlocking Museum Information
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with SGML" Spectra (http://world.std.com/~mcn/): Journal of the
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Museum Computer Network 23(4)(Summer 1996): 16-17. -- A concise,
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informative introduction to the benefits of applying the SGML
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(Standard Generalized Markup Language) standard for electronic
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publishing and document management. The article will be a useful
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resource for any type of organization considering its document
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access needs; the writers cite examples of successful
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applications in the museum world for illustration of how SGML can
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work in the real world. -- RR
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Harter, Stephen P. "The Impact of Electronic Journals on Scholarly
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Communication: A Citation Analysis." The Public-Access Computer
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Systems Review 7(5) (1996).
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(http://info.lib.uh.edu/pr/v7/n5/hart7n5.html) -- Electronic
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journals have been available on the Internet for years, but there
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have been few studies on their impact on scholarly communication.
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This citation study attempts to answer that key question by
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comparing citation statistics of electronic journals begun prior to
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1993 with citation statistics of print journals. The author
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concludes that "the great majority of scholarly, peer-reviewed
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e-journals have had essentially no impact on scholarly
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communication in their respective fields," but nonetheless
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acknowledges that this is the case partly due to publishing far
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fewer articles, in general, then their print counterparts.
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Therefore, even though the overall impact of e-journals appears to
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be slight, the impact of the typical e-journal article is high. Of
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all the e-journals examined in this study, PACS Review (in the
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field of library and information science) emerged as the most
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successful. -- RT
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John, Nancy R. "Putting Content on the Internet: The Library's
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Role as Creator of Electronic Information" First Monday 1(2)
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(http://www.first.monday.dk) -- The University of Illinois-Chicago
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launched a large scale project to offer digital libraries with four
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partners, including the Chicago Public Library, the U.S. Department
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of State, the Illinois State Archives, and Pemberton Press. The
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project is titled the "Great Cities Initiative," and the goal is to
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leverage academic library skill in the greater context of the urban
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community. Each project varied according to the "content" of the
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partner institution, with Illinois-Chicago coordinating the overall
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shape of the service. The author reviews the development,
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challenges and future prospects of the collaborative venture, which
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seem bright. Since launching the project the Illinois-Chicago
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library has also become the publisher of an online journal titled
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the AIDS Book Review Journal, further evidence of a strong
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commitment to digital collections. -- TH
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MacEwan, Bonnie, and Mira Geffner. "The Committee on Institutional
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Cooperation Electronic Journals Collection (CIC-EJC): A New Model
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for Library Management of Scholarly Journals Published on the
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Internet" The Public-Access Computer Systems Review 7(4) (1996).
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(http://info.lib.uh.edu/pr/v7/n4/mace7n4.html) -- An overview of a
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cooperative project to catalog, archive, and provide structured
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access to a collection of electronic journals. Access to all titles
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is provided by linking to the publisher's site, but they are also
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building an archive to serve as a permanent record should the
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original be destroyed or discontinued. The Web site provides for
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searching and browsing by topic or title. All journals in the
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collection are cataloged with standard MARC records that are
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distributed to OCLC and member institutions. The URL for each title
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is included in the 856 field of the MARC record to facilitate
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access from the catalog record. Future plans include a Persistent
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URL (PURL) server. -- RT
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"The Property of the Mind" The Economist 340 (7976) (July 27 -
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August 2, 1996): 57-59.
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(http://www.economist.com/issue/27-07-96/wbsf1.html) -- For a
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clear look at the challenges facing intellectual property
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regulation in a global context, step beyond the U.S. debate and
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read this issue's feature article and leader, titled "Copyrights
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and Copywrongs" (p. 16). The Economist traces the development of
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copyright (Jefferson: "...he who lights his taper at mine
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receives light without darkening me") and analyzes the dramatic
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changes wrought by digital media. In effect, the Internet is one
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big copying machine, some argue, while others wish to hold to the
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Jeffersonian high ground. Meanwhile, most Americans (and many
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others too) feel that what they do (and digitally replicate) in
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the privacy of their own homes is no one else's business. UC
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Berkeley law professor Pamela Samuelson argues that the
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attitudes of the public ("Don't Tread On Me") and of publishers
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is moving farther apart. Although no strong solutions are in sight,
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Esther Dyson thinks original content could be enhanced, or perhaps
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publishers could discover new ways to make money from it.
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Unregulated recording at Grateful Dead concerts is one example of
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this, Netscape's long-lasting giveaway of its browser is another.
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-- TH
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Stewart, Linda. "User Acceptance of Electronic Journals: Interviews
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with Chemists at Cornell University" College and Research Libraries
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57(4) (July 1996): 339-349. -- Based on interviews with a group of
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students and faculty affiliated with the Cornell University
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Chemistry department who participated in a project that loaded the
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full text of twenty American Chemical Society (ACS) texts, this
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paper explores the potential of electronic journals to accomplish
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the scholarly role traditionally associated with printed journals.
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Important to participants in the study was ease-of-use and the
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ability to browse regardless of the format; most users felt that
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printed copies (or at least the ability to create a print copy) was
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important and some questioned whether electronic journals would
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allow them to discover articles serendipitously or read the
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articles in comfort (eyestrain and the awkwardness of reading in
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front of a terminal were cited as problems). On the other hand,
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participants thought that electronic journals would allow them to
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read more complete articles, spend their reading time more
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efficiently and read articles sooner. As libraries face the
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challenge of choosing between electronic and printed journals, this
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article offers an excellent snapshot of how academic users feel
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about electronic journals. Also helpful are the footnotes which
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cite some important research in this field. -- MP
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Multimedia and Hypermedia
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Nov'Art [ISSN: 1165-37x] -- This quarterly publication from France
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covers a range of issues in new media, usually from a conceptual
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or social angle rather than purely technical. The February 1996
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issue (118pg), for instance, focused on writing and multimedia;
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articles ranged from the role of the artist in new media to the
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network blurring the line between spectator and actor. A website
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is not listed, however you may contact them via email at:
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art3000@Calvanet.Calvacom.fr. -- RR
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Networks and Networking
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Theme issue of _Computer_ on the U.S. Digital Library Initiative
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(May 1996) (http://www.computer.org/pubs/computer/dli/) -- This
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special issue covers the six digital library projects funded by
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the National Science Foundation. An overview article entitled
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"Building Large-Scale Digital Libraries" (by Bruce Schatz and
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Hsinchun Chen) leads into articles on each of the six projects
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based at U.S. Universities:
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Schatz, Bruce, et. al. "Federating Diverse Collections of
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Scientific Literature" (University of Illinois)
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Wilensky, Robert. "Toward Work-Centered Digital Information
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Services" (University of California, Berkeley)
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Wactlar, Howard D., et.al. "Intelligent Access to Digital Video:
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Informedia Project" (Carnegie Mellon University)
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Smith, Terence R. "A Digital Library for Geographically Referenced
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Materials" (University of California, Santa Barbara)
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Paepcke, Andreas, et. al. "Using Distributed Objects for Digital
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Library Interoperability" (Stanford University)
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Atkins, Daniel E., et. al. "Toward Inquiry-Based Education
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Through Interacting Software Agents" (University of Michigan)
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The cutting-edge digital library research reported in these
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articles is interesting, but don't hold your breath waiting for
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much of it to appear in an application on your desktop. It is,
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after all, research, which need not concern itself with
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practicalities or products. -- RT
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Fleischhauer, Carl. "Access Aids and Interoperability"
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(http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/award/docs/interop.html), "Digital
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Historical Collections: Types, Elements, and Construction"
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(http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/elements.html),"Digital Formats for
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Content Reproductions" (http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/formats.html).
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Library of Congress, 1996. -- This trio of Web documents provides
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the best source for practical, up-to-date advice on various aspects
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of building digital collections that will interoperate well with
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other such collections. They were drafted by the Library of
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Congress to provide guidelines for organizations competing in the
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LC/Ameritech National Digital Library Competition, but their
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utility goes far beyond that. For anyone who is involved with
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creating or managing digital collections, these documents provide
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important advice and assistance on some of the key decisions to be
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made as well areas of continuing ambiguity. You won't by any means
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find all the answers here, but you'll find a few as well as
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many of the pertinent questions that must be answered before a true
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National Digital Library can be a reality. -- RT
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Gardner, Elizabeth. "Keeping Users Hot on Your Site's Trail"
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WebWeek 2(6) (May 20, 1996): 48.
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(http://www.webweek.com/96May20/undercon/webweaver.html)
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-- This article introduces the idea of PURLs or "Persistent
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URLs" as a better way of identifying and locating webpages.
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URLs of course are dependent on the location of a specific
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filename at a specific machine, domain, and directory location.
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If any element in that structure changes, the document is as
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good as lost to most users, at least until all relevant links
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are laboriously updated. OCLC (Online Computer Library Center)
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proposes to keep the URL's for web documents centrally on a
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local PURL server. Then when someone requests the page, the
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central PURL server sends them along to the document. This way,
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a user merely needs to know which online system a document
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resides at, and all updating of URL's happens at the location, by
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the people who know best. While this is not quite the nirvana of
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each document having a unique identifier which travels with it,
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regardless of system, it would be quite an improvement to current
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document location systems, especially if PURL Servers could be
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networked and updated like newsgroup servers, so one need only ever
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find the local World-Wide PURL server to locate any document on the
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web. -- RR
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Varian, Hal. "Differential Pricing and Efficiency" First Monday
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1(2) (http://www.firstmonday.dk) -- Varian, an economist and
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Dean at UC Berkeley's School of Information Management and Systems,
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lays out the reasons why several core economic suppositions are
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turned upside down by digital media. Specifically, he argues that
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a key market concept--marginal pricing--is not relevant where
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digital media allows for increasing returns to scale, large fixed
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costs (such as telecommunications infrastructures) or economies of
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scope are at play. "Willingness to pay" is an equally important
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principle. The solution he argues, lies in differential pricing
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that can allow both forces to work in an inter-related fashion.
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Economists will enjoy the thorough treatment (with beautifully
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rendered graphics of economic formulae), while laymen will be able
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to follow Varian's plain English. This is a useful guide to the
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economic issues underlying impending commercial uses of the
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Internet. -- TH
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Wilson, David. L. "Campus 'intranets' Make Information Available to
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Some but Not All, Internet Users" Chronicle of Higher Education
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62(47) (August 2, 1996): A15-A17. -- Higher education was the
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primary launching pad for Internet information systems (along with
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the defense industry), but higher education is just beginning to
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catch up the corporate sector in the development of "intranets."
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Where corporations have moved quickly to implement web-based
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internal services that are safe behind firewalls, higher education
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has moved more slowly, mainly due its open computing environment.
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The author explores several of the issues that arise when colleges
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seek to define who should and who should not have access to college
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intranets, and some of the technological challenges of distance
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learning and remote registration (to name just a couple issues).
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There's an interesting discussion of the downstream impact of
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choosing proprietary software (like Lotus Notes) over Internet
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software; and, according to many quoted, there's plenty of room for
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improvement in all the options. -- TH
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Information Technology & Society
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Reagle, Joseph M., Jr. "Trust in Electronic Markets: The
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Convergence of Cryptopgraphers and Economists" First Monday 1(2)
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(http://www.firstmonday.dk) -- This is one of those studies that
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skillfully summarizes a tried-and-true "real world" function: the
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social and technical infrastructure of commerce, and then explores
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the impact of cyberspace on the status quo. Reagle poses the
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question of what is to be done in cyberspace, where none of the
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stanchions of secure financial transactions have been fully worked
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out; clearly, it's not an area that can be safely left in the hands
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of either cryptographer or economists, when we all have a stake in
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the outcome. It's a fascinating article, for two reasons. First,
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Reagle lays out the things we take for granted, such as
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check-writing, security and deposits, and so on, reducing this
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universally accepted system to its most basic definition: it's just
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information. Second, Reagle writes speculatively about how to
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transfer (or perhaps better said, invent) a similar system in
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cyberspace. You may not agree with some of the ideas (how about
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buying this nice "Digital Bearer Bond?"), but the analysis is
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cross-disciplinary, and grounded in an understanding of both
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society and human nature, and technology. -- TH
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-------------------------------------------------------------------
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Current Cites 7(8) (August 1996) ISSN: 1060-2356
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Copyright (C) 1996 by the Library, University of
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California, Berkeley. All rights reserved.
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All product names are trademarks or registered trademarks
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of their respective holders. Mention of a product in this
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publication does not necessarily imply endorsement of the
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product.
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[URL:http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/CurrentCites/]
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To subscribe, send the message "sub cites [your name]" to
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listproc@library.berkeley.edu, replacing "[your name]"
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with your name. Copying is permitted for noncommercial use
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by computerized bulletin board/conference systems, individual
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scholars, and libraries. Libraries are authorized to add the
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journal to their collections at no cost. An archive site is
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maintained at ftp.lib.berkeley.edu in directory /pub/Current.Cites
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[URL:ftp://ftp.lib.berkeley.edu/pub/Current.Cites]. This message
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must appear on copied material. All commercial use requires
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permission from the editor, who may be reached in the following
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ways:
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trinne@library.berkeley.edu // (510)642-8173
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