Volume 53, Issue 2

On our way to an information-based society, the volume of data, of information and of knowledge will become ever greater. At the same time a technology is developing which, on the one hand, facilitates data processing but, on the other hand, requires competent handling and efficient management of information and knowledge. The existence of digital, multimedia information resources also support distance education and decentralized learning in our society. The library as a physical location for knowledge and wisdom is becoming increasing replaced by a library of electronic information, multimedia teaching and learning. As a consequence, clients and users must acquire sufficient information literacy and at the same time libraries must become actively involved and provide an appropriate range of services for distance learning. This article reviews the position of libraries and continuing distance education programs especially in Germany. Finally it provides a vision of a successful integration of distance education and library information environment as a qualitatively new form of learning and teaching.

Library and information science educators have long sought to internationalize scholarship to enrich the quality of educational programs and professional practice. But many obstacles restrict the size and growth of traditional international education efforts, particularly in developing countries. This article presents a case study that uses emerging distance education techniques to deliver a graduate course on knowledge management in The Peoples' Republic of China and the United States. Sponsored by the U. S. Fulbright program, this demonstration project blends learning technologies, using Web-based WebCT software, videoconferencing, personal contacts and readings to create an international, virtual learning space. The article describes how faculty and students achieved the three course goals: (1) learning to learn internationally, (2) bilateral communication and (3) knowledge management. Findings and recommendations support the following conclusions: using active learning pedagogies that engage the students in the learning process; applying multiple technologies that can be supported internationally; maximizing the use of two-way, asynchronous and synchronous communication to encourage individual and group learning; and focusing on broad, interdisciplinary content to facilitate participation in international learning environments.

Library consortia development processes were examined from an ecological approach, combining historical perspective, dynamic developmental approach, and social structure, stressing the issues of permeable boundaries in library consortia and the manifestation of inter-organization relationships. A comparative analysis of several nationwide consortia (from Australia, Brazil, China, Israel, Italy, Micronesia, Spain and the U.K.) using six criteria enables delineation of a developmental pattern. Additional support for the model is based on a study of U.S. statewide consortia conducted by Potter in 1997. A four-stage life cycle sequence is outlined: embryonic, early development, development, and maturation. In addition, the ecological approach stresses founding and disbanding processes, suggesting disbanding as a fifth stage. The contribution of this paper to developmental theories at other levels of analysis (individual, group, organization) is in proposal of an inter-organizational life cycle model.

Major research and academic libraries in four Central and Eastern European countries (Hungary, Poland, Czech Republic and Slovakia) have undergone significant changes since their socio-political transformations that began in the early 1990s. In-depth interviews with forty-nine (49) key library policymakers were conducted in 1999. The data suggests that cooperation and resource sharing are at the heart of the institutional changes taking place in the libraries in the four countries. Commonalities and differences between and among the countries were identified along four dimensions: centralisation vs. decentralisation, individual vs. collective goals, product vs. process orientation, and global vs. local considerations. A typology of cooperation models (‘artificial,’ ‘contested,’ ‘directed,’ and ‘voluntary’ cooperation) was devised that reflects the changing nature and visions of cooperation as reported by the respondents interviewed. The results raise questions about the exogenous vs. endogenous forces that contribute to the adoption of new attitudes and values toward cooperation and resource sharing.

A Web portal can be defined as a Web site for a specific audience that aggregates an array of content and provides a variety of services including search engines, directories, news, e-mail and chat rooms. This article investigates the factors that must be considered during the design and development of an academic portal. Personal interviews were conducted with academics in order to identify the content, functions, appearance and value of an academic portal. A working academic portal, the Infoportal , was developed to support academics' task performance.

As information technologies have developed, the digital library is making the library undergo a changing paradigm of its role to create, organize, and distribute information resources. Digital libraries have created and promoted innovative information services with digitization of resources. The development of digital libraries has been attracting the attention of many countries and South Korea is no exception. This article provides an overview of recent developments in digital libraries in South Korea. To build the digital library, various innovative projects are currently in progress involving a range of different libraries and institutions. This article also discusses information policies, standards, and technical issues in South Korea in recent years. Until now, the various projects involving digital collections and digital libraries in South Korea have been carried out with very little coordination. If a more coordinated and coherent approach to building digital libraries is to succeed in South Korea, all libraries and institutions will need to work closely together to establish the appropriate framework for cooperation.

The University of London Library has recently undertaken a project to catalogue one of its special collections online, that of Sir Edwin Durning-Lawrence (1837–1914), a protagonist of the Baconian theory in the controversy over the authorship of the works attributed to Shakespeare. The collection is especially rich in editions of Bacon's works and other Baconiana and in seventeenth-century English drama, with other strengths being emblem books and early editions of the works of Daniel Defoe. This article places the retrospective cataloguing project in the context of the international drive for retrospective conversion of antiquarian material and of the Library's mission to support research within the federal University of London and the region and internationally. It describes the method used for cataloguing, focussing on the benefits of the project both academically for researchers and administratively. In addition to the commonly acknowledged benefits of multiple access points in online catalogue records and speed and precision of searching from anywhere in the world, others include the opportunity as part of the project to conduct a preservation survey with little extra cost of time or handling, the establishing of the rarity of particular items and classes of items in the collection, and the insight into the collector provided especially by provenance notes in the catalogue records, enabling scholars to learn a considerable amount about Durning-Lawrence and his collecting patterns from direct electronic access. The value of projects conducted along similar lines may easily be inferred.