Providing access to local government information: The nature of public library activity

This article focuses on the problems associated with providing access to local government information. The research on which it is based is from a 1986 survey conducted by the author of 265 public libraries in six library systems in northern Illinois, the largest comparative study of public library providers of local government information conducted to date. Fifty-five active providers of local government information (those that received requests for this information at least every two weeks) were identified: the findings are based on telephone and group interviews with key staff of those libraries. The article examines a variety of methods that might be used to increase access to local government information. It analyzes the nature of requests received and the types of responses given by these libraries. It examines the major problems associated with providing access to local government information and discusses the reasons given by librarians for providing access to local government information sources. The article concludes that a serious local government information gap exists and that librarians who seek to over-come it must articulate a role that addresses the serious barriers that must be overcome before a library can provide meaningful access to local government information.     

Creating Access to Oral Histories in Academic Libraries

Oral histories, a common form of documenting the past, are found in the collections of many academic libraries. As evidenced by a study of Georgia academic libraries conducted in 2007, no standard procedure exists to coordinate access to these materials. Establishing policies and procedures for collecting, acquiring, managing, and providing access to oral histories can greatly enhance their value and usability. Drawing on examples from the program instituted at Columbus State University (CSU), this article outlines a practical strategy that academic libraries, particularly small or medium-sized libraries, can follow as a guideline to ensure that oral histories are made available to the public. This article also raises awareness of the problems inherent in managing access to oral histories and presents some solutions to these problems in an effort to increase standardization among libraries.     

From warehouse to gateway: A new university library and a new paradigm

Developing a research library for a new university provides the challenge and the opportunity to test some ideas currently prominent within academic librarianship and to use new information technology in an unprecedented way. A philosophical commitment to building an “electronic library” affects planning and management decisions at every stage. This library is committed to supporting university teaching and research programs by providing access to bibliographical citations, abstracts and full-text material, based on what is available in a discipline, not just what has been acquired by the library; “access over ownership” is not just a current slogan but a basic element in decision-making.     

The impact of electronic access to government information: what users and documents specialists think

This article discusses the results of a survey designed to assess the current state of electronic access to government information from both the specialist and the user viewpoint. The first survey, designed to determine the government documents staffs' level of commitment to and opinions of electronic access to government information, was distributed in electronic format to subscribers of GOVDOC-L, a listserv for specialists dealing with government documents. The second survey, designed to provide insight into the user's point of view, was conducted at the University of Illinois Documents Library. This article synthesizes earlier studies and articles on the topic to show that while the consensus is that electronic access represents a positive, beneficial move toward providing access to government information to a wider audience, there is also an acknowledgment that there are many inherent problems that have not been addressed adequately.     

Responsibility Rolls Down: Public Libraries and the Social and Policy Obligations of Ensuring Access to E-government and Government Information

Access to government information has been considered an essential element of democracy since the foundation of the American republic. Over time, the amount of government information produced has increased significantly, and the rise of e-government has made access to online government information, communication, and services equally vital to participation in society and interaction with governments. However, the outlets of free public access to government information and e-government have constricted over time, leaving public libraries as one of the only free public Internet access points in most communities. As a result, public libraries serve as a social guarantor of access to and assistance with government information and e-government services. This article first discusses the historical evolution of the means of access to government information and changes over time in responsibilities in providing such access. After exploring the interrelationships between government information and e-government, the article then details the development of the role of public libraries as guarantors of e-government access. Finally, the article examines the impacts of policy on e-government access in libraries, leading to a set of recommendations and conclusions to support the vital library roles related to e-government.     

Bringing the Law to the Library: The Importance of Librarian Mediation in Access to Justice Services

Library access to justice programs and services help people who need legal information and who cannot afford an attorney. Librarian mediation is a critical component in the provision of access to justice services. However, the value of library mediation, or assistance with using library resources, is often unrecognized, particularly where members of the public are trying to access electronic legal information sources, online legal forms, and other law technologies. This article will explore the role of librarians in providing access to justice services from the perspective of the work of Richard Susskind, which emphasizes technological approaches to providing legal services. While there is a place for technology in access to justice services, there is also a valuable role that librarians play in contributing to access to justice.     

The textbook problem: Investigating one possible solution

This article explores the inherent problems for academic libraries in providing access to textbooks to students, the growing demand for such access by students, and presents the findings of a reserve pilot project conducted at a major Midwest university. Findings indicate the pros and cons of the pilot attempted as well as demonstrating the need for continued research and collaborative work with appropriate organizations on the campus and beyond.     

Reforms to counter a culture of secrecy: Open government in Australia

Governments for most of recorded history have surrounded their information and decision-making with a culture of secrecy. By the latter half of the 20th century western liberal democracies, driven by right-to-know movements, slowly moved away from secrecy towards more openness of government through public access to its information. Australia, with a series of reforms beginning in the late 1970s, declared in 2010 that government information was a national resource, and public access was the default position. This paper, by providing a history of the Australian Commonwealth legislative and regulatory reforms, their impetus and interpretations, explores the ebb and flow of openness and the intended and sometimes unintended, consequences for traditional government secrecy. Using the complete freedom of information datasets made available by these reforms, the paper presents an insight into government attitudes to openness by providing access to its information. These datasets also enable research into government and bureaucratic actions to pushback against these reforms for pragmatic or ideological reasons. The paper concludes that although there continues to be worrying vestiges of secrecy, on balance, Australia has achieved much in countering a culture of secrecy and the delivering more openness of government.     

The Policy Implications of Internet Connectivity in Public Libraries

The provision of public Internet access and related networked services by public libraries is affected by a number of information policy issues. This article analyzes the policy dimensions of Internet connectivity in public libraries in light of the data and findings from a national survey of public libraries conducted by the authors of this article. After providing a summary of the study methodology and findings, this article examines key policy issues that include the nature of sufficient bandwidth and broadband, the perpetuation of the digital divide of Internet access in libraries, the role of libraries as e-government access points, the complexities of funding Internet access, the impacts and contradictions of filtering, and the chilling effect of homeland security legislation in public libraries. This article concludes with a discussion of how examining these policy issues can lead to a better understanding of public libraries and the Internet access they offer within the context of public policy.     

Introducing touchscreens to black and ethnic minority groups--a report of processes and issues in the Three Cities project

There is a need for people to have access to health information but this may not be readily available for some black and ethnic minority groups living in England. This study aims to improve access to health information for ethnic minority groups by providing this in their own language, in an audio and visual format through a touchscreen computer. The study was led by health promotion and public health workers informed by advisory panels of representatives from local black and ethnic minority groups in the cities of Nottingham, Sheffield and Leicester. Discussion within the advisory panels and local epidemiological data helped to identify groups to be targeted and priority health issues to be addressed. Other issues covered during development included interface design, language translation and identification of accessible locations. A number of problems were addressed in establishing appropriate touchscreen facilities, mainly relating to producing information in an electronic format for multiple languages and populations not necessarily computer-literate. Three touchscreens, containing information on 10 health topics, translated into five languages are currently installed, one in each city. They are being rotated through a series of locations including a library, GP practice, and a temple. Their use, and satisfaction with use, is being evaluated over a 2-year period, by statistical analysis of computer logs and the collection of qualitative information by bi-lingual interviewers with users, over an 18-month period. Health information can be made available for ethnic minority groups even if they are unable to read their mother tongue. Touchscreens appear to be a suitable medium for achieving this.     

Biowatch South Africa and the challenges in enforcing its constitutional right to access to information

This paper examines the difficulties encountered by Biowatch, a South African civil society environmental organization, in its attempts to obtain access to government information in respect of genetically engineered plants. After establishing the context of South Africa's access to information regime, including a brief discussion of several of its weaknesses, the paper engages in an extended account of the Biowatch case as an exemplar of some of the more pronounced challenges to the effective implementation of the country's access to information legislation. The elaboration of the case is based on interviews conducted with the Director of Biowatch and counsel from the Legal Resources Centre that aided Biowatch, as well as various internal and court documents provided by Biowatch and its lawyers.     

Methods for Collecting,Processing, and Providing Access to Electronic Serials

The issues surrounding methods for collecting, processing, and providing access to electronic serials are discussed. Weston debates the access versus ownership issues of electronic journals, and discusses the changing roles of systems and acquisitions librarians in the provision of access to these journals. Reinke outlines the University of Houston's acquisitions process, an approach paralleling traditional serials acquisitions methods. Morgan describes an automated serials acquisitions process developed at the North Carolina State University.     

Authors and Open Access： Effective Ways to Achieve OA in China

Although there are effective methods available to authors for providing open access to their work, more than half are still not doing so and provision in China is poorer than in many other countries. There are a number of issues and concerns that dissuade authors from making their work open access ： some are still unaware of the concept and of the increased visibility and impact that open access brings; many are unfamiliar with open access journals and how they work; many are uninformed about self-archiving and for some of those who are aware of the possibility of providing open access by this means, concerns about copyright and technical issues remain. Yet all these worries can be addressed with simple facts that reassure and encourage authors to adopt open access to benefit themselves, their research and their teaching. There is also a wealth of resources now available to authors that provide information and advice on open access and its effects. As institutions and research funders, both with a strong interest in maximising the visibility and impact of research they support, begin to develop formal policies on open access, models for its provision are emerging. The optimal model is a network of institution-based open access repositories from which content can be harvested by open access search engines （ the basic＇ no frills＇ variant） or by service providers who add functionality or selectivity to provide users with value-enhanced products.     

Digital Access to Cultural Heritage and Scholarship in the Czech Republic

ABSTRACT. This article looks at selected digital library projects in the Czech Republic, with a focus on two main domains of activity: digital preservation of cultural heritage, and providing digital access to scholarship through institutional repositories. With regard to digitization of national cultural heritage, the Czech Republic, largely through the leadership of the National Library, has established itself as one of the most active countries in the region. With regard to providing access to Czech research and scholarship, although there is quite a bit of interest among research institutions and universities, institutional repositories are currently in the exploratory stage and have not yet been widely implemented. Copyright laws are repeatedly cited by Czech librarians as one obstacle to improving access to digital resources in both spheres of activity.     

Digital preservation: challenges and implementation

The research of the future requires access to the research of the past. This access cannot be assured without reliable long‐term preservation of scholarly digital content. Near‐term access can be guaranteed with backup and access system redundancy. Mid‐term access can be protected with byte replication. But assurance of long‐term access requires digital preservation – the series of management policies and activities necessary to ensure the enduring usability, authenticity, discoverability, and accessibility of content over the very long term. Portico, with a mission to preserve scholarly digital content, is one organization providing such long‐term digital preservation.     

Access to European Online Databases

Describes access to European online databases and their capabilities. Databases covered include FRANCIS, a French database covering the humanities, the European Communities Databases, and the German national bibliography as an example of the humanities and social science databases offered by STN. The authors conclude that these databases have potentials for providing new information possibilities to students in European studies but that their utilization presents implementation problems that are unlike those found in other online databases.     

Going the Extra Mile: Supporting Distance Education at University of Alaska Fairbanks

ABSTRACT

The Elmer E. Rasmuson Library at the University of Alaska Fairbanks has a long history of supporting distance education through state-of-the-art, remote access services. Harsh climate conditions (heavy snowfall and icing, high winds, and extreme temperatures), rugged terrain, limited road and telephone systems, and permafrost that prevents the installation of communications networks, all contribute to the challenge of delivering distance education. This article describes and explains the library's services while discussing the challenges of providing information access to a diverse student population living in an area covering over 500,000 square miles.     

Rural Public Library Outreach Services and Elder Users: A Case Study of the Washington County (VA) Public Library

ABSTRACT

Outreach services provided by rural public libraries are crucial to fulfilling their mission to provide information access to the widest array of user groups. Particular socioeconomic and geographic factors in rural areas present challenges of access to information resources, yet there exists only a limited amount of published scholarly work examining outreach services provided specifically by rural public libraries. This case study of outreach services to elder users offers contextual evidence for the centrality of social equity and access to the larger work of rural public libraries. Primary data were collected through four semi-structured focus group meetings conducted with elder users of the agency’s outreach services as well as through narrative interviews with six agency staff members. Principal findings showed that elder users had particular information needs related to entertainment and intellectual stimulation, challenges of transportation, and a limited access to technology and internet service. WCPL outreach services were found to positively impact the lives and general well-being of elder users by providing vital social and community connections and serving as a key link for elder users to an institution understood to be central to the life of the community in general.