From Carnegie to Internet 2: Forging the Serials Future. Proceedings of the North American Serials Interest Group 14th Annual Conference, June 10‐13, 1999, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Citation

Srivastava, S.D. (2002), "From Carnegie to Internet 2: Forging the Serials Future. Proceedings of the North American Serials Interest Group 14th Annual Conference, June 10‐13, 1999, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania", Collection Building, Vol. 21 No. 2, pp. 78-80. https://doi.org/10.1108/cb.2002.21.2.78.2

The North American Serials Interest Group is the only independent volunteer organization that encourages communication and fosters information and resource sharing in all aspects of serials. The organization is known for its informative and educational annual conferences; the 14th annual conference was held at the Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh.

The annual conference provided two pre‐conferences, three plenary sessions, 19 issues sections and 22 workshops. The pre‐conferences dealt with the topics of metadata and scenario building. The issues sections focused on electronic journals, database aggregators and issues of network licensing, database variety, whether to cancel paper subscriptions and how to provide access points in the OPAC for electronic journals. There were also three presentations concerning advertising in scholarly journals, print and electronic, and the effects it would have on print and online pricing.

The plenary sessions looked at the new information technology (the Internet and Internet2) and its effect in libraries. According to the editors:

The theme, “From Carnegie to Internet2: Forging the Serials Future”, identifies an influential individual and a powerful technology, both exerting a profound impact on librarianship.

The editors continue to state that, while both had different kinds of influence on libraries, they both also:

Serve the same fundamental purpose: to disseminate information and to encourage learning – bedrock goals of the library community.

One of the prevalent themes in the plenary sessions was the idea of “Information Ecologies”. Presented by Vicki O’Day, this topic provided an objective and conscious way of looking at technology. The focal point in her paper is stated as “the way we pay attention to technology has consequences for how we use it”. The ecological point of view allows librarians the ability to understand technology and its impact on libraries, their users and the way they relate to technology, and the way the library, as a whole, relates to the change of its users.

Workshops dealt with a variety of topics. Jean Hirons, from the Library of Congress, and Les Hawkins, from National Series Data, presented a workshop called “AACR2 and You: revising AACR2 to Accommodate Seriality”. The presentation describes the background behind the proposed changes in AACR2 to address the creation of new bibliographic descriptions for serials and other continuing publications and general changes to the code. This workshop is the historical, documented summary of the rules that have since been accepted in the serials world. Other workshops focused on the impact of databases on libraries, pricing of site and consortia licensing, deacidification process of journals at Johns Hopkins University, and using MS‐Access to collect usage information for serials collection development at Western Carolina University. The “Dear Abby/Dear Abbott” presentation consisted of a panel of one vendor, two publishers and one librarian. This presentation was basically a question/answer forum where burning questions were addressed such as: “Are many libraries dropping print subscriptions in favor of electronic ones?” and “How are libraries handling e‐journals available for free, on a trial or test basis?”.

Despite the fact that the information is dated, NASIG provides an excellent mix of theory and practice in this book. It is an excellent source for information on serials issues, especially for those libraries just beginning to be or already involved in all aspects of digital information access. I also recommend it to any beginner in the area of serials or electronic services librarianship.