The Internet: Its Impact and Evaluation: Proceedings of an International Forum Held at Cumberland Lodge, Windsor Park, 16‐18 July 1999

Citation

Premkamolnetr, N. (2002), "The Internet: Its Impact and Evaluation: Proceedings of an International Forum Held at Cumberland Lodge, Windsor Park, 16‐18 July 1999", The Electronic Library, Vol. 20 No. 1, pp. 58-62. https://doi.org/10.1108/el.2002.20.1.58.2

The Internet is becoming a global and important tool for all sectors in many countries. Consequently, researche on its impacts and evaluation from various sources are growing considerably. This volume, which is one example, is an outcome from a forum on the impact and evaluation of the Internet that was held in England. The forum had five objectives: to explore methods for evaluating the Internet’s features and functions; assess the impact of the Internet in strategic areas of human endeavor; identify the key concepts that are emerging as a result of the spread and development of the Internet; put down an agenda for future Internet research and collaboration; and establish and promote innovative and creative thinking in keeping with the Internet. The participants came from various walks of life, such as computer scientists, information scientists, geographers, journalists, publishers and statisticians.

One keynote lecture and 12 papers that were presented in this conference were divided into three broad sessions. The first session, Internet impact on key strategic communities and sectors: government, education and the media, contains three papers. Each paper extensively elaborated experiences and ideas on how the Internet not only has impact on the mentioned issues but also how to assess them effectively. The second session contained four papers related to Internet impact on strategic activities and issues. These include some concept and methodologies in impact studies, ownership of information, impact of the Internet in Africa, and IR research for the evaluation of the WWW. Once the concept and current practice on how to assess the Internet’s impact were detailed in the two previous sessions, the research methodologies are presented in the third session. Five papers were included in this section on methodological issues, which are, for example, papers about bibliometrics and cybermetrics, Webmetrics, and surveying the diffusion of the Internet. One insightful paper, written by I. Rowlands – “Who can count the dust of Jacob? From bibliometrics to cybermetrics” – pointed out some key elements in applying the conventional bibliometric method to the Internet space and the digital library. It provided thoughtful issues for future Internet research.

Overall, this handy volume of proceedings puts together the outstanding papers that nicely meet the projected objectives. All the informative papers were written by recognized authors who have extensive experience in research and come from different backgrounds, for example journalists, an economist, lecturers and researchers. As a result, the 12 papers presented here give the readers different perspectives on the same issue, the impact of the Internet, which are not easy to find in one volume. I highly recommend this book for librarians and information professionals who are interested in conducting research on the impact of the Internet, not only in the library context but also in society and community contexts.