Changes at the British Library

Citation

(2003), "Changes at the British Library", Interlending & Document Supply, Vol. 31 No. 1. https://doi.org/10.1108/ilds.2003.12231aab.008

Changes at the British Library

Changes at the British Library

The transformation of the senior management at the British Library, both staff and structure, appear to be complete. The appointment of Richard Boulderstone as the new Director of e Strategy suggests a stronger commercial focus as Richard has a strong history in Knight-Ridder and Reed Elsevier, very different from his academic predecessor, Herbert Von Sompel. The BL will need to generate all the revenue that it can, given its flat running costs funding for the next five years. Good news, however, is that they have a capital grant of £12 million; hopefully much of this will go on updating the creaking infrastructure for remote supply of material for which the BL still remains the world leader.

The other interesting appointment is that of David Brown. A key part of his job is to negotiate deals with publishers for remote supply of documents – an activity that has not progressed fast enough in the past. In addition he will look at the range of issues involved in legal deposit in the electronic era and the archive role of the BL generally. David is well known in the information industry; his affability, widespread contacts in publishing and thorough understanding of the issues facing us in a hybrid environment make him a good catch for the BL. We look forward to an acceleration of publisher agreements, especially the smaller ones. This can only be good news for docdel librarians who are looking for a genuinely integrated "e" and non "e" document delivery service.