Annual Review of Information Science and Technology – Vol. 37

Citation

Calvert, P. (2003), "Annual Review of Information Science and Technology – Vol. 37", Online Information Review, Vol. 27 No. 4, pp. 287-287. https://doi.org/10.1108/14684520310489078

In this, the second ARIST volume edited by Blaise Cronin, are 11 chapters on subjects old and new. They are all of high quality and, if you do not know of this annual already, then you certainly should. Its publication is one of the highlights of the information science calendar. Rather than give brief details of all 11 chapters, I will make comments on just four chapters that give an indication of the range and the quality of the contents.

At the very basis of information science, or whatever we wish to call it, lies the study of information itself. In Chapter 8 Capurro and Hjorland have adopted the approach of exploring the topic through the numerous definitions used to explain it. For example, Shannon’s model of communication is examined but the authors make it clear that they feel this approach has little value for information science due to the absence of meaning within the information that is communicated.

The authors have not written an epistemological piece but they do not dodge the tough arguments. Does information exist separately from human thinking, or is information what we say it is? The authors lean to the explanation of “information as meaning” without hammering us over the head with their opinions.

In contrast with information, which is frequently analysed by information scientists, the concept of trust and its significance are rarely discussed. In Chapter 10 Marsh and Dibben look at the role of trust in information science and technology. The increase in concern for trust is almost directly coincident with the arrival of the World Wide Web, for both the immediacy and the general lack of gatekeeping allow misinformation, fraud and other misbehaviours to prosper.

Rather than attempt a very broad sweep of trust in all its manifestations in information science, the authors concentrate upon two aspects: the place of trust in interactions between users and technology, and second, information “both as a tool for working and as the subject of the work” (p. 477).

Despite the analysis, the authors find it hard to define trust in the information context, and to a large extent the practical world can get by without a definition. The market will inevitably serve as a correction mechanism, for if the consumer is unsatisfied they will probably not revisit the service.

Kling and Callahan, two authors not previously known to me, have contributed an excellent chapter on the place of electronic journals and the Internet in scholarly communication. Though this appears at first sight to be a bland topic, there is considerable controversy raging within the scholarly community on the role of commercial publishers, peer review, archiving, and other topics once taken for granted. The names of Harnad and Odlyzko are inevitably included, though perhaps not as much as might be expected, perhaps in order to demonstrate an even‐handed approach to the issues.

Finally, museum informatics receives a rare outing in the chapter by Marty, Boyd Raward and Twidale. They have concentrated on the impact of ICTs on museums, and it is plain that museums are adapting to digitisation as rapidly as other information management institutions. The development of online museums has been covered, as has personalising the museum experience. Intellectual property, a key issue in all information management, is covered, though I did not see much on the way in which digitisation can affect objects as evidence, but that, to be fair, was not in the authors’ brief.

This is a great volume and good value for all libraries.