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5856 results in Facet Publishing

Page 252 of 293

  • 1 - The big picture: Web 2.0 and current trends in IT

  • from Part 1 - The Nature Of The Changing World
  • Steve Bailey
  • Book:
    Managing the Crowd
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    08 June 2018
    Print publication:
    20 June 2008, pp 3-16

  • Summary

    Questions addressed in this chapter

  • • What defines Web 2.0?

  • • How does it differ from Web 1.0 and what do they have in common?

  • • What are some of the other trends in IT and information creation that are influencing, or influenced by, the rise of Web 2.0?

    • What is Web 2.0?

    You don't need to be an IT professional to have noticed the rapid rise of a new breed of web applications and services over the past couple of years. Names such as YouTube, Facebook and Wikipedia have seemingly appeared from nowhere to become part of the cultural mainstream almost overnight. And these represent just the tip of a very big iceberg, one which is commonly known as Web 2.0.

    It must be acknowledged at the outset that this is not a term or even a concept accepted by all and is indeed disputed by such luminaries as the man credited with the invention of the world wide web itself.1 But equally, there exists a growing body of evidence and band of supporters who perceive a significant enough change, both in the technology and in the way in which it is being utilized, to support the assertion that what we are now witnessing does indeed represent a new, second iteration of the world wide web.

    That said, the scepticism of Tim Berners-Lee and others should at least serve to remind us that any definition of Web 2.0 is bound to be imperfect, open to challenge and likely to change over time – so too the type and range of services and applications that may be said to fall under its umbrella.

    It is possible to identify at least seven distinct types of Web 2.0 application (van Harmelen, 2007) and in many respects it is through such a list that we can most usefully define what we currently mean by Web 2.0.

    According to van Harmelen these seven types of Web 2.0 software include:

  • 1 Blogs

  • 2 Wikis

  • 3 Social bookmarking

  • 4 Media-sharing services

  • 5 Social networking systems

  • 6 Collaborative editing tools

  • 7 Syndication and notification technologies.

    • But while the above list tells us something of the type of web service that can be described as ‘Web 2.0’, it does little to clarify what it is that actually differentiates them from their Web 1.0 predecessors.

  • Foreword

  • Steve Bailey
  • Book:
    Managing the Crowd
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    08 June 2018
    Print publication:
    20 June 2008, pp xi-xvi

  • Summary

    Given The Nature of this book, I think it wise to spend a little time at the outset explaining what this book is not. This may seem a rather odd way to commence, perhaps even a touch negative, but I believe it to be important in terms of establishing the context for this work and maybe for managing readers’ expectations.

    This book is not a handbook, a manual or even a guide to Web 2.0 and records management. As a consequence, those who are seeking any form of indispensible ‘How to’ book which provides clear step-by-step instruction on how to manage Web 2.0 information within their organization may well be disappointed; though, in my defence, I would argue that anyone claiming to have produced such a work at this point in time is almost certainly guilty of exaggeration, with its readers destined to be left sorely disappointed. This, then, is the truth that lies at the heart of this book and which is largely responsible for the path it has taken: not only do we not currently know the answers, we are only just beginning to understand the questions.

    Nor, I'm afraid, can much of this book be described as ‘optimistic’. In many respects, much of what follows is an explanation of the unprecedented size and scale of the challenge that faces us, of how records management currently falls short in terms of a response, and of the likely consequences of our unpreparedness. This may not always be comfortable to read (nor for me to write) but is, I believe, perhaps the single most important job this book has to do, for without first convincing the reader of the very real and immediate challenges ahead, and the severe limitations of the professional tools we have at our disposal, we lack the incentive to change. After all, if the status quo is rosy, why bother to think (or indeed read) beyond it? The danger is, of course, that repeated proclamations of the imminent coming of the apocalypse can understandably breed an air of fatalistic resignation that helps nobody. Thankfully for us, the very force that is responsible for hurling this maelstrom towards us also brings with it the exact same tools we need to tame it and to manage it – but that is for a later chapter …

  • 7 - The centralized command and control ethos

  • from Part 2 - Is records management no longer fit for purpose?
  • Steve Bailey
  • Book:
    Managing the Crowd
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    08 June 2018
    Print publication:
    20 June 2008, pp 67-80

  • Summary

    Questions addressed in this chapter

  • • Why isn't records management scalable?

  • • Why are records management tools often too generalized to meet our users’ needs?

  • • What are the limitations of our existing approaches to resource discovery?

  • • Why is tagging more popular than adding metadata?

  • • Are we about to witness the decline of the general applicability of the classification scheme?

  • • If so, what can we replace it with?

    • Records management as a bottleneck

    Records management, as traditionally practised, is not infinitely, nor even highly, scalable and this represents a significant barrier to its potential and influence. In fact, records management as a discipline is founded upon a very strong and entrenched ‘command and control’ ethos, largely stemming from the US corporate culture of the 1950s where it could be said that records management as a discipline was toughened and given added rigour. It assumes that decisions will be made at the centre by a small select group of people (or indeed a single person in the form of the records manager) and that these will then be applied, largely without question, by the general user base. This assumption is evident in just about every branch of records management theory and practice: from the formalization of a classification scheme and metadata schema, to decisions regarding which records should be destroyed and which retained.

    This is not to say that the records manager acts as a dictator. If he or she is to stand any chance of success, it has long been recognized that such corporate standards must be arrived at in consultation with their user base. We have all experienced (perhaps from both sides) the finely honed new working practice that seemed to work brilliantly on the drawing board but quickly sank without trace when released into the real world because of a lack of consultation. The gulf between theory and practice can often be a large one. But even when changes are introduced after extensive consultation, much of our records management practice still acts as a significant bottleneck – and one that may prove unsustainable as we move into the Web 2.0 world.

Managing the Crowd
  • Rethinking Records Management for the Web 2.0 World
  • Steve Bailey
  • Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    08 June 2018
    Print publication:
    20 June 2008
  • Imagine a records management (RM) future where the user community collectively describes the value and properties of a record using the wisdom of the crowd; where records retention, description and purpose are determined by their users, within general boundaries defined by the records manager. It may sound far-fetched, but could represent a way forward for managing records. It has never been more apparent that RM as traditionally practised will soon no longer be fit for purpose. With the increasing plurality of information sources and systems within an organization, as the deluge of content increases, so the percentage of the organization's holdings that can be formally classed as records declines. In the Web 2.0 world new technology is continually changing the way users create and use information. RM must change its approach fundamentally if it is to have a role to play in this new world.This provocative new book challenges records managers to find time amidst the daily operational pressures to debate the larger issues thrown up by the new technological paradigm we are now entering, and the threat it poses to established theory and practice. A range of stimulating ideas are put up for discussion: why not, for instance, embrace folksonomies rather than classification schemes and metadata schemas as the main means of resource discovery for unstructured data? Adopt a ranking system that encourages users to rate how useful they found content as part of the appraisal process? Let the content creator decide whether there should be any access restrictions on the content they have created? This is a thought-provoking book which questions received wisdom and suggests radical new solutions to the very real issues RM faces. Every records manager needs to read this challenging book, and those that do may never think about their profession in quite the same way again.

  • 2 - The reality check: surely change is endemic in IT?

  • from Part 1 - The Nature Of The Changing World
  • Steve Bailey
  • Book:
    Managing the Crowd
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    08 June 2018
    Print publication:
    20 June 2008, pp 17-24

  • Summary

    Questions addressed in this chapter

  • • Is Web 2.0 simply the latest stage in a continuum of IT change?

  • • How different is the office of today from the workplace of 1997 and what does this tell us about the nature of the change likely to accompany Web 2.0?

  • • Is it possible to identify major ‘paradigms’ within the history of IT development, and if so, how has records management responded to them?

    • Change as the only constant in IT

    Everybody knows that the only constant thing in IT is change. If the last 20 or 30 years have taught us anything it is surely that the forward march of technology is relentless and unstoppable. At a superficial level one only has to view with our 21st century eyes how Hollywood was portraying cutting-edge technology in the 1980s, in films such as War Games for example, to see how laughably outdated and obsolete it all looks. Scenes set in offices filled with green screens displaying jerky vector graphics, printers spewing out ream after continuous ream of hole-punched printer paper and actors struggling to lift house-brick heavy mobile phones to their ears.

    Even within our own lives and experiences we can see obvious echoes of this change. Contrast the size and speed of your first laptop with the sleek, slim-line model you currently use; the complex line commands of DOS compared with the familiarity and ease of use of Windows; the speed of an 8MB domestic broadband service as opposed to the slow torture of a dial-up connection.

    Change is the oxygen that the IT industry breathes. Without it there is no improvement and, more importantly, no incentive for the user to upgrade. Satisfaction with the status quo is not good for sales. No sooner have you taken the plunge and bought their latest model than you see advertisements in the press proudly announcing the launch of their next model, which sweeps away all before it. Of course, within the IT industry the motivation for change is also largely driven by ever increasing capacity, and the constant pushing of technical and engineering boundaries by some of the world's largest research and development budgets. More efficient hardware enables the development of more complex applications, which in turn empower the user to undertake evermore advanced activities.

  • 18 - Breaking through the walls: current developments in library service delivery: observations from a Sri Lankan perspective

    • By Kamani Perera, Regional Centre for Strategic Studies, Colombo, Sri Lanka
  • Edited by Peter Brophy, Jenny Craven, Margaret Markland
  • Book:
    Libraries Without Walls 7
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    09 June 2018
    Print publication:
    15 May 2008, pp 181-184

  • Summary

    Introduction

    Libraries, which have been repositories of knowledge for hundreds of years, now need to make major changes in their operations and the means by which they make information and knowledge available. The world is moving rapidly towards the model of the digital library, which provides wide opportunities not only for efficient retrieval and access to knowledge, but also creates avenues for taking libraries far beyond the buildings and structures in which they are housed. Digitization makes it possible to read material that may physically be housed thousand of miles away.

    The internet has added a new dimension to information technology and knowledge-sharing platforms, giving rise to rich concepts such as e-learning, knowledge management and archiving of indigenous culture and heritage. Digital libraries can help the move towards realizing the enormously powerful vision of ‘anytime’ access to the best and the latest of human thought and culture, overcoming all geographical barriers, so that potentially no classroom or individual needs to be isolated from knowledge resources.

    Information provision is not the only important role for the library in the transmission of information through the value chain from author to end-user. The individual library also needs to consider tasks in relation to e-publishing and elearning as being as important as the more traditional role of information provision. The task of information provision remains central but should probably be organized in a new way, changing the role of the individual library.

    Technological progress has changed how libraries do their work, not why. But the most profound technological development, the connection of computer to computer in an unbroken chain around the world, may alter the fundamental concept of the library in the 21st century. Librarians may discover that ‘Libraries without Walls’ are actually only libraries with new walls, technologically bounded, legally and administratively restricted.

    With the advancement of ICT, most of the libraries in Sri Lanka, such as the National Archives and those of government organizations and non-governmental organizations (NGOs), have focused their attention on digitization. Digitization provides a convenient mode of storage, quick retrieval of information and preservation.

  • 7 - Libraries as a social space: enhancing the experience of distance learners using social software

  • Edited by Peter Brophy, Jenny Craven, Margaret Markland
  • Book:
    Libraries Without Walls 7
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    09 June 2018
    Print publication:
    15 May 2008, pp 59-70

  • Summary

    Introduction

    LASSIE (Libraries and Social Software in Education) is funded by the Centre for Distance Education, University of London, UK, and runs from March to December 2007. Led by the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) and the Institute of Education, its project partners also include the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, the University of London Research Library Services and the Open University Library. Colleagues at LSE represent the Library, the Centre for Learning Technology and LSE Archives.

    LASSIE is exploring how ‘social software’ (or ‘Web 2.0’, see below) might enhance the use of library services by distance learners. The project addresses two concerns. First, University of London External Programme students do not make full use of electronic library resources; the reasons for this are varied, including a low awareness of how to access library resources and information literacy issues. Second, LASSIE provides an opportunity to explore how social software is affecting libraries and their services. The project will gather empirical evidence about which technologies enhance the experience of students, specifically distance learners, and those which are less valuable. The project also provides advice for the wider library community.

    Another important element in the project is to examine the role of libraries as a social space. LASSIE recognizes that physical libraries have changed considerably over the last ten years, to reflect changes in the nature of education. The importance of collaboration, group work and communication in teaching and learning are widely recognized and libraries are being built as key learning spaces to reflect this shift. LASSIE is therefore interested in how virtual libraries might become more social. This paper is largely based on the literature review completed in July 2007.

    Project overview

    The research for LASSIE to date has primarily been gathered through a review of the literature, focusing on three key areas:

  • Libraries and social software: definitions and key developments.

  • What are the current issues in supporting distance learners and how might social software address these?

  • How are libraries developing as a physical and virtual social space?

  • 1 - Introduction

  • Edited by Peter Brophy, Jenny Craven, Margaret Markland
  • Book:
    Libraries Without Walls 7
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    09 June 2018
    Print publication:
    15 May 2008, pp 1-4

  • Summary

    The seventh Libraries Without Walls conference, held as is the custom at Molivos on the Aegean island of Lesvos, demonstrated that ‘anytime, anywhere’ delivery of library services has become the norm. Only 12 years after the first Libraries Without Walls conference in 1995, when remote delivery of services was a niche interest in the profession, it is the library within its walls which is in danger of becoming the minority concern. Of course that library remains of vital importance, both for the preservation of information resources of all types and as the base from which to deliver an ever-wider range of services, but its centrality is under challenge. Speakers and delegates from many countries and from both the academic and the public library sectors came together to discuss recent developments and to try to map out future directions.

    Our keynote speaker, Professor Christine L. Borgman of the University of California at Los Angeles, drew attention to the increasing need for libraries to consider their role in facilitating and supporting the use of research data, enabling scholars from disciplines as disparate as history and nuclear engineering to handle the ‘data deluge’ that increasingly characterizes leading-edge research. However, as yet only a few fields recognize the publication of data as a scholarly contribution in the same way as that of papers, books, etc. The immaturity of data curation is illustrated by a lack of coherence between the essential components of the infrastructure needed for long-term sustainability. In this developing scenario the roles of libraries, and indeed of other actors, are unclear. Many scholars would prefer to trust their precious data collections to colleagues with the necessary disciplinary knowledge rather than to generalist librarians. Librarians therefore need to promote the relevance of their existing expertise, while at the same time recognizing that they too are faced with a new set of challenges – they will need to change and adapt if they are to become significant players in the data curation field.

    Bo Öhrström, of Denmark's Electronic Research Library (DEFF), has presented at previous Libraries Without Walls conferences and used this opportunity to demonstrate how national infrastructures for research information are evolving. Central to these changes has been the espousal of open access, with important international collaboration being realized in Europe through the Knowledge Exchange partnership.

  • 20 - Information Central: a service success case study

  • Edited by Peter Brophy, Jenny Craven, Margaret Markland
  • Book:
    Libraries Without Walls 7
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    09 June 2018
    Print publication:
    15 May 2008, pp 195-204

  • Summary

    Background

    The University of Western Sydney (UWS) is the ninth-largest university in Australia, with over 35,000 students, including some 5000 international students. Its six campuses, served by seven libraries, are responsible for students over an area of 9000 km2, a footprint roughly the size of the Netherlands. A large proportion of UWS students study through off-campus and offshore multimodal delivery. ‘Two thirds of our domestic students live in the region, which has a population of 1.8 million and the third largest economy in Australia’ (Pavincich, 2007, 1).

    The UWS library is committed to ensuring that it provides an equitable approach to all services across all campuses, and all modes of study. The challenge of providing high-quality client services to such geographically dispersed and disparate groups of academics and students has been in part met through a service we call Information Central, which is a single receipt and response point for all incoming queries (telephone, online and e-mail). Information Central is staffed by a small team throughout the library's extensive opening hours, including evenings and weekends.

    Previous remote client services

    Prior to 2006, the library ran an e-mail enquiry service (Contact Us) and virtual reference service (Online Librarian), operating as adjuncts to an individual library's desk and phone services. Contact Us, although popular, suffered from a lack of consistency of responses and the 24-hour turnaround key performance indicator (KPI) was not always met, particularly on weekends and evenings. While the more traditional universities were cancelling their virtual chat subscriptions due to poor use, ours was flourishing, although once again consistency of responses was an issue, and the service operated for very limited hours. All queries to the service desks were received and responded to at a campus level. A complex faceto- face reference query could be interrupted at any time by a phone enquiry involving a loans dispute, resulting in interruption of service for all parties concerned. An integrated approach to service delivery was clearly required. Kortz, Morris and Greene (2006) assert that from a client perspective it is good practice to have a number of access options available, such as face-to-face, live chat, e-mail and phone, and integrate them in a meaningful way so that the client can choose the method most comfortable and useful to them.

  • 9 - Re-usable learning objects for information literacy: are they practical?

  • Edited by Peter Brophy, Jenny Craven, Margaret Markland
  • Book:
    Libraries Without Walls 7
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    09 June 2018
    Print publication:
    15 May 2008, pp 81-90

  • Summary

    Introduction

    This paper will explore the emerging themes from the Eduserv-funded Birmingham Re-Usable Materials (BRUM) project. Particular elements of the project stand out as needing further exploration, including the technology used in the project and design attributes of the re-usable learning objects (RLOs), liaison with academics and students and issues for the future, including use of Web 2.0 to deliver information skills training. The paper will look at how practical it is to create electronic RLOs for information skills training and the key issues to consider.

    Background

    The BRUM project ran from June 2006 to February 2007 at the University of Birmingham (UK). The project aimed to create electronic RLOs to support students in developing information skills. The project team (consisting of two librarians) worked with a group of four academics to deliver the learning objects within curricula and to gather qualitative feedback from students using questionnaires and a focus group. The findings of the project were published in a project report available from www.is2.bham.ac.uk/blasst/brum.htm.

    Fifteen new RLOs were created and hosted on a web page. The RLOs were used in lectures and an institutional virtual learning environment (VLE) (WebCT) and different software was used to create such RLOs as a quiz on referencing and an online demonstration on literature searching. In the focus group students were asked to evaluate the RLOs and to discuss information skills training in general.

    Technology and attributes of RLOs

    There is a plethora of software to create RLOs and the project team took this as an opportunity to try out different software and evaluate the results. Different software was used to create RLOs on the same topics to appeal to different learning styles. The project team were also aware that the RLOs should reflect the need to support independent learning and so created learning objects that had specific attributes designed to do this.

    Use of new and different software

    The project team utilized everyday software, including Microsoft PowerPoint, and bought in new software for the creation of some RLOs, including Macromedia Captivate, Camtasia and Turning Technologies’ Turning Point.

  • 4 - An African experience in providing a digital library service: the African Virtual University (AVU) example

  • Edited by Peter Brophy, Jenny Craven, Margaret Markland
  • Book:
    Libraries Without Walls 7
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    09 June 2018
    Print publication:
    15 May 2008, pp 29-38

  • Summary

    Introduction

    This paper discusses the African Virtual University (AVU)'s experience in delivering digital learning resources to students and academics in its partner institutions across sub-Saharan Africa. Although digital resources are perceived as perfect supplementary resources to the deprived traditional libraries, the AVU has had first-hand experience in the successes and challenges of exploiting these resources in an African context. The fundamental lesson learnt is that the relatively poor technology status in Africa, including limited bandwidth and inadequate ICT infrastructure critical to successful exploitation of these digital resources, tend to reduce their benefits for African higher education. This is supported by a number of studies that have been carried out in the recent past by the AVU. The studies further show the negative impact that these low bandwidth levels have had on the overall access, utilization and usefulness of the educational digital resources to the learners and academics in African universities. In addition, this has directly impacted on the level of basic information literacy in a modern electronic environment that most of the African students encounter for the first time when they join tertiary education.

    The paper presents examples of the nature of the digital resources that are used by the AVU, ranging from library resources to open educational resources (OERs). The AVU, recognizing the negative impact this technological situation has had on education, has in the past three years invested in exploring alternative creative solutions. Some of these initiatives have successfully evolved to become continent-wide projects, as will be discussed later in this paper. This includes a project to expand bandwidth through VSAT (very small aperture terminal) technology deployment in the AVU's partner institutions at an affordable cost by aggregating bandwidth demand. Other examples include the use of hard disks and local servers to store and make available digital content that would otherwise require huge bandwidth if they were to be made available online, thus making it possible to easily access targeted sets of resources in ways that are both pedagogically effective and cost-effective.

    The African Virtual University is a pan-African educational network established in 1997 as a World Bank project to serve the countries of sub-Saharan Africa.

  • 6 - Publishing, policy and people: overcoming challenges facing institutional repository development

  • Edited by Peter Brophy, Jenny Craven, Margaret Markland
  • Book:
    Libraries Without Walls 7
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    09 June 2018
    Print publication:
    15 May 2008, pp 49-58

  • Summary

    Much has been written in recent years about the development of open access institutional repositories, and how an institution such as a university can stock them with its research outputs, particularly refereed articles published in scholarly journals, thereby making the findings of its researchers freely available to the wider community. It is an idea which has attracted generous project funding in the UK and elsewhere, and which has triggered debate between supporters and sceptics alike. Since the first Budapest Open Access Initiative in 2002 (www.soros. org/openaccess/read.shtml), the number of universities with institutional repositories in the UK and indeed worldwide has certainly grown, yet the number plentifully stocked with the ‘full text of these articles’ as envisaged by the Initiative continues to be quite small.

    A key finding of an important enquiry by Swan and Brown (2005) into the attitudes of authors towards institutional repositories is also often reported. It is that 81% of authors would willingly comply with a requirement by their employer or research funder to deposit copies of their articles in an open archive (Swan and Brown, 2005, 63). And yet the number actually doing so remains far fewer. This paper brings together data from an evaluation of the SHERPA project (www.sherpa.ac.uk/), funded by the UK Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) and carried out by the Centre for Research in Library and Information Management (CERLIM) during 2005, and insights (illustrated by quotations) from the more recent experiences of a team of library staff at Manchester Metropolitan University (MMU) as they continue to create, manage and develop their institution's repository, e-space at MMU (www.e-space.mmu.ac.uk/e-space/).

    The SHERPA project aimed to investigate a new model of scholarly communication by creating institutional repositories in 13 UK research-led university libraries. These repositories were to be managed by library staff, populated with freely available full-text copies of articles published in scholarly journals and written by researchers at these universities. The project therefore was concerned to see how this new model of depositing copies of publications in a repository would sit alongside traditional journal publishing. Authors would be encouraged to self-archive their publications, rather than using librarians as intermediaries.

  • 2 - Keynote address: Disciplines, documents and data: emerging roles for libraries in the scholarly information infrastructure

  • Edited by Peter Brophy, Jenny Craven, Margaret Markland
  • Book:
    Libraries Without Walls 7
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    09 June 2018
    Print publication:
    15 May 2008, pp 5-16

  • Summary

    Introduction

    Libraries have long taken responsibility for maintaining the scholarly record by selecting, collecting, organizing, preserving and providing access to publications. As data become part of the scholarly record in their own right, libraries are confronted with a new set of responsibilities. Some research libraries are curating data, some are deferring to data centres and disciplinary repositories and some are ignoring data entirely. While improving the ability to use and reuse data is a central goal of e-research programs in the UK, USA and elsewhere (Cyberinfrastructure Vision for 21st Century Discovery, 2007; Hey and Trefethen, 2005), the best ways to accomplish this goal have not been determined (Lyon, 2007). Notions of what it means to ‘publish’ data are far less mature than notions of publishing journal articles and books (Borgman, 2007). Definitions of ‘data’ vary widely between disciplines and between individual research specialties. Librarians, scholars, funding agencies and publishers are entering a new conversation about which data will be of most future use to whom, and how to capture, preserve, curate and make those data accessible over the short and long term (Borgman, in review).

    Use and reuse of data

    Today's scholarship is distinguished by the extent to which its practices rely on the generation, dissemination and analysis of data. These practices are themselves distinguished both by the massive scale of data production and by the global dispersion of data resources. The rates of data generation in most fields are expected to increase even faster with new forms of instrumentation such as embedded sensor networks in the sciences, mass digitization of texts in the humanities and the digitized traces of human behaviour available to the social sciences. Digital scholarship is spawning its own new set of research questions about how to manage the ‘data deluge’, about the changing nature of scholarly practices and about economic and policy models to sustain access to research data (Borgman, 2007; Hey and Trefethen, 2003).

    The scholarly value chain

    Data can be reused to leverage research investments, whether by replicating or verifying findings or by asking new questions with extant data. Data are even more valuable if they can be linked to the resulting publications and to other associated objects such as field notes, grant proposals and software models.

Libraries Without Walls 7
  • Exploring Anytime, Anywhere Delivery of Library Services
  • Volume 7, Libraries Without Walls
  • Edited by Peter Brophy, Jenny Craven, Margaret Markland
  • Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    09 June 2018
    Print publication:
    15 May 2008
  • This edited collection is drawn from the seventh Libraries Without Walls Conference, held in 2007. From their beginnings in 1995, the Libraries Without Walls conferences have mapped a major change in the practice of librarianship. While libraries are still concerned to provide users with physical access to their buildings, electronic access - often from remote locations - is becoming ever more dominant, and library services are increasingly being integrated into virtual learning, research and personal environments. In 2007, CERLIM wished to encourage the widest possible range of papers to reflect the diverse current developments in library service delivery. These cover: new kinds of service, especially those that open up new paradigms of 'library' - perhaps the library equivalent of YouTube or MySpace; the library's role within new models of scholarly publishing, including development of services based on institutional or other repositories, and the responsibility of the library for digital curation; service delivery in challenging environments, especially where the infrastructure may be sub-optimal, as in some developing countries, or where the user group represents particular challenges; new technological solutions and the impact on users of the improved services they make possible; and, delivery and assessment of information skills and literacies, especially where this is achieved through electronic environments. These state-of-the-art papers are designed to increase understanding of the role and importance of information in the learning process, and to enable information professionals and course developers to keep abreast of the latest developments in this vital area.

  • 14 - Public libraries, learning and the creative citizen: a European perspective

  • Edited by Peter Brophy, Jenny Craven, Margaret Markland
  • Book:
    Libraries Without Walls 7
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    09 June 2018
    Print publication:
    15 May 2008, pp 137-146

  • Summary

    Learning: the strategic background

    European Ministers of Education have agreed on three major goals to be achieved by 2010 for the benefit of citizens and the EU as a whole. These goals are to:

  • • improve the quality and effectiveness of EU education and training systems

  • • ensure that they are accessible to all

  • • open up education and training to the wider world.

    • The 2006 EU Communication Adult Education: it's never too late to learn (European Commission, 2006a) calls on countries to promote adult learning in Europe and to place it firmly on the political agenda. A planned Action Plan on Adult Learning will aim to promote this goal, thereby contributing to personal benefits of development and fulfilment, raising skill levels, reducing social exclusion, promoting active citizenship and supporting employability and mobility in the labour market. Among the major challenges identified is lifting the barriers to participation affecting all groups, but especially the ageing population and migrants.

    One of the major pillars of Europe's i2010 (European Commission, 2006b) initiative calls for ‘inclusion, better services for citizens and quality of life’, and emphasizes the enhanced use of information and communication technology (ICT) for lifelong learning and social inclusion. A flagship initiative under this encourages a focusing of research and deployment efforts in the field of ‘digital libraries’, specifically to use high-tech tools to make Europe's rich heritage available to as many people as possible, in order to combine individual creativity with ICTs.

    The European Union's e-learning initiatives also promote ‘digital literacy’ as one of the basic skills of all Europeans, alongside the contribution of ICT to learning in general, especially for those who, owing to their geographical location, socio-economic situation or special needs, do not have easy access to traditional education and training. ‘Digital literacy’ is sometimes held to encompass the following:

  • • knowledge about ICT components, operations, capabilities and limitations

  • • skills in using ICT to perform relevant tasks and retrieve and make use of digital content

  • • positive attitudes toward ICT use personally and in society.\

    • In European society, it can be difficult to separate the processes of learning from the practice of education. Heavy investment in schools, colleges and universities leads to an almost inextricable relationship between the idea of learning and the issue of how schools should be organized, managed and run.

  • 3 - Denmark's Electronic Research Library: implementation of user-friendly integrated search systems in Denmark

  • Edited by Peter Brophy, Jenny Craven, Margaret Markland
  • Book:
    Libraries Without Walls 7
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    09 June 2018
    Print publication:
    15 May 2008, pp 17-28

  • Summary

    Introduction

    In 2003 Denmark's Electronic Research Library (DEFF in Danish) became a permanent activity on the Danish budget after a five-year project period. The Ministry of Culture, the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation continued to finance DEFF annually through the national budget with 17 million DKK (2.3 million euros). 1 January 2007 marked the beginning of a new planning period with a new steering committee, a changed organization and additional activities.

    DEFF is a co-operative organization for Danish research libraries. All participants in DEFF have slowly learned to seek co-operation in most areas in order to avoid duplicating work and to increase the value of individual efforts. The main target group for DEFF is still researchers, lecturers and students at institutions of higher or further education and research institutions within the public sector, who are primarily serviced directly through the institutions that participate in DEFF. The overall objective is to ensure an optimal exploitation of the institutions’ research-based information resources. The implementation of user-friendly integrated search systems in Denmark is in this respect an obvious activity within the framework of the DEFF strategy. Parts of the systems can be shared, and the systems support the overall objective of DEFF.

    Challenges for a research library

    DEFF has identified three important activity areas for research libraries in Denmark, which are the results of the changing roles of libraries in the digital environment (DEFF, 2006). These areas pose major challenges for the libraries, and therefore become targets for DEFF's manpower and funding efforts:

  • In the e-publishing area libraries are defining new tasks for themselves, and DEFF is among other things supporting institutional repositories and migration of journals to Open Access. Furthermore, research registration and a common research database are in focus. DEFF has been the political advocate for Open Access in Denmark and has provided support for it through an EU petition in February 2007 made by the Knowledge Exchange partnership. DEFF's partners in Knowledge Exchange are the German Research Foundation (DFG) in Germany, the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) in the UK and the SURF Foundation (SURF) in the Netherlands. In the near future DEFF will be launching pilot projects with publications’ underlying datasets in line with the development of e-science and e-research.

  • 10 - An introduction to the LearnHigher Centre for Teaching & Learning (CETL), with particular reference to the information literacy learning area and its work on information literacy audits at Manchester Metropolitan University

  • Edited by Peter Brophy, Jenny Craven, Margaret Markland
  • Book:
    Libraries Without Walls 7
    Published by:
    Facet
    Published online:
    09 June 2018
    Print publication:
    15 May 2008, pp 91-104

  • Summary

    Introduction

    In 2003 the UK Higher Education Funding Council (HEFC) created 74 Centres for Excellence in Teaching & Learning (CETLs) through a detailed and competitive bid process. The successful CETL bids covered a wide range of educational activities throughout higher education in the UK.

    Most CETLs are solo projects, though 19 are collaborative in nature. The largest of these is LearnHigher. The LearnHigher CETL is a collaborative project involving some 16 higher education institutions (HEIs), covering 19 learning areas in learning development in higher education (HE). It was originally conceived as a ‘one-stop shop’ for resources of excellence for practitioners and students involved with learner development in UK HE. The LearnHigher website (www.learnhigher.ac.uk) further defines its context and purpose (Glass, 2007a).

    As the country's biggest collaborative HEFCE-funded Centre for Excellence in Teaching and Learning, LearnHigher is a partnership of 16 universities and the Higher Education Academy. The CETL is committed to improving student learning through practice-led enquiry, building a research base to inform the effective use of learning development resources. LearnHigher is a network of expertise seeking to enhance professional practice and student learning, and build capacity both within the network and across the wider sector.

    The LearnHigher partnership has a large and diverse amount of expertise. Each of the 16 partner institutions is engaged in enquiry-led practice which aims to build a sound evidence base in learning development across a broad spectrum of learning areas that underpin activity across all academic subjects.

    Throughout the five-year programme LearnHigher will be undertaking a strategic approach to research, to build and disseminate a sound evidence base in learning development. Practitioners across the sector will be encouraged to share in, and contribute to current pedagogic understanding.

    LearnHigher will also be a gateway to tried and tested resources in a broad range of learning areas. Each of our 16 partner institutions contributes researchdriven, peer reviewed and evaluated resources in 20 learning areas. ‘In conjunction with the Higher Education Academy, LearnHigher will create a portal service to provide resources and materials to the whole of the sector. Staff in both support roles and teaching roles will be able to use these resources in their course delivery and, in time, resources will be available for students to support their studies’ (www.learnhigher.ac.uk/).

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