WXGB6105: Technologies for Information Management

1^st entry

Discuss the role of libraries and librarians in managing digital information.

Librarians in traditional libraries collect, organize, disseminate and preserve information. That role has not changed with the usage of computers in libraries to store, organize, disseminate and preserve information but instead has evolved in tandem with the technological developments.

According to Burke (2001), the role of librarians in the digital library includes “to provide intellectual access to information in any format”, “to evaluate available sources of information”, “to organise and structure information”, “to ensure the preservation of information” and “to provide specialized staff to offer instruction and assistance in interpreting resources and access to resources”.

1. Ensuring Continued Access to Information

In the digital environment, librarians will have to ensure patrons have uninterrupted access to information. The role of librarian will not be confined to acquiring the printed material and made available to patrons within the framework of library policies but instead librarians negotiate “access rights through contracts and licenses” (Burke, 2001) with publishers. A good example of continued access instead of ownership to information is the scholarly electronic journals provided by academic libraries.  

2. Organizing and Structuring Information

Librarians manage and organize information (for printed books or journals) using classification schemes such as Library of Congress Classification scheme or the Dewey Decimal classification scheme, which has not changed. For digital information, librarians need to know the Dublin Core. The Dublin Core metadata standard “is a simple yet effective element set for describing a wide range of networked resources” (Dublin Core Metadata Initiative). Metadata is defined as “data about data or information about information”, and is a “structured information that describes, explains, locates, or otherwise makes it easier to retrieve, use, or manage an information resource” (Understanding metadata). Librarians need to know how to use metadata to describe and organize digital information resource so that patrons can access needed information in the most effective manner.

Libraries’ role is to ensure patrons can access digital information resources “through a single interface, usually the library’s catalogue” (Burke, 2001).

3. Preserving Digital Information

Preservation of digital information proves to be challenging to libraries and librarians alike. The computer technology changes so fast that the computer of today will be obsolete in ten or twenty years from now, therefore, it is vitally important that the “software and the mediating technology is also preserved” (Burke, 2001). Besides preserving digital information, internet resources need to be findable by users, because internet resources sometimes change locations. In this, librarians have an important role in the initiative to find ways to provide persistent and comprehensive resource discovery on the internet.

PADI (Preserving Access to Digital Information) is one such example of initiative by the National Library of Australia in the preservation of digital information.   

4. Providing Instruction on Accessing Resources.             

Librarians provide guidance to users on information retrieval. Librarians are able to “teach the difference between intellectual access and electronic access” (Burke, 2001).

References:

Burke, Liz. 2001. The future role of librarians in the virtual library environment. The
         Australian Library Journal 51(1).  
         http://www.alia.org.au/publishing/alj/51.1/full.text/future.role.html
         (accessed January 15, 2011).

Dublin Core Metadata Initiative. 2011. Using Dublin Core.
         http://dublincore.org/documents/usageguide/ (accessed January 21, 2011).

Understanding metadata. 2004. Bethesda, MD: NISO Press.