Director of Strategic and Operational Planning, Dawson Holdings PLC
Professor of De Montfort University, UK
Introduction
The digital library is a curious entity. It has been long predicted, but the innovations which
made it a reality only recently were not generally foreseen. Although it is a reality, it is a
diffuse concept which is being manifested in many different forms. Although professionals
and users alike realise that it is critical for the future, there is much uncertainty about what
it means for culture, learning, democracy, commerce, jobs, and society in general.
Debate about the digital library is clouded by emotion and self-interest. Emotion plays its
part because the digital library is seen by some as a threat to the book, and a threat to the
book is an attack on culture itself. Self-interest enters the fray because in the instability
provoked by the digital library there will be winners and losers, whether in business, or the
professions. Depending on your point of view the digital library can be the end of libraries
as we know them, or the salvation of libraries as we know them.
The growth of digital libraries has been phenomenal. Ten years ago the projects could be
enumerated singly, such as those at Carnegie Mellon and Cornell Universities and in the
public library sector at Pikes Peak, Colorado. When my university commenced the first UK
digital library project, ELINOR, in 1991 true digital library projects were still very few.
Since then, the World Wide Web and its associated products and standards brought about a
sea change whereby digital library projects now are simply too numerous to mention, but
do we yet know what we mean by the digital library, and if so do we know how to handle
it?
Definition and theory
Perhaps we should ask ourselves if and why definitions and theory are needed. After all, the
Internet has famously changed the world of information without much formality of that
kind. It could be argued that market forces have led us to the present state of the art and can
be relied on to lead us further. One compelling software invention can overturn a mass of
theory. On the other hand, it is argued, principles of information management hold firm
whatever the technology, and practitioners just need to adapt themselves to the new
techniques in order to proceed.
One of the early authors on the electronic library, and we note here that the terms
electronic library and digital library are synonymous, was Kenneth Dowlin who wrote a
book entitled ``The Electronic Library'' in 1984.(1) He defined the characteristics of the
electronic library as follows:
Management of resources with a computer
The ability to link the information provider with the information seeker via electronic
channels
The ability for staff to intervene in the electronic transaction when requested by the
information seeker
The ability to store, organise, and transmit information to the information seeker via
electronic channels
There is nothing to disagree with there, so given the date of the work, this characterisation
stands up quite well. However from a perspective thirteen years on we say much more. In
1991 when we started ELINOR at De Montfort we used the following working definition:
A teaching, learning and study environment in which learning resources are held
primarily in electronic form
That definition was intended to convey that a book library, however highly automated, is
not a digital library. A library becomes digital when the majority of its resources are held in
electronic form. That definition itself began to look dated with the phenomenal speed of
development over the next three years and in 1994 we arrived at this, which I now propose
to revise.
A managed environment of multimedia materials in digital form, designed for the
benefit of its user population, structured to facilitate access to its contents and equipped
with aids to navigation of the global network
We should note at this stage that the term hybrid library is creeping into use. It is not a
term to which I have any objection, it just does not help us very much. It simply expresses
the obvious, that books and electronic materials in many libraries will continue to co-exist.
The virtual library, on the other hand, does need to be defined. It is the extension of the
digital library to a state where there is no single physical access locale and there may be no
single point of electronic storage. One can imagine a virtual library where the users and the
holdings are totally distributed and the answer to every search is assembled ``on the fly''.
We can imagine it, but we cannot see how at this stage such an entity would be managed,
and we have said already that a requirement for the digital library is that it should
manageable. However let us hazard the following definition for the virtual library:
An electronic library in which the users and the holdings are totally distributed, yet
still managed as a coherent whole
Returning to the question of whether definitions and theory are needed, the quick answer is
that if there is no digital library theory, there would be no profession of digital librarianship.
More important is the recognition that whilst some principles of information management
endure, information technology has changed the world. All revolutions cause turbulence
and anarchy, after which there is a new order. We are at that stage in library and
information services. A framework is needed because some extremely basic issues about
the digital library must be addressed, namely:
We have to manage it
We have to fund it
We have to legislate
The lessons of previous work
The last few years have seen massive development. From a situation only six or seven
years ago where digital libraries were the tentative proposition of a few enthusiasts and
often regarded with scepticism and hostility, they are now receiving endorsement and
support at national and international level. In the United Kingdom, for instance the eLib
programme in higher education has now funded over sixty projects involving the majority
of UK universities. This programme has had a massive impact on strategic thinking in the
university sector, not only on how libraries will develop, but more fundamentally on how
teaching, learning and scholarship will be conducted in the digital age. Strategic planning
will be developed further when the recent Dearing Report (2) into higher education has
been fully discussed. What everyone seems to agree is that learning will become more
student centred and resource based. In that scenario we ask ourselves, where will be the
dividing line between the digital library and the virtual university? Change has been so
rapid that the first lesson learned is the first of my list:
The digital library is happening more quickly than you think, but not necessarily how
you expect
The digital library is still a complex unstable entity
Because of this instability, investment and implementation is relatively high risk, yet
must be faced. This situation is more challenging than at earlier periods in the
development of library information technology because:
We are in a global market
Co-operation is therefore a key factor, not just between libraries but also with the
private sector
Content will be the dominant factor. Access to content will fund new development
Copyright issues will be resolved. In retrospect much progress has been made in a few
years
The economics of the digital library are not yet well understood
Jobs will change rapidly. Professionals and organisations must prepare their skills and
infrastructure
Academic libraries have tended to lead digital library development, but the above lessons
apply equally to public libraries. However we must recognise that public libraries have a
special role to play in the emerging information society. In the last analysis academic
libraries exist to serve their host organisation and their direct customers: staff and students.
Public libraries underpin the literacy of the people, access to information supporting
citizenship and democracy, and of course leisure and culture. As public libraries become
more engaged with the digital library than hitherto, even more fundamental questions will
be asked and lessons learned which affect the fabric of society. In Britain, the Library and
Information Commission, on which I have the honour to serve, has launched a public
library networking plan, entitled ``New Library: the people's network'' (3) which will
propose to government a national infrastructure of communications, training and content to
modernise public libraries for the next century. Already the Secretary of State has
welcomed the proposals stating that they could be a defining moment for public libraries.
Characteristics of the digital library
In order to understand the magnitude of change which our theory of the digital library must
encompass let us try to describe the characteristics of the digital library and to do so
independently of the library environment: academic, national, public or commercial.
Access to the digital library is not bounded in space or time. It can be accessed from
anywhere at any time.
Content in electronic form will steadily increase and content in printed form will
decrease
Content is in textual, image, and sound form
Usage of electronic information as a proportion of total usage will steadily increase, and
usage of printed material as a proportion of total usage will decrease
Expenditure on electronic material will steadily increase and, relatively, expenditure on
printed material will decrease
Expenditure on information will shift from ownership to subscription and licensing
Expenditure on equipment and infrastructure will increase
Usage of buildings will shift from stockholding to places for study, animation and
citizenship
Jobs, training and recruitment will be re-profiled
Issues
Funding
Funding for new technology has always been a problem for libraries. As library automation
developed over the last thirty years budgets have changed substantially to the extent that
information technology infrastructure is now a major item. Although adjustment for
automation was often difficult in tight fiscal circumstances, the problem was eased because
it could be handled incrementally over time. With the advent of the digital library we do
not have so much leeway. Electronic information gets added to the portfolio without
corresponding reduction. Generally speaking libraries do not envisage huge improvements
in budgets to allow for digital information. Digital information may well expand at the
expense of printed information, which would be a painful process and exacerbate the
polarisation of books versus electronic materials. It is possible that operational savings
could be made which could help, but not I suspect sufficient within the library budget to
cope with a step increase in content acquisition. However we should look more widely than
the library budget. In universities, for instance, there is much talk of developing student
centred, resource based learning, both on pedagogic and on financial grounds. We are not
yet seeing the restructuring of teaching and learning, together with the associated
restructuring of expenditure away from teacher centred activity towards resource based
activity. This will surely have to come. As organisations move towards being learning
organisations, or knowledge based organisations this type of restructuring will need to
occur in many types of enterprise.
Returning to the library, a new library economy will need to be developed. It is not enough
to say that electronic information is expensive, without making valid comparisons with the
alternatives and measuring the relative cost benefits. These could be intangible, but
nevertheless hugely important. How do you measure, for instance the benefit of making
citizenship information available to the population, compared to its cost? How would you
calculate the benefit the library brings through electronic information of increasing a
university's student numbers by fifty per cent? Our thinking is not well developed but it
needs to be quite soon and the sort of factors entering the calculation will be:
Licensing versus ownership, over time
Payment by usage versus subscription
Space requirements in the electronic environment
Equipment and communications
People, their changing skills and remuneration
Co-operation with other providers, including the private sector
Income generation, publishing and charging
All of these factors will need to be compared with the traditional library economy,
including all the associated overheads of print-based libraries, which are often ignored.
Free or fee
The debate as to whether libraries should offer fee based services, or be free at point of use
has intensified with the development of online and business information services. The
totally electronic library will require this issue to be faced more than ever before. As a point
of principle, this is most sensitive in public libraries, but it is an issue for all. As the
electronic information market grows ever larger, and budgets remain constrained, the
pressure for income generation will become more intense. Although I am a firm supporter
of the principle of free at point of use for an agreed core of information, particularly in
public libraries, in my view the case for a mixed economy will become irresistible.
Authority
Authority is an important issue for the quality of library services. In the past we relied on
the process and the reputation of publishers to provide document authority.. Authority was
further supported by the librarian, who by professional and subject knowledge guaranteed
the integrity of the collection. In the electronic world this authority us threatened in two
ways:
Proliferation of unvalidated documents
Possibility of alteration of documents
The former is of course not new, but it is the scale of the problem which will require
attention in our new theory. The latter we can reasonably expect to be solved by emerging
watermarking and ``cryptolope'' techniques such as those developed by IBM, but in an
increasingly commercially driven world our theory will need to alert librarians to the risks
of supplying incorrect material or that which infringes copyright or paternity rights.
Censorship
Librarians have long been supporters of freedom of information and against censorship in
general. It is one of the basic principles of librarianship. There is, however a growing
recognition that the unprecedented availability of pornographic, violent and otherwise
illegal or undesirable content will require new policy approaches in the electronic library.
Whereas in the past, librarians would protect children through their acquisitions policy, the
electronic library will require active, preventative measures. I see this as a major issue
when we come to network public libraries in UK.
Social inclusion
Like many new developments, the electronic library has potential for both positive and
negative outcomes. Nowhere is this more critical than in the area of social inclusion.
For instance, information technology is raising great expectations for improving access for
the disabled, through specialised applications and through home access. People in rural
areas or in minority community groups now have opportunities for access to information in
general or to specialised local services. At the same time the gap between the rich and the
poor, at least in Britain, is widening and there is a clear danger that the increasing
commercialisation of the library and information market will exclude sections of the
community. On the wider scale, the ever increasing dominance of the English language
threatens global cultural diversity. These and the next issue I shall raise are indeed weighty
issues for our new theory to encompass.
Democracy and citizenship
In various countries, there is a strong tradition of support for freedom of information. In
Britain, I regret there is no such tradition. From central government there has been a
tradition of secrecy, often taken to absurd lengths. This reminds us that in Britain we are
subjects, not citizens. However we have great hopes that our new government with its high
ideals and huge majority will promote citizenship through information. This is one of the
main thrusts of our proposals for the ``People's Network''. On the global level, the
electronic library, which transcends borders, is potentially a great safeguard against secrecy,
propaganda and disinformation.
Libraries as publishers
Many of these big issues lead to the realisation that libraries have the opportunity, more
than that, the responsibility to publish. The technology is not a problem. Public libraries are
the natural collectors and publishers of government, community, cultural and leisure
information at the local level. University libraries may yet decide to publish their faculty's
academic work rather than utilise the existing supply chain.
Towards a general theory
In thinking about this paper, I thought it would be useful to review the topics that seem to
be forming the core principles which would underpin a general theory. Two Internet sites in
particular were helpful, namely Rutgers (4) and Berkeley (5). We see that some of the
topics are of course carried forward from traditional library management. Others are
entirely new or are not new, but have not hitherto been of such central importance to
librarians. This leads to a set of assumptions which perform two functions. They expand
and elaborate the definition of the digital library with which I have been working for three
years. Second, they provide, I propose, the framework within which our new general theory
of the electronic library can be developed.
Of course the digital library must be electronically stored and accessed
It must be quality assured as to authority, stability, and legality of content
It must manage access and ownership
It must be designed for its users
It must be financially manageable, which means that costs must be predictable,
controllable, sustainable and acceptable
It must provide sophisticated facilities for navigation locally and globally, providing
effective searching and avoiding duplication
It must provide assurance to copyright holders of good practice and protect from
infringement by staff and users
It must provide facilities to track, control and pay for usage, whether or not usage is
paid for at point of use
It must provide facility for human intervention for help and management purposes.
If we can elaborate the body of theoretical and practitioner knowledge around these
principles, I propose that we will be well on the way to managing the electronic library, and
developing a theory of the electronic library. This will provide both a cultural and
economic framework within which digital library professionals can form principles of good
practice for operational purposes and for ongoing training of our people..
References
(1)
Dowlin, K.E. The electronic library. Neal-Schuman, 1984
(2)
Higher education in the learning society. The national committee of inquiry into higher
education. Chairman: Sir Ron Dearing. Summary report. HMSO, 1997. ISBN:185838253X
(3)
New library: the people's network. Library and Information Commission, 1997.
(4)
URL:http://aultnis.rutgers.edu/texts/DRC.html Graham, P.S. Requirements for the digital
research library.
(5)
URL:http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/UCDL/report.html The University of California digital
library: a framework for planning and strategic initiatives.