- LIS-Forum - ncsi.iisc.ernet.in

Copyright Law Amendment
by Padmanabha Vyasamoorthy 04 Apr '06

04 Apr '06

Dear Friends The Indian Copyright Act is being amended and the government is asking for views of the public. Please visit www.copyright.gov.in and follow the Link Amendment to Copyright Act to send your views. Librarians have a lot of concerns and they must be addressed now. The form needs some expertise in legal matters. I suggest that some 'active' associations like KALA, ALSD or ILA or IASLIC collect views quickly and send it to government. -- Dr P Vyasamoorthy, SENIORS (Society for Enriched Information of Relevance to Seniors), 30, Gruhalakshmi Colony, Secunderabad 500018 Phone 27846631

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Mandating OA
by Subbiah Arunachalam 04 Apr '06

04 Apr '06

Friends: The European Commission has just released a report that talks about guaranteeing open access to all publicly-funded research. We in India should adopt a much more progressive step and mandate instant open access for all publicly funde research, meaning that papers should be made available via open access the same day as they are published. We have already lost much time. We cannot afford to lose any more time. Arun [Subbiah Arunachalam] EC recommmends OA archiving for publicly-funded research The European Commission has released its lengthy (108 pp.) and long-awaited report, Study on the Economic and Technical Evolution of the Scientific Publication Markets in Europe. (Thanks to INIST-CNRS.) The report is dated January 2006 but was not apparently released until today. The underlying inquiry was announced in June 2004. Excerpt: Aware of current public debates that reveal worries about the conditions of access and dissemination of scientific publications, the European Commission's Directorate- General for Research has commissioned a study that seeks: (i) to assess the evolution of the market for scientific publishing; and (ii) to discuss the potential desirability of Europeanlevel measures to help improve the conditions governing access to and the exchange, dissemination and archiving of scientific publications (taking into account all actors/ stakeholders of the sector)....The report considers the specificities of the market for current journal issues. In doing so, it discusses the broad facts about the market; it undertakes a quantitative analysis of journal prices; it discusses the implications of technological innovation on pricing strategies and the dynamics of entry; and it analyzes the implication of these developments in terms of competition policy. It also discusses the various alternatives for disseminating and accessing scientific publications. This includes the question of access to research results on individual web pages or in public repositories, the development of openaccess journals as well as other alternatives, such as pay-per-view, the question of the longterm preservation of electronic publications and the use of standards to ensure interoperability between systems....[M]uch of scientific activity is publicly funded: the output of research is typically not bought by journals but 'donated' by publicly-funded researchers; so are to a large extent refereeing services for the evaluation of research; and finally, journals are bought by publicly-funded researchers or, more often now, by publicly-funded libraries. It is therefore crucial for public authorities to form a view on the relative efficiency of the scientific publication process.... In view of the libraries' ongoing budgetary difficulties and of the opportunities provided by information technologies, and acknowledging the significant part of public funds involved in the scientific publishing process, a movement in favor of open access to scientific information has gained scale in the research community and research-related organizations. Declarations in favor of open access, such as Budapest Open Access Initiative and the Berlin Declaration on Open Access to Knowledge in the Sciences and Humanities, were signed by thousands of individuals and by major research institutions and research funding bodies around the world. These concerns about access to research results have been echoed by the civil society (e.g. at the World Summit on the Information Society) and by political bodies at national and international levels (e.g. the OECD Declaration on Access to Research Data from Public Funding). In the UK, the House of Commons (2004) recommended that public funding agencies require open access to publicly-funded research through deposit of the publications in the authors' institutional repositories. Following these declarations and recommendations, several important research funding bodies have established policies urging their funded researchers to publish in open access journals, offering to pay the publication fees if any, and/or to deposit their articles in an open access repository (e.g. the US National Institutes of Health, the UK Research Councils, the Wellcome Trust, CERN.). These policies have raised publishers and learned societies' concerns about the potential threat on their existence and activities: they fear that as articles become freely available in open archives and as search, access and retrieval facilities are enhanced by search engines and interoperability, journal subscriptions will be cancelled, thereby undermining the viability of their journals. Starting from this global economic and research-policy context, this report provides an independent analysis of the conditions regarding access and dissemination of research results, with a view to maximizing societal returns on R&D investments.... The evidence discussed in Sections 3 to 5 points however to a market where publishers do enjoy market power. This means that access can be improved significantly before one has to start worrying about threatening this reader/library-pay model. At present, immediate access can be achieved through individual web pages, through open access repositories or archives collecting e-prints deposited by their authors, and through open access journals which rely on various sources of income. In some countries, public authorities have funded large-scale projects to develop portals providing free online access to selected scholarly journals published in their countries (e.g. SciELO in Latin American countries, J-STAGE in Japan, various projects in India). As an increasing volume of research output from outside Europe becomes openly accessible, it raises the question of the visibility and accessibility, and of the subsequent potential impact, of European research as most articles by European researchers are published in subscription-based journals. In this respect, policies like those put in place by the U.S. NIH, the UK Research Councils or the Wellcome Trust - which promote open availability of research results no later than 12 months after publication - could be emulated across Europe, after discussions with the publishers. The aim could be to ensure that published European-funded research (at EU, national, or regional levels) be deposited in standardized open archives some time after publication. Recent surveys show that a majority of researchers seem willing to self-archive their articles if induced to do so by their employer or funding body....It is worth noting that, if the research funding authorities want to 'give a chance' to the author-pay model, they have to allow for a 'level-playing field' in comparison with the reader/library-pay model, that is, provide funding for publication costs and not only for library budgets....[T]here is a central role for funding bodies to define policies which will improve access and dissemination of publications, especially in terms of self-archiving requirement.... RECOMMENDATION A1. GUARANTEE PUBLIC ACCESS TO PUBLICLY-FUNDED RESEARCH RESULTS SHORTLY AFTER PUBLICATION. Research funding agencies have a central role in determining researchers' publishing practices. Following the lead of the NIH and other institutions, they should promote and support the archiving of publications in open repositories, after a (possibly domain-specific) time period to be discussed with publishers. This archiving could become a condition for funding. The following actions could be taken at the European level: (i) Establish a European policy mandating published articles arising from EC-funded research to be available after a given time period in open access archives, and (ii) Explore with Member States and with European research and academic associations whether and how such policies and open repositories could be implemented. Also see the HTML splash page for the report. The EC is soliciting comments on the report; please send them to rtd-scientific-publication(a)cec.eu.int by June 1, 2006. Peter Suber's Comment. This is big. Recommedation A1 doesn't directly call for an OA mandate to publicly-funded research, but it does call for a "guarantee" of OA, asserts that OA archiving "could become a condition of funding", and proposes that a mandate is one action that "could be taken at the European level". If the authors are distinguishing a guarantee from a mandate, then I'd like to hear more about it. But "even" a guarantee would be extremely welcome. Moreover, the recommendation calls for OA "shortly after publication". I hope this report strengthens the final draft of the RCUK policy, triggers the adoption of OA policies at the national level across Europe, and increases the odds that the nascent European Research Council will mandate OA to ERC-funded research. Friends: The European Commission has just released a report that talks about guaranteeing open access to all publicly-funded research. We in India should adopt a much more progressive step and mandate instant open access for all publicly funde research, meaning that papers should be made available via open access the same day as they are published. We have already lost much time. We cannot afford to lose any more time. Arun [Subbiah Arunachalam] EC recommmends OA archiving for publicly-funded research The http://europa.eu.int/comm/index_en.htm European Commission has released its lengthy (108 pp.) and long-awaited report, http://europa.eu.int/comm/research/science-society/pdf/scientific-publicati… Study on the Economic and Technical Evolution of the Scientific Publication Markets in Europe . (Thanks to http://www.inist.fr/openaccess/ INIST-CNRS .) The report is dated January 2006 but was not apparently released until today. The underlying inquiry was http://www.europa.eu.int/comm/research/press/2004/pr1506en.cfm announced in June 2004. Excerpt: Aware of current public debates that reveal worries about the conditions of access and dissemination of scientific publications, the European Commissions Directorate- General for Research has commissioned a study that seeks: (i) to assess the evolution of the market for scientific publishing; and (ii) to discuss the potential desirability of Europeanlevel measures to help improve the conditions governing access to and the exchange, dissemination and archiving of scientific publications (taking into account all actors/ stakeholders of the sector)....The report considers the specificities of the market for current journal issues. In doing so, it discusses the broad facts about the market; it undertakes a quantitative analysis of journal prices; it discusses the implications of technological innovation on pricing strategies and the dynamics of entry; and it analyzes the implication of these developments in terms of competition policy. It also discusses the various alternatives for disseminating and accessing scientific publications. This includes the question of access to research results on individual web pages or in public repositories, the development of openaccess journals as well as other alternatives, such as pay-per-view, the question of the longterm preservation of electronic publications and the use of standards to ensure interoperability between systems....[M]uch of scientific activity is publicly funded: the output of research is typically not bought by journals but donated by publicly-funded researchers; so are to a large extent refereeing services for the evaluation of research; and finally, journals are bought by publicly-funded researchers or, more often now, by publicly-funded libraries. It is therefore crucial for public authorities to form a view on the relative efficiency of the scientific publication process.... In view of the libraries ongoing budgetary difficulties and of the opportunities provided by information technologies, and acknowledging the significant part of public funds involved in the scientific publishing process, a movement in favor of open access to scientific information has gained scale in the research community and research-related organizations. Declarations in favor of open access, such as Budapest Open Access Initiative and the Berlin Declaration on Open Access to Knowledge in the Sciences and Humanities, were signed by thousands of individuals and by major research institutions and research funding bodies around the world. These concerns about access to research results have been echoed by the civil society (e.g. at the World Summit on the Information Society) and by political bodies at national and international levels (e.g. the OECD Declaration on Access to Research Data from Public Funding). In the UK, the House of Commons (2004) recommended that public funding agencies require open access to publicly-funded research through deposit of the publications in the authors institutional repositories. Following these declarations and recommendations, several important research funding bodies have established policies urging their funded researchers to publish in open access journals, offering to pay the publication fees if any, and/or to deposit their articles in an open access repository (e.g. the US National Institutes of Health, the UK Research Councils, the Wellcome Trust, CERN). These policies have raised publishers and learned societies concerns about the potential threat on their existence and activities: they fear that as articles become freely available in open archives and as search, access and retrieval facilities are enhanced by search engines and interoperability, journal subscriptions will be cancelled, thereby undermining the viability of their journals. Starting from this global economic and research-policy context, this report provides an independent analysis of the conditions regarding access and dissemination of research results, with a view to maximizing societal returns on R&D investments.... The evidence discussed in Sections 3 to 5 points however to a market where publishers do enjoy market power. This means that access can be improved significantly before one has to start worrying about threatening this reader/library-pay model. At present, immediate access can be achieved through individual web pages, through open access repositories or archives collecting e-prints deposited by their authors, and through open access journals which rely on various sources of income. In some countries, public authorities have funded large-scale projects to develop portals providing free online access to selected scholarly journals published in their countries (e.g. SciELO in Latin American countries, J-STAGE in Japan, various projects in India). As an increasing volume of research output from outside Europe becomes openly accessible, it raises the question of the visibility and accessibility, and of the subsequent potential impact, of European research as most articles by European researchers are published in subscription-based journals. In this respect, policies like those put in place by the U.S. NIH, the UK Research Councils or the Wellcome Trust which promote open availability of research results no later than 12 months after publication could be emulated across Europe, after discussions with the publishers. The aim could be to ensure that published European-funded research (at EU, national, or regional levels) be deposited in standardized open archives some time after publication. Recent surveys show that a majority of researchers seem willing to self-archive their articles if induced to do so by their employer or funding body....It is worth noting that, if the research funding authorities want to give a chance to the author-pay model, they have to allow for a level-playing field in comparison with the reader/library-pay model, that is, provide funding for publication costs and not only for library budgets....[T]here is a central role for funding bodies to define policies which will improve access and dissemination of publications, especially in terms of self-archiving requirement.... RECOMMENDATION A1. GUARANTEE PUBLIC ACCESS TO PUBLICLY-FUNDED RESEARCH RESULTS SHORTLY AFTER PUBLICATION. Research funding agencies have a central role in determining researchers publishing practices. Following the lead of the NIH and other institutions, they should promote and support the archiving of publications in open repositories, after a (possibly domain-specific) time period to be discussed with publishers. This archiving could become a condition for funding. The following actions could be taken at the European level: (i) Establish a European policy mandating published articles arising from EC-funded research to be available after a given time period in open access archives, and (ii) Explore with Member States and with European research and academic associations whether and how such policies and open repositories could be implemented. Also see the HTML http://europa.eu.int/rapid/pressReleasesAction.do?reference=IP/06/414&forma… splash page for the report. The EC is soliciting comments on the report; please send them to mailto:rtd-scientific-publication@cec.eu.int rtd-scientific-publication(a)cec.eu.int by June 1, 2006. Peter Suber's Comment . This is big. Recommedation A1 doesn't directly call for an OA mandate to publicly-funded research, but it does call for a "guarantee" of OA, asserts that OA archiving "could become a condition of funding", and proposes that a mandate is one action that "could be taken at the European level". If the authors are distinguishing a guarantee from a mandate, then I'd like to hear more about it. But "even" a guarantee would be extremely welcome. Moreover, the recommendation calls for OA "shortly after publication". I hope this report strengthens the final draft of the RCUK policy, triggers the adoption of OA policies at the national level across Europe, and increases the odds that the nascent European Research Council will mandate OA to ERC-funded research.

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Re: [LIS-Forum] GOC Conversion Rates - April '2006
by ++ Mukesh Anand ++ 04 Apr '06

04 Apr '06

GOC Rates are published by us for the convenience of the Libraries adopting these rates. Both RBI Rates and GOC Rates are being adopted by various libraries depending upon their account policies. As a library supplier, we have customers opting for either GOC or RBI rates, and our effort is cater to the requirements of both, in a prompt and efficient manner. Best Regards Mukesh Anand www.monitorinfo.com ----- Original Message ----- From: "R.K.SHUKLA" <milanramakant(a)hotmail.com> To: "++ Mukesh Anand ++" <mukesh(a)monitorinfo.com> Sent: Tuesday, April 04, 2006 2:06 PM Subject: Re: [LIS-Forum] GOC Conversion Rates - April '2006 > Is there any relevence of GOC, when we can have a conversion rate from RBI > site. moreover by accepting GOC rate we are inviting audit objectins as > these are much higher > > r.k.shukla > librarian Delhi College of Engineering > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "++ Mukesh Anand ++" <mukesh(a)monitorinfo.com> > To: <lis-forum(a)ncsi.iisc.ernet.in> > Sent: Monday, April 03, 2006 2:21 PM > Subject: [LIS-Forum] GOC Conversion Rates - April '2006 > > > Dear Librarian > > GOC Conversion Rates - April '2006, has been posted > on weblog / links given below: > > http://www.monitorlinks.typepad.com > > http://del.icio.us/newbooks > > > Thanks > - - > > Mukesh Anand > Director - Marketing > MONITOR INFORMATION SERVICES > http://www.monitorinfo.com > Library Suppliers of Science, Technology & Management Publications > > > > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- > > >> _______________________________________________ >> LIS-Forum mailing list >> LIS-Forum(a)ncsi.iisc.ernet.in >> http://ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/mailman/listinfo/lis-forum >> > > GOC Rates are published by us for the convenience of the Libraries adopting these rates. Both RBI Rates and GOC Rates are being adopted by various libraries depending upon their account policies. As a library supplier, we have customers opting for either GOC or RBI rates, and our effort is cater to the requirements of both, in a prompt and efficient manner. Best Regards Mukesh Anand http://www.monitorinfo.com www.monitorinfo.com ----- Original Message ----- From: "R.K.SHUKLA" < mailto:milanramakant@hotmail.com milanramakant(a)hotmail.com > To: "++ Mukesh Anand ++" < mailto:mukesh@monitorinfo.com mukesh(a)monitorinfo.com > Sent: Tuesday, April 04, 2006 2:06 PM Subject: Re: [LIS-Forum] GOC Conversion Rates - April '2006 > Is there any relevence of GOC, when we can have a conversion rate from RBI > site. moreover by accepting GOC rate we are inviting audit objectins as > these are much higher > > r.k.shukla > librarian Delhi College of Engineering > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "++ Mukesh Anand ++" < mailto:mukesh@monitorinfo.com mukesh(a)monitorinfo.com > > To: < mailto:lis-forum@ncsi.iisc.ernet.in lis-forum(a)ncsi.iisc.ernet.in > > Sent: Monday, April 03, 2006 2:21 PM > Subject: [LIS-Forum] GOC Conversion Rates - April '2006 > > > Dear Librarian > > GOC Conversion Rates - April '2006, has been posted > on weblog / links given below: > > http://www.monitorlinks.typepad.com http://www.monitorlinks.typepad.com > > http://del.icio.us/newbooks http://del.icio.us/newbooks > > > Thanks > - - > > Mukesh Anand > Director - Marketing > MONITOR INFORMATION SERVICES > http://www.monitorinfo.com http://www.monitorinfo.com > Library Suppliers of Science, Technology & Management Publications > > > > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- > > >> _______________________________________________ >> LIS-Forum mailing list >> mailto:LIS-Forum@ncsi.iisc.ernet.in LIS-Forum(a)ncsi.iisc.ernet.in >> http://ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/mailman/listinfo/lis-forum http://ncsi.iisc.ernet.in/mailman/listinfo/lis-forum >> > >

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Professional trainee for NLSIU
by Mailing List Manager 04 Apr '06

04 Apr '06

Date: Tue, 4 Apr 2006 14:34:34 +0530 (IST) From: Mailing List Manager <mailman(a)ncsi.iisc.ernet.in> Date: Tue, 04 Apr 2006 06:21:24 +0000 From: chandrashekhar navalgund <cnavalgund(a)hotmail.com> A Professional Trainee is required at National Law School of India University Library which is a well equipped modern Law Library. Monthly stipend of Rs. 3000/- would be paid. Those who are willing to work on shift basis may send in their resume immediately through email to the Librarian , N L S I U (cun(a)nls.ac.in) Short listed candidates would be called for interview. C U Navalgund Librarian N L S I U Nagarbhavi Bangalore - 72

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Digital Library Software
by veena bhat 04 Apr '06

04 Apr '06

Dear Sir/ Madam, Our institution is purely Academic. We want to build a Digital Library. Which Digital Library software is best for Academic Library? On which basis I need to select the software? Plz, suggest me. Thanks and Regards, Veena Bhat International Institute of Information Technology, Pune --------------------------------- Yahoo! Messenger with Voice. Make PC-to-Phone Calls to the US (and 30+ countries) for 2¢/min or less. Dear Sir/ Madam, Our institution is purely Academic. We want to build a Digital Library. Which Digital Library software is best for Academic Library? On which basis I need to select the software? Plz, suggest me. Thanks and Regards, Veena Bhat International Institute of Information Technology, Pune Yahoo! Messenger with Voice. http://us.rd.yahoo.com/mail_us/taglines/postman1/*http://us.rd.yahoo.com/ev… Make PC-to-Phone Calls to the US (and 30+ countries) for 2¢/min or less.

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Accepting documents as gifts
by Chitra P Rao 04 Apr '06

04 Apr '06

To Mr Saji S Nair: I think accepting or giving as gifts needs same consideration from both the giver and reciever. If the gift is not appropriate it does not make sense accepting it. Instead as lirarians always do we must guide the person to that library which will accept the same and use it well. So some work on the part of the reciever is to guide to the correct doner. In all such cases however close or important the doner I have felt being clear and honest alwsys makes for better management. Chitra Rao Sr Librarian and Head LIS NITIE Mumbai 400 087 ph: 28573371 extn 337

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OA picking up at last
by arun＠mssrf.res.in 03 Apr '06

03 Apr '06

Heather Morrison, The Dramatic Growth of Open Access: March 31, 2006 Update, Imaginary Journal of Poetic Economics, March 31, 2006. Excerpt: In the last quarter, over 780,000 records have been added to OAIster, suggesting that those open access archives are beginning to fill! There are 170 more titles in DOAJ, likely an understated increase due to a weeding project. 78 titles have been added to DOAJ in the past 30 days, a growth rate of more than 2 new titles per day. Disciplinary archives are showing remarkable growth. E-LIS has been increasing at the equivalent of 56% annually. Differences in growth rates suggest the possibility of a life-cycle factor in open access archives growth, perhaps initial slow growth, followed by very rapid growth, then a more steady growth as the archive matures....The most notable increase is the addition of over 780,000 records to OAIster, the equivalent of a 50% annual increase. This rate of increase doubles that of 2005 (25%). This evidence suggests that those open access institutional archives are beginning to fill! Among the disciplinary archives examined, the highest growth rate was shown at E-LIS, with an equivalent of a 56% annual increase. The longer-established disciplinary archives showed impressive but slower growth rates: RePEC, 25%, and arXiv, 12%. One possible explanation could be a life-cycle factor for successful disciplinary archives, with a relatively high percentage growth rate at an early stage, followed by slower percentage growth at a more mature phase. This will reflect, in part, the larger size of the repository. It takes more records to create a 12% increase in a large repository than a 50% increase in a small one. Data from the Canadian Metadata Harvester may indicate another potential life-cycle effect. That is, the Canadian repositories showed a growth rate equivalent to less than 12% per year. The difference between the Canadian open access archives data increase and the OAIster increase (50%) may reflect the relative newness of many of the Canadian repositories. While delayed free access is not true open access, the 200,000 articles added to the Highwire Free program - an equivalent of a 72% annual increase - does represent a dramatic increase in free access. DOAJ includes 170 more titles now than on Dec. 31, 2006, an equivalent annual growth rate of 34%. This percentage is likely an understatement, as DOAJ has been undertaking a weeding project to remove titles no longer

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GOC Conversion Rates - April '2006
by ++ Mukesh Anand ++ 03 Apr '06

03 Apr '06

Dear Librarian GOC Conversion Rates - April '2006, has been posted on weblog / links given below: http://www.monitorlinks.typepad.com http://del.icio.us/newbooks Thanks - - Mukesh Anand Director - Marketing MONITOR INFORMATION SERVICES http://www.monitorinfo.com Library Suppliers of Science, Technology & Management Publications Dear Librarian GOC Conversion Rates - April '2006, has been posted on weblog / links given below: http://www.monitorlinks.typepad.com http://www.monitorlinks.typepad.com http://del.icio.us/newbooks http://del.icio.us/newbooks Thanks - - Mukesh Anand Director - Marketing MONITOR INFORMATION SERVICES http://www.monitorinfo.com http://www.monitorinfo.com Library Suppliers of Science, Technology & Management Publications

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College libraries in A.P.
by Jai Haravu 03 Apr '06

03 Apr '06

Dear Friends We would like to share some of our experiences in working with college libraries in Andhra Pradesh in their modernization plans. These experiences and observations are being made as dispassionately as possible. The intention is not to blame any one. In fact there are too many players and we believe that all are responsible, to some degree or other, for the problems we found. Many college libraries seem to want to automate their libraries only to please either AICTE and NAAC visiting teams. We would like to share two of our experiences and our conclusions. 1. One college was expecting a NAAC team to visit the college in a week's time. There was a frantic call from the Principal asking that our software be installed the next day and their data in MS-Access be converted in time for the visit of the NAAC team. The software was installed on a system that was supposed to have been acquired for the library, their data was migrated; the NAAC committee came and went. Soon after, we approached the librarian of the college to find out when we could train him and his colleagues so that they could make full use of the software. We were surprised to learn that the system on which we had installed the software and data was in fact the property of the Physics department who promptly reclaimed their machine. The librarian told us that since they did not have any system, there was no point of getting any training. 2. Similar scenario except that this time it was the AICTE committee's visit. Frantic call. Installation of software. However, this time, we had to convert data that was entered as an Excel spreadsheet. When we saw the data we were aghast. Both the professional librarians of the college had M.L.I.Sc degrees, one even had a post-graduate diploma relating to automation. We pointed out that their data had apparently been entered without reference to any standard. For instance author names were entered in the normal form e.g. Peter Drucker instead of Drucker, Peter. When a monograph had more than one personal name, these were entered as a single string without any separators between the names. They did not think it necessary to subject index the items in their collection. All books in chemistry (organic, inorganic, physical, molecular, etc.) were subsumed under the code CHE standing for chemistry. Similar was the case for books in other subjects. We asked them why they had not used any standard subject headings list. We were told that the NAAC/AICTE team would be interested in seeing all books held by the library, say on chemistry, and therefore simply by searching under CHE they would be able to show a list of all books on chemistry. We pointed out that this could have easily been achieved also by searching for books under the Dewey classification number 54. They had no answer to this. There were other lacunae in their data which will take long to describe. Our conclusions based on these two and other experiences: 1.Managements of colleges are driven more by NAAC and AICTE to modernize their libraries than real academic considerations. 2.Librarians have very little or no initiative to drive the modernization of their libraries. Some librarians even complained that they do not have the time to learn new ways of doing things. 3.Only a few libraries can boast of having a connection to the Internet. 4.In spite of all the graduate/postgraduate education that Library schools seem to be providing to students of library science, the quality of the work of college librarians seems to be far from even satisfactory. 5.College librarians have not carved a niche for themselves as useful members of the academic community they serve in these libraries. Understandably, their salaries too are poor and motivation to make an impact often non-existent. 6.We found from the data conversion exercises that we did and from visits to college libraries that these are no better than text book banks and not eclectic collections of older and contemporary books, and useful reference materials. In quite a few places, we found that as many as 30 copies of all text books are acquired. The library's budget serves little else than for the acquisition of text books. Students depend on the library mainly for text books and little else. This reflects only on the text book and examination oriented teaching that obviously predominates in these colleges. 7.Apparently, NAAC and AICTE committee's look only at the nitty gritty of libraries and their modernization. They do not seem to look deeper to see if libraries serve a greater purpose as knowledge centres and whether their collections reflect to some extent at least modern thought and principles. There are no bench marks for collection evaluation. All the above observations are made with our experience of colleges in big cities of A.P. What the situation is in smaller towns is anybody's guess. Is the situation in other states better? In fairness, it must be pointed out that librarians in special library's do not fortunately fit into the same mould as those in college libraries. They have created an impact and are well sought after. There are too many cats to bell: librarians, library schools, managements, NAAC, AICTE, professional bodies, teachers, etc., etc., and mice alone cannot help. Like the proverbial elephant and six blind men, each entity seems to seeing its own side of the problem . L J Haravu Trustee Kesavan Inst. of Information & Knowledge Management

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GoPubMed - Ontology-based Literature Search Tool
by Sukhdev Singh 03 Apr '06

03 Apr '06

Dear Friends, I just happened to hit on a search engine called - GoPubMed < http://www.gopubmed.org/ > It is an Ontology-based literature search tool. It takes the query and submits it to PubMed. The references retrieved are then categorized using "Gene Ontology terms". Which is a hierarchical vocabulary for molecular biology covering cellular components, biological processes and molecular functions. Just wondering how fast new information retrieval innovations are taking around us while we keep on dreaming to retail our conventional tools. --Sukhdev Singh, NIC. http://openmed.nic.in

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