ACRL News Issue (B) of College & Research Libraries


512 /C&RL News

The transformation potential 
of netw orked inform ation
By C harles H en ry an d  Paul Evan Peters

Approaches to knowledge creation, 
dissemination, a n d  utilization

Editor’s note: The following essay was origi­
nally distributed at the O ctober 1992 meeting 
of the Coalition for N etw orked Information. 
Tom Kirk, one of ACRL’s representatives to CNI 
and ACRL president, believes the authors have 
identified important elem ents of the transfor­
mational potential of netw orked information. 
Further, Tom  believes, it suggests w ays in 
w hich librarians can facilitate the achievem ent 
of the transformational potential. He has asked 
that the article be published in C&RL News to 
give broad distribution of the ideas to the ACRL 
mem bership. I am pleased to do so.

O
v e r th e  p a st d e c a d e  th e tra n sfo rm a ­
tional potential of netw orked informa­
tion has attracted attention in a variety o

demic forums. These discussions have most fre­
q u e n tly  e m p h a s iz e d  ty p e s  o f te c h n o lo g y  
(hypertext, hyperm edia, m ultim edia, and so 
forth) that enable approaches to know ledge 
creation, dissemination, and utilization that go 
far b e y o n d  the autom ation of text and the 
m echanization of information processing. Of­
ten missing in these discussions have b een  spe­
cific information and perspectives from projects 
that point to a genuine m etam orphosis in the 
w ay scholarship is transacted.

In truth, it is only recently that a num ber of 
p o w e rfu l a n d  c o m p e llin g  p ro g ra m s  hav e 
em erged that dem onstrate the potential to trans­
form scholarly comm unication and m ethodolo­
gies. These include large, netw orked resources, 
multi-media programs, collections of electronic 
texts in dozens of languages, electronic edi­

tions of single authors, as well as online jour­
nals that allow iterative know ledge develop­
m ent w ithout a fixed text. Examples include: 
The Center for Electronic Texts in the Humani­
ties (CETH); the Perseus Project; the Thesau­
rus Linguae G raecae; the D artm outh D ante 
Project; ARTFL; the Electronic Pierce Consor­
tium; the Guttenburg Project; the Einstein Pa­
pers; the O ppenheim er Papers; the European 
Visual Arts Center (EAC); the Oxford Text Ar­
chive; Psycoloquy; the CORE Project; Project 
O pen Book; and the Text Encoding Initiative 
(TEI). Many of these programs incorporate net­
working as an essential aspect of their present 
or future design.

P rog ram  possibilities
The transforming properties of these and re­
lated products of invention are w ide and deep. 
These program s explore a range of opportuni­
ties and challenges including: the possibility of 

f aicma­plem enting universal standards for text e n ­
coding (TEI); the developm ent of a new  elec­
tronic know ledge base for hum anities research 
(CETH, OTA, and ARTFL); the construction of 
a new  electronically accessible database for out- 
of-print and rare materials (Project O pen Book); 
and the expansion of interdisciplinarity in re­
s e a rc h  a n d  te a c h in g  (EVAC, P e rse u s, th e 
O ppenheim er Papers, and indeed, almost all 
of the projects listed above). They also por­
ten d  a transform ation in disciplines w here in­
dividuals working in isolation becom e far more 
collaborative (access to the Internet has already 
begun to effect this change), and a m etamor­
phosis to iterative, incremental know ledge in 
a floating electronic environment in areas where 
m ore discrete blocks of know ledge existed 
b e fo re  (E lectro n ic P ierce C o n so rtiu m  a n d  
Psycoloquy).

Charles Henry is director, Vassar College Library, Poughkeepsie, New York, a n d  P a u l Evan Peters is executive 
director, Coalition f o r  Networked Information, Washington, D .C .



October 1993/513

Looking even further to the future, such
problems have the potential to eliminate cur­
rent disciplinary boundaries, to effect profound
changes in the tenure process, to merge meth­
odologies more typical of the sciences into

Given the transforming 
capabilities o f these projects . . . 
it is a responsibility o f highest 
value .. .to  increase overall 
awareness o f these projects, to 
[support] them, and to help 
improve the climate in which 
these and similar initiatives are 
conceived and implemented.

humanities research, to transcend the demar­
cation betw een word, image, and sound, to 
transform the scholarly publication processes, 
to redefine the terms ‘text,’ ‘author,’ and ‘own­
ership,’ to eliminate the centuries-old concept
of a fixed source of information and the ac­
crual of clearly defined scholarly interpretation, 
to contribute to the reorganization of academic 
institutions, to render printed matter obsoles­
cent, to introduce research methodologies more 
directly into classroom teaching, and to blur
the distinction betw een graduate and under­
graduate education.

It is not sufficient to simply identify and cata­
log these projects. Even a cursory study of their
histories suggests that while these resources

Internet: Path to the 21st 
century
Indiana Online Users Group (IOLUG) will 
hold its fall conference entitled “Internet: 
Path to the Twenty-First Century” on Thurs­
day November 11, 1993, in Indianapolis. The 
keynote speaker will be Ed Krol, author of 
The Whole Internet. There will also be sev­
eral concurrent sessions on topics such as 
the ABC’s of connecting, gophers and fop, 
refe re n c e  on in tern et, a n d  e-m ails and 
listservs. For registration information, con­
tact Jim Cannon, IOLUG Treasurer, India­
napolis-Marion County Public Library at 317- 
269-1741. Fax: 317-269-1768.

 

 

 

 

 

carry a far-reaching transformational potential 
for scholarship and teaching, they are invari­
ably confronted with challenges and hurdles 
that threaten their viability and intellectual in­
fluence. These challenges include: variance in 
financial support; variance in institutional sup­
port, including the absence of recognition of 
the value (or at times the existence) of these 
projects; the disposition in the current tenure 
system to impute relatively low value to com­
puter-based research and to the development 
of computer-based teaching projects; obsoles­
cence of hardware and software; and a limited 
audience, i.e., an audience defined by an inter­
est group categorized by a specialty within a 
discipline.

Given the transforming capabilities of these 
projects, the current fragility of the academic 
environment, it is a responsibility of highest 
value and return to increase overall awareness 
of these projects, to frame ways and means for 
supporting them, and to help improve the cli­
mate in which these and similar initiatives are 
conceived and implemented. A beginning out­
line of workable means to these ends includes 
efforts to:

•  identify com puter-based programs and 
tools that have the potential to transform cur­
rent means of scholarly communication and 
methodologies;

•  bring these projects to the attention of 
university administrators, directors of profes­
sional societies, colleagues within specific dis­
ciplines, and the creators of other projects to 
increase the visibility of and appreciation for 
these projects;

•  identify the aspects of these projects that 
distinguish them as excellent examples of their 
genre;

•  ensure responsive and productive interac­
tion of the perspectives, plans, proposals, and 
experiences of the constituencies of these 
projects;

•  promote wide accessibility of these projects 
using the National Research and Education 
Network and other, related networks;

•  promote the development of international 
standards for networked access to the results 
of such projects;

•  foster intellectual collaboration among a 
variety of constituencies for such projects and 
their products; and,

•  study and promulgate the implications 
a n d  tra n s fo rm a tio n a l p o te n tia l o f th e s e  
projects. ■