ACRL News Issue (B) of College & Research Libraries April 1988 / 211 International Conference on Scholarly Inform ation Network By Sachié Noguchi Assistant Japanese Librarian University o f Illinois at Urbana-Cham paign East Asian applications and international cooperation, Tokyo, D ecem ber 8 -11, 1987. I n East Asia, under the influence of the West, na tional and university library automation has pro gressed, and the number of machine-readable bib lio g rap h ic records has grown rapid ly. For instance, in Japan, in addition to JAPAN MARC distributed by the National Diet Library, biblio graphic information on academic and research materials is created and distributed by the National Center for Science Information System (NACSIS) under the banner of the Scholarly Information Sys tem. Chinese characters are used in Chinese, Japa nese, and Korean languages; however, they are read differently and have developed variant forms within each language community. In addition to the adopted Chinese system of writing, the Japa nese use a syllabic script called kana and the Kore ans employ hangul. Each language community de veloped each two-byte (except C C C II in Taiwan) character set code independently and there has been little discussion concerning exchange of infor mation about the Chinese character set code or about bibliographic data among East Asian coun tries. On the other hand, in North America, the Re search Library Group (RLG) developed and inau gurated the bibliographic network system which is capable of processing Chinese, Japanese, and Ko rean (CJK) scripts as an RLIN subsystem. This was done in cooperation with the Library of Congress in 1983. More than 300,000 bibliographic records have already been accumulated. The Online Com puter Library Center (OCLC) launched its CJK subsystem in May 1986. These two CJK systems are used by thirty-four libraries in North America and by the British Library. Both RLIN and O CLC CJK subsystem use a three-byte character code, the RLIN East Asian Character Code (REACC), and it is expected that the REACC will be established as the “American National Standard, East Asian Character Code set for Bibliographic Use.” Its the saurus is under the administration of the Library of Congress. Utlas International Canada introduced the sys tem into Japan in 1985 and it is used mainly among private university libraries. In 1987, Utlas devel oped Japan CATSS as a bibliographic utility specif ically for Japanese language materials. It uses mod ified JAPAN MARC format and the same character set as the National Diet Library of Japan (Japan In dustrial Standard C6226 1978, two-byte). It was obviously time to coordinate the stan dardization and stabilization of character set and bibliographic data among East Asian countries to facilitate the future exchange of data among them selves and across the Pacific. NACSIS of Japan took 212 / C &RL News the initiative to organize the first International Conference on Scholarly Information Network— E a s t Asian A p p licatio n s & In te rn a tio n a l Cooperation— on December 8 -1 1 , 1987, by invit ing interested parties to Tokyo to discuss the prob lems involved and attempt to reach a consensus on these issues. The conference took place at NACSIS and at the National Diet Library. Seventeen invited panelists attended from Jap an , and sixteen from Hong Kong, Korea, the People’s Republic of China, T ai wan, the Federal Republic of Germany, the United Kingdom, the United States, and Canada. There were also fifteen observers from Japan and the United States. Among the North American mem bers of the panel were C. James Schmidt (RLIN), Rowland C .W . Brown and Andrew H. W ang (O C LC ), Robert F. Asleson and N. Furuya (Utlas International Canada), Beacher Wiggins (Library of Congress), and C .J. Durance (National Library of Canada). The discussion at the conference was based on the six position papers and the eighteen that com mented on them. These were distributed to the participants before the conference. Round Table 1 was entitled “Improvement of International Ex change of Scholarly Inform ation.” Round Table 2 dealt with the technical issues of East Asian charac ter set codes. An open forum for the public catered for the growing interests in bibliographic utilities among the Japanese library community. Utlas and O C LC have made inroads into the Japanese mar ket, and they and the British Library, RLIN , and N A C SIS m ade in tro d u cto ry p resen tatio n s to mainly Japanese audiences. There are two technical committees (TC 97 and T C 46) working on character sets within Interna tional Standardization Organization (ISO), and it was felt that they should either be amalgamated or responsibility be given only to one. The Interna tional Organizing Committee agreed to submit a “review paper” to ISO on this matter. The neces sity for a coordinating body of national standards of character set was expressed by a quite few mem bers represented by the proposals from L C , Inter national Committee on Character Bet Coordina tion, and NACSIS, Clearing Center for Chinese Character Users in East Asian environment. The Committee unanimously agreed to continue the di alogue and cooperative efforts for the international exchange of scholarly information in the future. Today, technology has blurred national bound aries, and cultural and language demarcation are no longer quite so clearly defined. By bringing to gether the major bibliographic utilities and other bodies involved in the area, this conference offered a precious opportunity for promoting mutual un derstanding and sharing the common issues. It was a crucial, constructive step towards coordinating the basis for bibliographic data communication containing East Asian scripts, and for international scholarly information exchange of such data be tween East Asia, North America, and Europe. Guaranteed availability, when you want them. Journals of Science, Technology, and Medicine in microform. Every title filmed and delivered— from the first issue forward. Current subscriptions are delivered within three months of the end of the volume year, and availability of all backfiles is guaranteed. For complete title listings and prices, call 1-800-REACH-RP (1-800-732-2477) now. From Connecticut, Alaska and Canada, call collect (2 0 3 ) 397-2600. Research Publications, Inc. 12 Lunar Drive/Drawer AB Woodbridge, CT 06525 ( 203) 397-2600