Due to a printing error, the On the Net column in the January issue of Information Outlook was difficult to read. With that in mind, we have placed that article, titled "Discussion Lists" below for you to read and enjoy. We have also placed February's On the Net column, "Observations of a Webliographer" to follow.

Discussion lists commonly but erroneously called "Listservs" give life to the Internet because they provide the mechanism for communicating with others, particularly people with whom you share common interests. Their archives contain the collective wisdom of our profession.

I'm a subscriber to almost all of the SLA discussion lists. There are nearly 50 of them. Hope Tillman maintains the "SLA Directory of Lists and World Wide Web Home Pages" on the Web at www.tiac.net/users/hope/slalist.html. You can use this directory to locate the addresses of the lists mentioned in this column. The vast majority of these lists are open to members and nonmembers alike. In fact, many divisions view their lists as a public relations tool: if nonmembers subscribe to the list and the discussions interest them, maybe they'll join that division.

Like the Internet users surveyed by FIND/SVP last year, the special librarians that Tillman and I interviewed back in 1991 used the Internet first for communications, and a distant second for finding information. This past September, I collected over 250 messages that were posted to chapter and division discussion lists in preparation for writing this column. The topics discussed, questions asked, requests filled, and problems solved are not all that different from the reports five years ago.

Here are just a few of the things special librarians are discussing on SLA e-mail lists these days: SOLOLIB-L, the Solo Librarians Division's list, is the place to ask questions about the intricacies of managing a small special library. Topics discussed in September included, among other things, the most effective statistics to report to management and how to archive VHS video tapes. A new solo librarian asked for "advice to the newly-hatched solo" (she was told, among other things, to "market, market, MARKET" her services; to network "early, often, and quickly"; and to join SLA).

Lists sponsored by SLA subject divisions, particularly those in the sciences, are great places to find out about the best Internet resources in the discipline, as well as issues facing sci-tech librarians. Journal issue and interlibrary loan requests are common on these lists, as are job announcements. SLAPAM-L, the Physics-Astronomy-Mathematics Division list, for example, had postings about accessing electronic journals in physics, strategies for dealing with journal price increases, and an astronomy Web site in Hawaii. SLAPAM-L, founded in the mid-1980s, is the oldest SLA discussion list. Other sci-tech lists are ERMD (Environment and Resource Management Division), PER_FORU (Petroleum and Energy Division), SLA-AERO (Engineering Division, Aerospace Section), SLA-ENG (Engineering Division), SLA-FAN (Food-Agriculture-Nutrition Division), SLA-ST (Science-Technology Division), and TRANLIB (Transportation Division). LMDSLA-L, the Library Management Division list, tends to be more issue-oriented than most. Topics discussed in September included a comparison of the career paths of librarians and accountants, and a thought-provoking debate on whether the Internet is an ally or threat to special librarians.

Discussion lists sponsored by SLA chapters are more locally focused. If your chapter has a list and 24 of the 57 SLA chapters do be sure to subscribe for last minute information about meetings, job postings, and member news. Chapter officers and committee chairs might want to subscribe to other chapter discussion lists as well to get ideas for program topics, speakers, fundraising, and member recruitment. In September, for example, the president of the Heart of America Chapter posted a request on SLAHOA-L for volunteers to serve on the Kansas Library Network Board, and a Western Canada Chapter officer asked for help in the library booth at the Calgary Career Expo. Very often requests like this are too time sensitive to be announced in a chapter newsletter.

One of the newest discussion lists is SLA-PRES, a list introduced by SLA President Sylvia Piggott to encourage SLA members to ask questions and discuss issues. SLA-PRES is one of the first lists to be hosted on the server located at SLA headquarters in Washington, DC. In 1997, chapters, divisions, and caucuses will have the opportunity to move their lists to this server. Draft guidelines are being prepared for discussion and review at the Winter Meeting in Ft. Lauderdale.

Hopefully, I've whetted your appetite for trying one or more SLA discussion lists. Most are not overly active, so you won't be inundated with a plethora of e-mail. Subscribing to a list is a great way to find people who have successfully dealt with problems you are encountering on the job or in your work for SLA and make new friends in the process! I get a real thrill when I finally meet someone at annual conference whom I previously knew only through e-mail.

Information Outlook Table of Contents

I discovered that Web resources augment, but do not replace, print resources. I continue to use older research resources while learning how to use the new ones. When a reference is both in print and on the Web, I usually cite both sources in a bibliography and therefore must verify two sources for a single article.

Search and retrieval skills acquired using older online sources are not always transferable to the Web. Each Web search site has its own set of search commands. This adds to the time the bibliographer spends doing the preliminary research.

Since there are few standard evaluation tools yet available for Web materials, webliographers must rely on their own judgment or word-of-mouth evaluations. Help is growing in this area, evidenced by a number of recent articles providing evaluation advice (see "Evaluating Web Resources," IAT Infobits, issue no. 40, October 1996, www.iat.unc.edu/infobits/bitoct96.html).

Information authentication is another problem. The Web has been called the world's largest vanity press, and some Web publishers pretend to be more authoritative than they really are. Some sites are also deliberately designed to mislead users into thinking the site is authentic.

The Web has also presented us with a whole new concept of what "out of print" means. Web pages are notorious for suffering from "link rot." A reference that was cited yesterday may be moved or disappear entirely tomorrow without notice, making maintenance of these resources another headache.

The Web has also changed many users' perceptions of what they should get from online information providers. No matter how exhaustive its coverage, a bibliography is only a snapshot in time of what has been written on a subject and chosen by the bibliographer. Users have accepted the limitations of a traditional bibliography. However, with the increasing hype about the Web's capability to provide immediate gratification for information seekers, webliography users have come to expect, and even demand, links to the latest materials--requiring regular updating that would never be expected of a print bibliographer. For example, six weeks after compiling a bibliography with Web links, I received an irate complaint that many of the links were not working, and therefore the bibliography was useless. I was able to reconstruct new links for some of the citations, however much of the material is lost forever.

How does the webliographer deal with user expectations and demands? You could have a large staff devoted to regular updating activities, you could put a disclaimer on your material warning that the compiler is not responsible for links that cease to work, or you could use automated tools to check for "link rot" and assist with updates--all of which require extra work or decreased user satisfaction. Finally, you could involve the users as part of your update team. This not only blurs the division between information provider and information users, but enables them to repay you by feeding you new information. This informal collaboration forms an information sharing cycle which benefits both parties.

Now the user not only benefits from the research performed by the provider, but also participates by 1) commenting on the usefulness of materials, 2) creating and making available their own materials, and 3) making suggestions from additional information that they have located on their own. Bibliographies on the Web can require more work for the information professional, but will provide new resources for users and enhance the more traditional bibliographies. When the bibliographer enlists the user to form an information partnership, the results can enrich the work of both parties and improve the relationship between the information providers and users.

Information Outlook Table of Contents