Aslib Electronics Group Update 99, 12-14 May 1999, Danbury Park Conference
Centre, Danbury, Chelmsford, Essex, UK.
Update yourself in key areas of information science and technology. The
conference for all Library and Information professionals, especially if you
have an interest in multimedia and in the practical impact of information
technology. This year's programme comprises:-
1. Foresight techniques
Graham May, Leeds Metropolitan University
Foresight and Futures Studies offer concepts and methods to work with the
difficulties of an uncertain future and to help us deal constructively with
a rapidly changing present. They can assist the development of the ability
to influence the future rather than merely predict it. To make the future
happen for us rather than happen to us, Graham will introduce a number of
foresight technique and give an insight into how they can be applied.
Graham is author of "The Future is Ours: Foreseeing, Managing and Creating
the Future" Adamantine Press and Praeger Twenty-First Century Studies, 1996,
and of papers and articles in a range of publications. He is Course Leader
of the Masters degree in Foresight and Futures Studies, the only such course
in the UK. Graham is the convenor of the UK Futures Group
(http://www.futures.org.uk/index.htm).
2. Towards an image library
Roy McKeown, De Montfort University
The Helix Project represents what is arguably the first attempt in the UK at
developing a substantive body of image-resource content based on distributed
image banks. These collections include Picture Post material from Hulton
Getty Picture Collection, a range of material from the National Art Slide
Library at DMU, and the Valentine Photographic Archive from St. Andrews
University Library. The Project is an operational service and its
implementation has stimulated other developments within the UK HE community.
Roy McKeown currently manages the National Art Slide Library at De Montfort
University and has been closely involved with the development of the content
aspects of the Helix service, including metadata and image capture, from its
beginnings. He has been involved with audio-visual materials in libraries
for over 20 years and is a member of the LAMIT Executive Committee among
others. Current interests include management of the transition from analogue
to digital image libraries.
3. Document delivery services - how do they compare?
Sheila Broadmeadow, BT Labs
Document delivery services are becoming an integral part of most libraries,
as information service managers move from a 'Just in case' collection to a
'Just in time' service. As we increasingly rely on document delivery, we
need to monitor the options available. Sheila will present the results of a
survey of document delivery providers.
Sheila joined BT Labs in 1982 with a degree in Librarianship and Spanish
from College of Librarianship, Wales. She managed the library services at
BTL during a period of great change and helped plan and implement the move
from a traditional library service with a large paper collection to a
digital library offering a core paper collection supplemented by electronic
journals and document supply. Sheila managed the design and implementation
of a user-driven online request system which uses the services of the BLDSC
and has published an article on this process.
4. Marketing the library and information service (panel discussion and
workshops)
Experienced information professionals will discuss how they approach
marketing in their own organisations. Learn from them what works and what
doesn't work from the panel, including Diane Richards, INSPEC; Alison
Matthews, Suffolk Business Link; and Dorothy Brook, Hewlett Packard, and a
representative from an academic library. Between them, the panel will bring
a wealth of experience and ideas to the problem of marketing the information
service or library.
Building on the ideas presented in the panel discussion, small-group
workshops will allow delegates to discuss these in more detail. Share your
own experiences and learn from others. This will be an ideal opportunity to
pick up good, practical ideas that you can put into action in your own work.
5. Streaming video - an introduction to adding video to your server
Andrew Grace, BT Labs
Over 30% of high tech libraries will be adding video to their WWW servers in
1999 according to a recent report. Andrew will describe what streaming over
IP is and give a technical insight into how it works. He will describe the
challenges that streaming video presents: bandwidth in the wide area
network, multimedia authoring and metadata, and the problem of overload of
visual information.
Andrew will outline the future developments in this area, including
automatic authoring and transcription, generating video indexes including
searching by image, and streaming new multimedia data types.
Andrew Grace joined BT Laboratories in 1988 having graduated from Plymouth
Polytechnic with a BEng in communication engineering. He spent the first
six years of his career applying novel data mining and visualisation
techniques to large quantities of performance data from BT's core
transmission network. He subsequently led research work on quality of
service in open distributed systems, and in 1995 he started to look at video
streaming for the Internet. In 1998 he became a founder member of the Real
Time Internet Group where he is currently team leader for IP video streaming
research.
6. Managing change, coping with change
Cathryn Gallacher, University of the West of England
In times of rapid change, it is easy to become so absorbed by daily demands
and decisions that we lose perspective on the change process as a whole.
For this reason, it is useful to step back occasionally and think about
the nature of change itself, and about its effects on organisations and
individuals. This paper will examine the process of change itself,
including the pressures for change, the causes of resistance to change, and
the effects of change on the performance of library staff and managers.
The paper will then outline some practical steps which librarians can take
to facilitate organisational change, and put forward some ideas for
discussion about methods of implementing change successfully.
Since August 1997, Cathryn has been Deputy Librarian (Academic Support) at
the University of Bristol. Prior to that she worked for eight years at the
University of the West of England in various middle management roles, at the
Bristol Central Reference Library, and at UCLA Library. She also currently
teaches the Management of Libraries course on Bristol University's MSc in
Information and Library Management, and runs short courses on Managing
Change and Strategic Planning at Universitat Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona.
Cathryn is the author of the Forthcoming Know-how Guide: "Managing Change
in Libraries and Information Services: A Practical Approach".
The Conference will also feature a poster session on benchmarking for
special libraries. Following a series of informal discussions between DERA
(Defence Evaluation & Research Agency) and SMILE (Swedish Military &
Electronics On-Line User Group), it was felt that existing criteria for the
measurement of performance of library services did not fully meet the needs
of special libraries and information centres. Consequently a series of
initiatives for benchmarking and performance indication have been agreed
upon between various interested member organisations. A presentation will be
given outlining some of these initiatives, and a discussion group will meet
to share experiences and ideas.
Fees for the Conference are _300 for Aslib members or _350 for non-members.
This includes accommodation and all meals, and no VAT is applicable. Day
rates are available on request.
For further details and a booking form please contact:-
Alison Matthews
Tel: 01473 282806
Fax: 01473 288008
E-mail: [log in to unmask]
John Coupland - Library Manager
Institution of Electrical Engineers,Savoy Place,LONDON,WC2R 0BL
Email: [log in to unmask]
Telephone: +44 (0)171 344 5451
Fax: +44 (0)171 497 3557
World Wide Web: http://www.iee.org.uk
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