Abstract
Three recent reports in the UK have urged a more coordinated and proactive approach to the exploitation of networked information. Computer networks are not however in themselves agents of change but an enabling technology. It is necessary to be clear about the purposes to which the Internet can be put, in particular how it might relate to the changing world of higher education. The electronic or virtual library, coupled with the notion of access rather than holdings, is being presented as the solution to the problems of university libraries (finance, growing student numbers, and quality assessment). The key challenge is however not to develop an information superhighway but to transform higher education. In improving the information systems that support research, technology seems to have ready answers such as e-mail, bulletin boards and ability to exchange preprints; but there is the danger of increasing the gap between the information rich and information poor, and the future of the printed journal is questionable. Radical changes in the pattern of ownership and control of research output are needed to ensure that the publishing industry is paid only for what it does, becoming a service provider in a system of academic communication owned and controlled by the producers. Suggested roles for librarians as information navigators or gatherers seem dubious; but they may have a role in the development of resource discovery systems and access tools which will help lecturers to identify and make available appropriate learning materials, and perhaps also in training users to evaluate and select information resources more critically. National coordination and intervention are required to ensure that relevant high quality information services are actually available over the networks.
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