Role of librarians

[Doran, Kelly]

.On Wed, 18 Oct 1995 weibel at oclc.org wrote:
..
.> Thom writes:
.>
.> > You'd find that what your friend and most people want is a dialog with
.> > the author as to what they meant. With books this is impossible. With
.> > the net it is very possible.
.>
.> Nope... what my colleague wanted was a canonical reference to cite for
.> the purpose of establishing  scholarly linkages.   Please spare Tim the
.> burden of having to converse one-on-one with everyone who has an idea
.> about the Web and how it should work.
[snip]
.> A resource should be
.> accessible irrespective of the person or place that is the custodian at
.> some time or another.
..
. .. but, if the resource is a person?? This is the new part ... remember?

Yes, but what about archival functions? If, for instance, that particular 
person is now retired/ deceased/ working in another field/ moved to Ecuador 
and cut off from the net? In such cases, I'd much rather have a link 
directly to the paper or the resource than have to try to contact the 
person.

What about the work of teams, where two (or more) people collaborated on a 
work?

What about mind-numbing reams of data that support the conclusions of a 
study or project? IMHO, very few researchers will want to be bothered go to 
the trouble of personally digging up a bunch of numbers when such numbers 
could be reached automatically (i.e., through a direct link to a database or 
ftp server). Especially if the person(s) requesting them wanted to use those 
numbers to verify/disprove the study or go off on an unrelated tangent.

I've dealt with all three situations, with varying degrees of success. Some 
authors that I have contacted for information are pleased to send it to me, 
others don't bother to reply. These people have lives of their own, y'know.

My two cents...

Kelly Doran                        dorank@ wdni.com
Weyerhaeuser Company Technical Information Services

My opinions are NOT those of my employer, my parents, or anybody else.