Selection<Internet is neither acquired nor a single work>

[Burt, David]

The Internet is neither "acquired" when access is provided, nor is the
Internet in any way a "single work", like a book on the shelf.

Providing access to the Internet means providing the potentiality of
access to materials which do not exist in the library.  This is clearly
not the same as selecting and acquiring materials.  This is more closely
analogous to providing inter library loan or television broadcasts. When
I attended the University of Washington, the Undergraduate Library had
several television sets for viewing news and educational programming.
All channels except CNN and PBS were blocked.    Filtering means
restricting the potentiality of access to materials that do not exist
within the library.  That is no more censorship than is the
non-selection of materials.  Restricting the potentiality of access to
materials that do not exist in the library simply cannot be shoehorned
into being analogous with the removal of existing materials.

Some argue that selecting the Internet is like adding a book to the
shelf.  Filtering is analogous to ripping out pages or deleting passages
with a magic marker.
While this argument makes for some great imagery, the idea that the
Internet is a single work is both technically and conceptually
untenable.

Technically, there is no such thing as "the entire Internet".  Internet
web sites exist in different locations, operated by different people and
organizations, and are connected only by media.  What "the Internet"
means from one library to another varies greatly.  Some libraries offer
Usenet, electronic mail, Telnet, and Chat, while others do not.  Some
libraries offer text-only access, while others offer the images
available on the Internet.  Many libraries buy databases through the
Internet, which not every library offers.  Finally, which Internet
resources are accessible varies depending on the browser software the
library has installed.

Conceptually, the Internet is not a single work either.  What
constitutes a single work in other media?  In print, a single work could
be a book, a newspaper, a multi-volume set, a magazine, maybe even a
whole run of a magazine.  But the entire medium of print would never be
thought of as a "single work".  In a broadcast medium, a single work
would be a program, a movie, perhaps a series of programs, or an
evening's worth of programs.  But no one would ever consider all
television or all radio broadcasts to be a single work. The Internet is
a medium.  So obviously, a single work is some kind of a discrete unit
from within a medium.  What then is a single work on the Internet?   A
single work could be a page, a web site, or a group of web sites.  But
just as you would never consider all books or all TV broadcasts to be a
"single work", it is similarly erroneous to consider all web sites to be
a "single work".

Another defining feature of a single work is that it has a responsible
issuing authority, usually the publisher or broadcaster.  The publisher
is yet another way in which a medium is atomized. Print media have
publishers, printer and editors.  Broadcast media have networks,
stations, studios, and producers.  Each in different ways and in
different situations can be considered responsible issuing authorities.
Is there an analog in the Internet?  Absolutely, the owners of web
sites.   The Internet does not have a "single publisher", it has many,
many "publishers", and is thus atomized, and from this perspective, can
hardly be considered a single work at all.

 ----------
From: Shaken Angel
To: Multiple recipients of list
Subject: Selection
Date: Thursday, July 03, 1997 4:39PM


I think the argument by the pro-censorship folks on this list about how
filtering is okay since libraries already "filter" by the selection of
materials process is a bogus one.  The Internet, merely by being brought
into the library, is "selected".  Making inaccessible parts of the
Internet through the arbitrary application of morality is, in my mind,
akin to ripping out pages 23, 46 and 54 of some book because you don't
like what was said on those pages.

I don't think any librarian would dream of ripping pages out of a book.
However, the selection argument can still be applied here.  One can view
the Internet as a single product like a book, or a magazine.  You don't
like something in the product, exercise your rights as a selector and
don't buy it.  Simple.

 -- john f., miami university library systems.

Speaking, as nearly always, for myself.