1996 ASIS Mid-Year Meeting: The Digital Revolution: Assessing the Impact on Business, Education and Social Structures

Bulletin of the American Society for Information Science, Feb/Mar 1996

The concept of the Digital Revolution relies on two senses of the word revolution: that of drastic change, as well as that of motion allied with rotation. The first suggests the upheaval that we now confront; the second is a reminder that we have been here before. Other massive social changes, such as the Industrial Revolution, raised equally profound questions and challenged the way we view the world. What does it mean to participate in this revolution? What does it mean to ignore it?

The Digital Revolution, simply put, involves both subtle as well as radical changes in the way information is created (by anyone, for example, with a home page or email account as a soapbox), stored (in media, as yet unknown in archival quality) and transmitted (more and more of it, faster and faster in numbers we struggle to comprehend).

We like to think the effects will be felt by everyone, and in terms of population groups, this is true--young and old, men and women, all nationalities, creeds and religions. No employment category will be left out--academics, clergy, police, architects, sales people and technicians. But within each of these groups, individuals will be omitted--and the distance between those who are included and those who are not is ever widening.

Any discussion of information demands the consideration of many paradoxes. Perhaps the most important for the 1996 ASIS MidYear Meeting is that of information's economic nature. It is an important economic good, but it is also an essential component of all political and social interaction, especially in open, democratic societies. It is a social good that contributes to the social good: exacerbating the distance between those that have and those who have not.

The 1996 ASIS Mid-Year Meeting is an exploration of the issues and effects of this Revolution on the ways we conduct business, the ways that we teach and the ways that we interact to build a social structure that forms our society. The conference seeks to identify and understand the dynamics of these changes and to develop and debate methodologies for this assessment.

Conference Committees

The program for the 1996 ASIS Mid-Year Meeting was developed under the direction of Jose-Marie Griffiths, technical program chair, and her committee members: Ann Bishop, Philip Doty, Carol Hert, Paul Kantor, Cecilia Preston, David Rodgers and Gretchen Whitney.

Local activities were planned by Pat Earnest, local arrangements committee chair.

Acknowledgment

ASIS is pleased to announce that Microsoft Library and Microsoft Network (MSN) are sponsors of the 1996 ASIS Mid-Year Meeting communications room and messaging system. Support from Microsoft will provide Internet access enabling conference attendees to check their e-mail and send secure messages to all conference attendees.

Plenary Sessions

Keynote address by Sherry Turkle, MIT Media Labs

Dr. Turkle's most recent research is on the psychology of computer-mediated communication which is reported in her latest book, Life on the Screen: Identity in the Age of the Internet. Among her other writings are "Project Athena at MIT" and "Growing up in an Age of Intelligent Machines: Reconstruction of the Psychological and Reconsiderations of the Human."

Address by Arno Pen:ias, vice president of research, AT&T Bell Laboratories

Dr. Penzias was the 1978 recipient of the Nobel Prize for his work in radio astronomy confirming the "big bang" theory. His latest book is Harmony: Business Technology and Life after Paperwork.

Program Sessions

As always, the ASIS Mid-Year Meeting program will change slightly as the meeting date approaches. Only by remaining flexible can the program committee ensure that presenters and presentations represent current thinking for the timely topic selected as the meeting theme. The program information that follows is current as of the date of publication of this issue of the Bulletin of the American Society for Information Science. For complete and frequently updated program information, point your WWW browser to http:// www.asis.org and follow the links to Meetings, 1996 Mid-Year Meeting (available after February 29). Or contact asis@cni.org to receive a complete copy of the program by mail or e-mail.

Technical Session Topics and Scheduled Speakers

MONDAY MAY 20

Information Policies and Principles

Alexandria Declaration of Principles and the GII, Ching-chih Chen, Simmons College

Big Brother is Watching You: The Panopticon in the Information Age, Julie Albright, University of Southern California

Assessing Impact from the Outset: Establishing a Strategic Research Program and Cooperative Research Policy for a New Community Network, Linda Schamber, University of North Texas

Digital Libraries: Tools, Usage and Models

The Distributed Data Repository: Tools for the Digital Library, Shelley Ford, Defense Technical Information Center Understanding Digital Library Use: From Information Retrieval to Communications Support, Lisa Covi, University of California

Digital Library Models and Prospects, Gregory B. Newby, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign