ADMINISTRATIVE NOTES Newsletter of the Federal Depository Library Program [ PDF version ] [ Back Issues ] --------------------------------------------------------------------- February 15, 2001 GP 3.16/3-2:22/03 (Vol. 22, no. 03) --------------------------------------------------------------------- GPO Update Remarks by Francis J. Buckley, Jr. Superintendent of Documents Before the Federal Documents Task Force Government Documents Round Table American Library Association January 13, 2001 Washington, DC Welcome Good morning! It's a pleasure to welcome you to Washington, DC for ALA Midwinter-not only is this the Nation's capital, but for those of us from GPO, this is only a Metro ride away from home! To let you know what you're in for, as if you didn't know, here are some quotes from Frommer's Irreverent Guide to Washington, DC: * "Washington is...a city of paper pushers (okay, computer inputters now). It produces hardly anything except laws, policy, and opinions. Washington has 15,000 lobbyists and only 5,000 journalists to keep an eye on them; it also has 56 lawyers for every 1,000 residents, compared to a mere 8 per 1,000 in New York City." * Yes, Washington is a special place, and yes, it is fun to visit. You come here to walk in the footsteps of history (corny as it sounds), to behold soul-stirring monuments, to observe close at hand the workings of government, to visit august museums of art and of the sciences. But if it's urban electricity you're after, you'd be better off in Cleveland." And a quote from Steve Kerchoff, who worked with us last year as a Transition Specialist, writing about places to eat in Washington, in the latest issue of American Libraries: "ALA Members coming to Washington, DC for Mid-winter this month might be laboring under the impression that political life defines our nation's capital. Don't believe it for a minute. Politics merely gives Washingtonians something to discuss over lunch, for this city revolves around not politics but food." As Mr. DiMario and Andy Sherman said, we are in the midst of changes as we transition to a new Administration. Future Trends I recently was asked to talk to the Federal Publishers Committee about trends in government information and what the future holds. At the time I said that the crystal ball they issued me when I came to Washington was very cloudy and murky, but I could take a stab at it. So, what are the trends in Federal publishing? Well, today there are many and unfortunately they are widely divergent. As you know, in 1999 GPO and the National Commission on Libraries and Information Science (NCLIS) produced a report examining trends in electronic publishing in the U.S. Government. The survey report, "Assessment of Government Information Products," found an overall lack of Government information policy about electronic publishing, dissemination, and permanent public access or information life cycle management. One conclusion of the assessment is that "responsibility for electronic publishing within agencies is decentralized, diffuse and unclear." And not much has changed in the year or so since the report was released. Technology has brought new, rich opportunities-use of online and CD-ROM or DVD, to complement hard copy publications or microfiche. We are now seeing more than half the publications we procure or identify for the FDLP in electronic format. But what about the e-book? I see it as a fad right now with a lot of hype surrounding it. Currently, I don't see it as a vehicle for extensive government information dissemination. A roundtable discussion on the book business in this time of change, organized by Publisher's Weekly, resulted in an interesting article titled, "To E or Not to E and Other Questions" in the January 1, 2001 issue. Richard Curtis was quoted as saying, "I think this printed book versus e-book argument is a non-issue. Whether or not one medium will dominate the other...is not relevant, because the content...is everything." Beau Friedlander said, "When the hubbub has died down and the opportunists on the business side have milked it for all its worth, (e-books) will subside into about 5% of the book market, somewhat akin to audiobooks." Despite how much we have heard for so many years about the "paperless society" we can all agree that we are not there yet. There are still many popular consumer and education oriented publications being produced in print by agencies as well as special studies and reports, many of which are also up on the Internet. My vision is for mixed media in our future. The usual suspects, in a manner of speaking, drive format selection: * Agency mission * Goals * Funding * Public acceptance * Usability To continue the theme of change, for my whole tenure as Superintendent of Documents (all 3 years) GPO and the FDLP have been in a constant state of program evolution as well as the subject of legislative proposals for reorganization-whether from the library community, House appropriations, National Commission on Libraries and Information Science (NCLIS), or the General Accounting Office (GAO). We have been deeply involved in the transition to a more electronic FDLP with all of the various issues that this major program shift entails from identification, authentication, bibliographic description, indexing, PURLS, bandwidth, accessibility and permanent public access. Recently, the Public Printer has commented on the proposed reorganization plan for government information developed by NCLIS as an outgrowth of the proposal to close the National Technical Information Service, titled, "A Comprehensive Assessment of Public Information Dissemination Final Report." This report is accompanied by a legislative proposal, "Public Information Resources Reform Act of 2001." Both can be found on the NCLIS Web site at . Currently, we are working with staff from GAO, who were directed in the FY 2001 funding bill to conduct a comprehensive study on the impact of providing documents to the public solely in electronic format. The study is supposed to include: 1. a current inventory of publications and documents which are provided to the public, 2. the frequency with which each type of publication or document is requested for deposit at non-regional depository libraries, and 3. an assessment of the feasibility of transfer of the depository library program to the Library of Congress that: o Identifies how such a transfer might be accomplished; o Identifies when such a transfer might optimally occur; o Examines the functions, services, and programs of the Superintendent of Documents; o Examines and identifies administrative and infrastructure support that is provided to the Superintendent by the Government Printing Office, with a view to the implications for such a transfer; o Examines and identifies the costs, for both the Government Printing Office and the Library of Congress, of such a transfer, and o Identifies measures that are necessary to ensure the success of such a transfer. The study is to be submitted to the Committee on House Administration and the Senate Committee on Rules and Administration by March 30, 2001. Over the past few months, we have been called upon to provide a lot of material and related statistics about the FDLP, GPO Access and the Sales Program to GAO. We anticipate they will continue to collect information this month and be preparing the report in February and March. FDLP Operations and Statistics I would like to take this time to report on some recent FDLP operations. As noted in the LPS FY 2000 annual report, the distribution of tangible products through the FDLP continues to decrease, with a particularly sharp decline, as I noted earlier, in the number of microfiche titles. The only category of FDLP titles that increased were those that GPO links to at other agency sites, which rose by over 45% compared to FY 1999. Overall, 53% of the titles disseminated to depository libraries in FY 2000 were online. Paper distribution (12,442 up from 11,867) accounted for 22%, microfiche (14,493 down from 25,635) 23% (down from 35% in FY 1999) with CD-ROMs remaining at 1% (617, down from 682). Total tangible titles were down from 39,525 to 28,849. Total copies of 12,207,064 were down from 16 million. Dissemination/Distribution Policy for the FDLP (SOD Policy) After considerable debate this past fall regarding the implementation of the FY 2001 budget, a dissemination plan was drafted by LPS staff and reviewed by the Depository Library Council. The library community "nominated" titles to remain in paper. This effort culminated in the Superintendent of Documents' "Dissemination/Distribution Policy for the FDLP" dated January 2, 2001, officially known as SOD 71. These "SODs," as we call them, are used within GPO to document policy and form the basis for detailed operating procedures. Some of you recall SOD 13, which contains the policies about distribution in microfiche. This is the modern-day equivalent to guide format selection for the FDLP. It is accompanied by a list of essential titles for public use in paper format. Both the SOD 71 and essential titles list can be found on the Web at . Some issues that have been raised about this new policy: * Sales: Changes in the depository library distribution format do not affect whether the product is for sale by GPO. * Permanent access: We are archiving the products that are available only online, either here at GPO, or through a partnership. * Cataloging: Cataloging electronic products in the FDLP is the highest priority of LPS. It is important to note that what is key in the policy statement is that the primary dissemination medium for the FDLP is online electronic. Tangible products, meaning paper, microfiche, or CD-ROM, will generally be furnished only when certain criteria or circumstances exist. This direction has already been established by the Congress and put into practice by LPS. Our decisions have been made based on how we can best serve the information needs of the public. New Desktop Pages Two new pages available on the FDLP Desktop have information about the Electronic Collection and the FDLP/EC Archive. This material can also be found on the FDLP desktop. One page contains a statement on the FDLP's archiving policy. And the LPS staff has just posted a newly developed set of Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) about the Electronic Collection that addresses collection development, archiving, PURLS, locators, and cataloging. These can be found on the FDLP desktop page under Electronic Collection. To assist depository librarians with collection management and maintenance, LPS staff is developing a Collection Maintenance Manager. This forthcoming Web-based service is an extension and expansion of the Superseded List. The Collection Maintenance Manager provides in one location a searchable database with information to assist documents coordinators in making decisions about weeding, superseding and substituting materials in their depository collections. The database currently includes records from the revised Superseded List and the Substitution List: Official FDLP Permanent Full-Text Databases. In fact, the database is structured in such a way that would allow for future incorporation of other data sets and information about the online documents. LPS staff is indebted to the members of the Superseded List Update Committee who examined their Federal documents collections for additions and updates to the entries in the 1996 edition of the Superseded List. New Partnership Two libraries have joined GPO in partnerships in the past few months. The University of Central Oklahoma (UCO) has become the home of the Browse Topics Web site and The Library of Michigan has created a series of Web pages for Regional depository libraries. Browse Topics was one of the original Pathway Services, created by the Electronic Transition Staff at GPO in the first days of the FDLP's presence on the Web. It has been comprised of the contributions of volunteer bibliographers. LPS staff analyzed the locator tools last year and determined that Topics was a service that documents librarians and users value, and that by its nature the site lent itself to being managed by an FDLP volunteer. Adriana Edwards-Johnson, Documents Librarian at UCO, has been working with James Mauldin of the LPS Analysis Staff to move files to the UCO server. During the coming months, past contributors will be contacted and work started on updating and expanding the various topics. The Regional Depository Libraries Web Pages were created by Ann Sanders, Regional Depository Librarian at The Library of Michigan, to provide a convenient site for information about regionals' concerns and needs. I want to take this opportunity to thank not only our two newest partners, but those individuals and institutions that have provided support for the FDLP during this time of transition. I would also like to mention that following much negotiation, we are capturing information from the National Partnership for Reinventing Government (NPR) Web site and will be keeping it available through one of our many partnerships with the University of North Texas. Through the diligent efforts of Cathy Hartman, the UNT libraries provide permanent online access to electronic publications of selected Federal Government agencies which have ceased operation, or as we call it, the "cybercemetery." LPS Personnel Changes The LPS handout we have made available here this morning contains information about recent changes in work assignments among the managerial personnel. I would like to briefly discuss those and one other. I have selected T.C. Evans to be the Director of the Electronic Information Dissemination Service, otherwise known as EIDS. T.C has been with GPO since 1981 and has held a number of positions; most recently he served as the Assistant Director of EIDS. He was the Product Services Manager in EIDS; Chief, Documents Planning and Development Branch and worked in the Documents Technical Support Group. As many of you know, after 19 years, Sheila McGarr left LPS in December to assume the position of director of the National Library of Education. Robin Haun-Mohamed has been named the Chief of the Depository Services Staff (DSS). Tad Downing, Chief of the Cataloging Branch, is acting Chief of the Depository Administration Branch and he will also continue as Chief of the Cataloging Branch. Vicki Barber, Chief of the Depository Distribution Division, will be working with other members of my staff to assist in implementing the Integrated Processing System (IPS) in the Documents Sales Service. During this time, Colleen Davis will assume the position of Chief of the Depository Distribution Division. With the departures of Tom Oertel and Gail Snider and Cindy Etkin's move to become a Program Analyst, our inspection team was down to one individual, Charles Bradsher. I am pleased to announce that on January 2, Walter Zoller from East Carolina University came on board as an inspector. There is still one inspector vacancy yet to be filled and that job has been posted. Conclusion And to conclude, I would like to quote one more time from Frommer's Irreverent Guide to Washington, DC. Who could have guessed that GPO, through its bookstores, would be included-irreverently of course: "Bureaucrats, scholars and people who really have trouble falling asleep at night will want to peruse the official tomes at the U.S. Government Printing Office Bookstore - an indispensable outlet for impact studies, workplace manuals, statistical compilations, task force findings, technical reports, plus general interest material on health and leisure activities."