Newsline: News You Can Use

DOCUSEND PROJECT MANAGER

Docusend <http://www.docusend.ac.uk> is a national three-year project which began in May 2002 and is funded by the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC). The key project objective is to develop a journal article request and delivery broker service. The Docusend partners include the ten university libraries which comprise the Lamda electronic document delivery service <http://lamdaweb.mcc.ac.uk>, with King’s College London as the lead site. Docusend is part of the JOIN-UP project cluster <http://edina.ed.ac.uk/projects/joinup/> which consists of two further JISC ⁵⁄₉₉ projects hosted at EDINA and the BL/MIMAS Zetoc development and works to encourage the production of separate but interoperable services.

The Consortium is now seeking to appoint a project manager for the final eighteen months of the project. The post-holder will ideally be based at the Joule Library, UMIST in Manchester (although applications can be considered from candidates able to be based in one of the Lamda partner institutions in London, Leeds or Birmingham by mutual agreement). Applications from candidates seeking secondment to this post will be welcomed.

The responsibilities will involve the day-to-day management and implementation of the project, including the provision of input and advice for the strategic development of Docusend on issues such as customer base and content supply development. Liaison with the other JOIN-UP partners and the user community will also be important elements of the job. Applicants should be educated to degree level and have experience of project management together with excellent communication and liaison skills. Knowledge of document delivery and/or the publishing industry would also be advantageous.

Salary will be circa £28,498 to £33,679 (ALC3) depending on skills and experience. (In the case of an exceptionally qualified candidate appointment on ALC4 will be considered.) Holidays will be 25 per year, plus public holidays. Informal enquiries should be made to Ms Anne Bell, Director of Information Resources & Services at King’s College London and Docusend Project Director, email anne.bell@kcl.ac.uk

Announcement: Web-Wise 2003

Registration is invited at this time for the fourth annual Web-Wise Conference on Libraries and Museums in the Digital World, to be held in Washington, D.C. from February 26-28, 2003. The conference is sponsored by the Institute of Museum and Library Services and co-hosted by Johns Hopkins University’s Sheridan Libraries. This year’s theme is “Sustaining Digital Resources,” with discussions focusing on preservation and economic issues as well as on opportunities for increasing impacts and reaching new audiences. The conference will also highlight a number of innovative digital projects both in plenary sessions and in demonstrations during long breaks. The target audience is all those involved in the creation and use of digital resources, including library, museum and archives professionals, computer scientists, educators and learners.

Registration is limited in order to facilitate discussion and networking among participants. There is no registration fee; however, participants will be responsible for their own travel and lodging expenses.

The conference will take place at the Hyatt Regency on Capitol Hill, 400 New Jersey Avenue, NW, Washington, DC (near Washington’s Union Station). The conference will open with a reception at the hotel on the evening of Wednesday, February 26. A continental breakfast will be provided February 27 and 28 and lunch on February 27.

For more information about the program and to register, please see the conference Web site at <http://webwise.mse.jhu.edu>. You will need to register early to ensure your place.

To reserve a sleeping room at the conference hotel at the rate of $169.00/night + tax, please call (202) 737-1234 or 1-800-233-1234. In order to obtain the group rate, be sure to mention that you are attending the “Web-Wise” conference. The cut-off date for hotel reservations is Wednesday, January 29, 2003.

Questions about the Web-Wise Conference may be directed to Matt Burdetsky, Capital Meeting Planning, Inc. at (703) 536-4993 or matt@cmpinc.net

Web-Wise Preconference

This year a special Preconference Copyright and the Digital Age will be offered on Wednesday, February 26, 9:00 - 4:00, at the Hyatt Regency Capitol Hill. The Preconference is organized by the University of Denver Penrose Library, Colorado Digitization Program, the National Initiative for a Networked Cultural Heritage (NINCH), and OCLC, and with funding from IMLS and OCLC.

Speakers include: Peter Jaszi, American University; Georgia Harper, University of Texas; Lolly Gasaway, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill; Maria Pallante, Guggenheim Foundation; Rachelle Browne, Smithsonian Institution, and Linda Tadic of ArtStor. There is no registration fee, but YOU MUST REGISTER SEPARATELY FOR THE PRECONFERENCE. The Preconference agenda and registration is posted at <http://www.oclc.org/events/register/rightsmanagement.shtm>

2003 Agentcities: Challenges in Open Agent Environments

The Agentcities Challenges in Open Agent Environments ‘03 Workshop will be held in Melbourne, Australia as part of the 2nd International Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems (AAMAS’03).

The workshop will focus on the practical deployment and application of Agent technology to large-scale, open heterogeneous environments: How can existing research be applied? Is it mature enough for use in real large-scale open systems? What are the most significant issues to be considered (technical, social, legal)? How do agent-based solutions relate to those from other technologies? and what is the role of standards & integration with industrial strength application software?

This area of work has become increasingly important with the emergence of industry and Internet developments such as Web Services, ebXML and GRID computing. These initiatives are beginning to enable the deployment of increasingly automated software components in the public Internet. The aim of the workshop is to act as forum for discussion of whether and how agent technology can help in this challenging new environment.

Last year’s Challenge’02 attracted 52 paper submissions, 60+ attendees, see on-line papers at: < http://www.agentcities.org> and will have proceedings published by Springer-Verlag in early Spring 03 as part of the LNCS series.

ERPANET Training Seminar
Policies for Digital Preservation

The programme for the ERPANET seminar on “Policies for Digital Preservation” has been released. ERPANET is happy to have enthused speakers with a background in digital preservation policies. Speakers will provide their valuable experiences, and thereby equip participants with the necessary skills to develop and implement digital preservation policies.

This two day training session, co-hosted by the Archives de France, will be held in Fontainebleau (near Paris) on January 29-30, 2003.

Venue
The venue at INSEAD, one of the worlds premier business schools, has been kindly made available by the Archives de France.

To Register
The cost of this seminar is 150 Euros. This price includes learning materials, lunch, and additional refreshments. Please register at <http://www.erpanet.org >. For any additional information, please contact dutch.editor@erpanet.org or coordinator@erpanet.org

Collection-level description and the information landscape
Users evaluate strategies for resource discovery

Thursday 30th January 2002, Hughes Hall, University of Cambridge

The Fifth Collection Description Workshop will concentrate on user needs, incorporating experiences from a range of disciplines and domains. The workshop will explore user studies and evaluation reports in order to highlight the ways in which CLD’s can help to facilitate information disclosure and discovery.

The workshop will focus on the needs of the “end-user”, who may be a researcher, a student or a member of the public. The workshop will also look at issues of accessibility with special reference to the physical accessibility of both collections and collection-level descriptions.

There is no charge for this event.

Further details and a booking form are available at: <http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/events/>