The Challenge

America has an abundance of recorded information, not a shortage. However, this precious resource is concentrated in relatively few locations, often virtually inaccessible to millions of people, and is lying largely untapped. Thus, the challenge is to find the means for making these resources available to more people through an effective identification, location and distribution system. Many local library facilities and procedures designed for other times and conditions can no longer cope with the ever-increasing volume of information produced in this country and abroad-nor can they fully satisfy the rapidly-changing information needs of our society.

The information-dependent institutions in our society— business, industry, agriculture education, government, professional societies, and others concerned with information service -are alarmed by the deteriorating ability of some information facilities to meet the essential needs of their constituents. In some fields, such as medicine, where the need is great and perhaps better understood, Congress has passed special legislation for development of information systems tailored to those specific requirements. These have been successful. In other fields, where the need is no less great, there has been little or no Federal activity. Local programs to improve libraries and provide better information services have usually been uncoordinated—lacking in continuity, overall leadership and sufficient funding. The nation must take steps now to strengthen and organize these resources into a coherent nationwide system, or it may soon face a form of information chaos which will sap the nation's intellectual energy and weaken its educational structure. Although information and knowledge exist in prodigious quantity in our country, they are unevenly distributed, and we often do not have the means to move relevant information to those who need it at the time they need it.

New networks can be developed where required and existing ones can be extended to allow requisite information to be moved to individuals and groups, some of whom can scarcely be expected to travel to the established information resources available today. If this is not done, the nation's ability to adapt to changing environmental, societal and political conditions and to find solutions to major problems is diminished. Without valid and timely information, the economy can atrophy;

without current and reliable information, society and government may falter; without relevant and useful information, individual development can languish; and without adequate means for distributing information, new knowledge backlogs. Libraries and information centers in the United States are not developing according to any national plan, and consequently, from a systems viewpoint, their growth continues to be uneven and lacks cohesion. There are gross inequities in library service in the United States today. A new philosophy of library and information service is needed, one based on a common sense of direction and purpose, a commitment to national cooperative action, and a consistent program of equalization.

The scope of the Commission's charge by Congress encompasses the library and information needs of all the people of the United States. It is the Commission's view that the time to introduce remedial and innovative reforms is now, and not later when the information crisis has become worse. Consequently, the Commission has directed its efforts toward planning a new nationwide program for better, faster, and more effective library and information services, a program which would eventually provide people everywhere in the country with access to broad reserves of intellectual energy, so that they may lead full, satisfying, and productive lives as creative and responsible members of society.

The Influence of Technology

This nation's future capability to handle information effectively will, to an important degree, depend on how well and how rapidly we are able to integrate new technological methods and devices into the mainstream of our information activities.

Libraries are affected by four new technologies: computers, micrographics, telecommunications, and audio-visual media. The use of computers in libraries has already been pioneered. However, direct application of computers in libraries has been focused mainly on housekeeping functions; the computer's potential for recording, analyzing, and retrieving information has not yet been fully explored and realized. In addition, there are critical shortages of trained human resources and funds to help libraries convert from manual to machine methods.

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The use of micrographics for preservation and compact storage is increasing but is far from widespread. While many publishers are making books, journals, and even entire libraries available on microfilm, there is still user resistance to materials in microform because special equipment is required for reading. In order for anyone to read the information in a small microphotograph, it must be magnified for viewing. Lack of an inexpensive portable reader, lack of standardized forms of film, and related equipment incompatibilities, have seriously slowed the rate of acceptance. It has become clear, however, that microfilm technology offers considerable potential for space and cost savings in libraries and represents a new era in information transfer. Together with the computer and telecommunications it promises to become a powerful force in shaping future library and information systems.

Libraries have been reasonably active in acquiring audiovisual materials: films, filmstrips, slides, audio cassettes, videotapes, video cassettes, and computer tapes. Unfortunately, capable personnel to handle such materials are in short supply, and the equipment is not only complex and expensive, but, in many cases, so little standardized that it causes difficulty and confusion to the user. A critical source of evaluation is needed to cope with the profusion of new and often incompatible devices that continually appear on the market.

Community Antenna Television (CATV), also known as cable television, is a technology still in its infancy. CATV stations have very powerful antennas that enable them to capture TV signals from many distant transmitters and retransmit the signals to the home through underground cables. Today, the technology embraces versatile broadband communication systems capable of providing the subscriber, by means of cable, with many channels and, potentially, two-way communication of both picture and sound, facsimile service and access to data processing. It thus becomes possible to bring sound and picture answers to information questions directly to individual home TV sets, over CATV educational channels reserved by Federal Communications Commission regulations for this purpose. Although there have been some library experiments exploring the possibilities for developing new library services and providing remote use of present services, much more needs to be done before the full potential of CATV for library applications is realized.

The potential for telefacsimile reproduction among libraries is very promising, but present costs per page of transmission and copyright considerations hamper its extensive use.

The joining of such diverse technologies as computers and telecommunications represent a new capability of great potential value to the United States. As yet, the nation has not perceived the far-reaching consequences of being able to distribute information to distant points with relative ease. CATV systems and computer data banks are just beginning to be used by libraries as means for information dissemination.

In the last decade, technology for the creation, processing and transmission of information has been vastly extended. Numerous on-line computer information systems are operating, and it is now realistic to consider harnessing the power of technology for new systems of organization, retrieval and distribution of information through networks. Advances in technology, and in information practices, occur each year. The Commission believes that the potential of the new technologies must be utilized to the fullest extent possible, and that this potential can be realized only by means of coordinated planning and adequate financing.

National planning for information technology is essential for several reasons. First, information technology is costly, and a long-range commitment from the Federal Government is required for sharing costs, contributing to research and development, and ensuring the stability of the program. Second, information technology is complex, and a common sense of technical direction at the national level is imperative, if all relevant agencies are to coordinate their activities effectively. Third, information technology is specialized, and its implementation will depend upon the technical education of the people who will work with it. And, finally, information technology breaks down former barriers to access.

Its introduction, therefore, invariably alters traditional ways of doing things and necessitates national concentrated attention on re-education of the specialist and the user.

There are two other important reasons to plan on the national level: (1) the rising cost of conventional library operations requires that information activities develop cooperative arrangements, which, if done outside of a national context, will be very difficult to interrelate; and (2) today's Federal

policy decisions with respect to telecommunications can greatly affect information practices for many years to come.

A Threshold Issue

Resolution of the complex problem of copyright is crucial to the continuing development of cooperative programs and networks among libraries.

It was the Copyright Law which enabled the United States to achieve for its people the freest, the most uncensored, and the widest dissemination of information in history. Copyright is, in fact, the Constitutionally prescribed means for promoting the progress of science and the useful arts. It provides the creator a limited monopoly, not in the ideas, but in the form in which they are embodied.

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In recent years, because of the widespread introduction of easy-to-operate copying machines and simplified means for distributing information electronically, the issues relating to copyright protection have grown increasingly complex. If the nation is to maintain the open and free society we enjoy today, with broad dissemination of information, then an updated system of copyright is absolutely essential.

Copyright issues are now before the Congress. An eventual solution must address the "threshold problem" of reconciling the rights and interests of authors, publishers, and other providers of information-in order to encourage the continuing creation and dissemination of their intellectual work-with the interests of the user in obtaining ready access to these works. The judicially constructed doctrine of “fair use” provides only a partial answer to this problem, and new solutions must be worked out which will maintain the economic viability of publishing in the context of new technological means of reproduction and electronic distribution.

The Commission believes that it is essential that the needs of networking systems should be among those considered by the Congress in devising new statutory provisions, and that a sound and clear copyright policy be worked out which retains incentives for those who create and disseminate cultural and intellectual materials.

Workable means must also be found whereby the library community can satisfy its legal and moral obligations to the author and publisher while meeting its institutional responsi