From: Sterling IMD <root@imd.sterling.com>
Message-Id: <199204072151.AA28353@sparky.IMD.Sterling.COM>
Subject: Re: Usenet and Archiving of Electronic Journals
Date: Tue, 7 Apr 92 16:51:55 CDT
Newsgroups: comp.society

Stevan,

> Here are some tentative answers to queries about Usenet and the
> archiving of elecrtronic journals:

> These are very important questions, and are even becoming urgent ones.
> I am currently advocating that libraries set up Usenet or Usenet-like
> interfaces to make the existing electronic journals immediately
> available to their readership through public-access terminals like the
> ones that allow readers to search library book and journal holdings. The
> Usenet interface is not ideal, but it's a good first approximation, and
> it already exists. A lot of different customized interfaces would
> probably have more trouble getting started, and then there would be a
> nonuniformity problem.

I applaud your efforts.  Time to bring the libraries up-to-date...

> What I recommend is that libraries get a Usenet feed and restrict what
> they make available to the electronic journals on Usenet as well as the
> few higher level scholarly discussion Usenet groups in various
> disciplines. Of the 3000 or more groups on Usenet, fewer than 50 would
> qualify, perhaps considerably fewer. Once the Usenet software is set
> up, it is then easy to add to it, in the same format, "local" journals
> that do not actually originate from Usenet. So, for example, single
> subscriptions to non-Usenet electronic journals (that are distributed
> either through Bitnet's Listserv, or as independent mailing lists)
> could be "fed" into the local Usenet server and would then appear
> and be available like all the other Usenet groups. This is a first step
> that libraries could take immediately, and it would greatly accelerate
> the evolution of electronic journals.

I would be interested in your list of 50 that would qualify.  See
below about bit. hierarchy access...   I would hope that there would
be a little more to the restrictions (such as no posting) or the net
will see a potentially large number of anonymous posts from generic
accounts with no way to trace the offenders... :(

> Insofar as archiving is concerned, Usenet itself is very poor; the
> software saves the current material for a while and then just erases
> it. There may be some permanent central archive, but I don't know where
> it is or how it is accessed. Moreover, most of the material on Usenet
> is not WORTH archiving in perpetuum.

A rather subjective decision and one I would not want to make from a
general community standpoint...

>                                      So here too the libraries can take
> an active role, arranging for local permanent archiving (on tape and
> disk) of the chosen few Usenet journals, with some sharing of the load
> at a few selected remote sites. This way, the electronic journal archives
> will be multiple and distributed.

Usenet newsgroups, including bit.*, are being actively archived via a service
call NetNews/CD.  This service is putting Usenet news on CD-ROM.  Currently
most all news, minus a few newsgroups with copyright problems, are being put
on that media for standalone reading and future uses.  The service will be
putting out more specialized CD-ROMs in the future that are targeted towards
specific topics or hierarchies, such as a year of K12 on a CD-ROM...

> A question is asked about PSYCOLOQUY: This journal is published both
> ways. On Bitnet it is distributed by listserv@pucc.bitnet as "psyc" and
> on Usenet, it is gatewayed from phoenix.princeton.edu as
> "sci.psychology.digest." The Bitnet version is also archived by
> listserv, and back issues are permanently searchable and retrievable
> using the listserv software. As mentioned, Usenet itself does not
> provide an archive. However, we are also permanently archiving
> PSYCOLOQUY on princeton.edu, where it is publically searchable and
> retrievable by anonymous ftp (directory: pub/harnad). In addition,
> several libraries that are making PSYCOLOQUY available along the lines
> described above are also independently archiving it. Finally, secondary
> services like GOPHER are also archiving it. This redundancy is
> desirable and important. Finally, we are working on software for
> archiving and retrieval that will allow full-text, real-time searching
> using ordinary informal English queries (with the help of Bellcore's
> "Latent Semantic Indexing") rather than just by ftp or Boolean search.

I am very interested in the work that you are familiar with in the area
of text search technologies.  We are currently trying to evaluate as many
different methods and sources as possible in order to try to incorporate
a facility into the service.

If you are interested in the NetNews/CD service, either send mail to
myself or to cdnews@sterling.com.  The general information is also
available via anonymous ftp on ftp.uu.net in the ftp/vendors/sterling
directory.

I am sorry if this sounded like an advertisement.  It was not meant to.

                        -Kent+
---
Kent Landfield                   INTERNET: kent@IMD.Sterling.COM
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