Recently, we have been involved in an ongoing discussion regarding the past, present and future of government information. Our discussions have coalesced around five key areas of concern. In the past a citation, advertisement, identification by NTIS or submission of a print order to the Government Printing Office alerted the community and its primary disseminating agencies to the existence of a publication. Even so the continual problem of fugitive publications was a source of concern.
Identification leads to cataloging and indexing of the material by the respective agencies.
With the advent of agency self-publication on the web this arrangement is no longer tenable. There needs to be a reassertion of the government s primary responsibility for providing identification and cataloging of the information it disseminates. Print forms are not liable to be corrupted or tampered with. What a user holds in her hand is clearly identified as a government publication. The answer to this question is crucial in any information setting.