World Libraries on the Information Superhighway: Preparing for the Challenges of the Next Millennium

Currently, little is known about library experience and success in providing Internet-based services to library patrons. Some studies conducted in the United States indicate that this is an area of great uncertainty, into which libraries are hesitant to venture. Issues such as planning, budgeting and costs, and types of services are some of the areas of concern. World Libraries on the Information Superhighway: Preparing for the Challenges of the New Millennium explores issues of Internet-based services in libraries and provides practitioners and educators with examples of libraries that have achieved success in this important emerging information area.

Patricia Diamond Fletcher is associate professor at the Department of Information Systems, University of Maryland Baltimore County. She is also Research Associate at the Maryland Institute for Policy Analysis and Research at the University of Maryland Graduate School. She has had a lifelong interest in libraries and takes special interest in their continued prominence in today's information world. Fletcher also studies U.S. government and information policy. She has published numerous books and articles on information technology management in state, county, local and federal government. She is an associate editor of the Journal for Global Information Management. She sits on many conference steering committees, the most recent being the CS2000 Committee of the Association for Computers and the Social Sciences and the Technology Working Group for the American Society for Public Administration's Y2K Conference.

John Carlo Bertot is an Associate Professor in the School of Information Science and Policy, University at Albany, SUNY. He teaches courses in library technology planning and technology applications, telecommunications policy and information policy. He is the co-author, with Charles R. McClure, of "Moving toward More Effective Public Library Access: The 1998 National Survey of Public Library Outlet Internet Connectivity" (US National Commission on Libraries and Information Science, 1999). With Charles R. McClure, Bertot has published several studies of U.S. and Victoria, Australia public library Internet connectivity as well as articles on the use of electronic networked resources by public and state libraries. Bertot and McClure are co-principal investigators for a U.S. Institute of Museum and Library Services National Leadership grant to develop national network statistics and performance measures for public libraries.