The Community Networking Handbook

Sandra Parker (School of Information Studies, University of Northumbria at Newcastle)

Library Management

ISSN: 0143-5124

Article publication date: 1 December 2000

51

Citation

Parker, S. (2000), "The Community Networking Handbook", Library Management, Vol. 21 No. 9, pp. 501-508. https://doi.org/10.1108/lm.2000.21.9.501.1

Publisher

:

Emerald Group Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2000, MCB UP Limited


Public libraries must become involved in the bigger picture of the life of the whole community if they are going to survive healthily into the twenty‐first century. The rhetoric about the role of the public library from the new Labour Government in the UK has been very positive. The development of the National Grid for Learning has energised library workers. There is money available for training – mostly courtesy of DCMS/Wolfson Challenge Fund and the New Opportunities Fund – but the principles are being established and, after decades of neglect, the quality of staffing skills is being addressed, especially those needed for role confidence in a networked future. There is investment coming for libraries from the National Grid for Learning to provide the necessary infrastructure, and Chris Batt joined the LIC, which became the Museum, Library and Archive Commission, and quickly changed its name to Resource, to oversee its development and effectiveness. The opportunities are all in place for librarians to move into the learning age and the knowledge‐based economy with confidence. The two books under review are therefore timely.

Alistair Black and Dave Muddiman look with suspicion on the networked world (Black and Muddiman, 1997). They believe that librarians are in danger of thinking that investment in the “kit” is more important than the “stuff” that comes down the wires. They thought that members of communities need face‐to‐face contact, mentoring, counselling and support more than a computer terminal. Sheila Pantry’s book Building Community Information Networks: Strategies and Experiences begins to illustrate that there are ways of providing the vital link between the nerds and the needy in the UK.

It has always been assumed that the USA and Canada are at least two years ahead of Europe in ICT developments, but in Stephen Bajjaly’s book, The Community Networking Handbook, he reveals that, at the time of writing, there were only 215 established community networks in the USA and Canada and that less than one‐third identified a library as a major partner. Pantry’s book indicates that there are many exciting developments in Europe that parallel the work in the USA.

Local authorities in the UK are under close examination by the Government. Tony Blair speaks of the lack of willingness to change and the bureaucratic structures that bedevil local democracy. We have long thought that the provision of information for democracy was one of the roles and functions of the public library service and the mission statements of some libraries start with this responsibility. Pantry gives us a set of strategies and experiences, which will help us build those very networks that will convince the political masters and mistresses that the public library counts, and that they ignore it, do not invest in it and do not support it at their peril. In the USA, the “National Information Infrastructure” reflects our “National Grid for Learning”. As Bajjaly says: “Americans continue to have a love affair with their libraries, but they have difficulty figuring out where libraries fit into the new digital world” (p. 14). The same must be true of the UK, where some librarians also have the same problem.

The twenty‐first century will need all communities to be networked in this way. If we as librarians do not do it, then other people will. As we learned with PRESTEL, they just do not have the information skills necessary and thus will do it badly. As Bajjaly says: “The library is the natural leader of the community networking effort … what other community institution knows more about delivering information services?” (p. 14).

Sheila Pantry has assembled the major leaders of public library service development in the UK. David Miller gives definitions and reviews of developments during the 1990s, with useful information on establishing a community information network. Some of the sections are, by their nature, a little simplistic, but could easily be expanded by the reader referring to some of the thousands of books devoted to specific subjects or by examining some of the excellent sites now available and by looking at the EARL “Best on the Web” awards (to which some of the authors could have referred). The vision of what can be achieved is exciting.

However, with both books, it is the time delay in publication which is the enemy of the detail. With the average life of a Web site currently standing at seven months, many of the data provided are now likely to be substantially out of date.

In Pantry’s book, Helen Leech’s chapter “Better communities through better information” should bring joy to the hearts of Muddiman and Black. “There are big questions here which can only be resolved by librarians acting as a community and approaching the electronic world with energy, openness and vision. Do we need a central database, are the regions the solution, do we need a Web ring, a search engine or something new?” (p. 46).

In both books it is the “experiences” dimension that is very valuable. In Pantry, various useful models are outlined – the city approach, the local network, the specialised subject approach, even a specific groups model – that of the “Women connect: using and shaping the Internet together – women getting online and connected”, by Marion Scott and Margaret Page. The part that the European Community has played in stimulating the development of networks, by training, encouragement and investment is well demonstrated. There are models here that could act as good role models; for example, the City of Cambridge, which uses the site for community involvement and publishing as well as for information. Bajjaly covers “Good ideas” in all of his many wide‐ranging chapters.

Both books cover the strategic thinking necessary to develop community networks, planning the networks, developing partnerships, managing and funding issues. Bajjaly goes into further details on the important issues of training staff and users, marketing and evaluation of the networks. It has a good bibliography, which incorporates useful Web sites and an Appendix “Learning from others”, which has an annotated list of useful organisations. The Web sites are all linked from the author’s Web site (www.lirsui.sc.edu/stephen/bajjaly.htm) that makes access easy.

The chapters are short and pithy in Pantry and there is a very useful Glossary. There is a very short print bibliography but it has a list of many Internet sites as would befit such a volume, though strangely the Web sites are listed in random order. The art of the Web site citation protocols is not as yet fully appreciated even by the doyennes of the profession.

The books would be valuable additions to any library, particularly as a snapshot of where public libraries in Europe and the USA are at the end of the century. The nature of the medium is that many of the facts will have changed and developed, but librarians need to move ahead together in this field if the New Library is going to become a reality. The books may provide a stepping‐stone to encourage us all to have the vision to move forward.

References

Black, A. and Muddiman, D. (1997), Understanding Community Librarianship: The Public Library in Post modern Britain, Ashgate, Aldershot.

EARL http://www.earl.org.uk/about/bow.html

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