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The purpose of this paper is to provide a new and useful formulation of relevance.

This paper is formulated as a conceptual argument. It makes the case for the utility of considering relevance to be function of use in creative processes.

There are several corollaries to formulating relevance as a function of use. These include the idea that objects by themselves cannot be relevant since use assumes interaction; the affordances of objects and how they are perceived can affect what becomes relevant but are not in themselves relevant; relevance is not an essential characteristic of objects; relevance is transient; potential relevance (what might be relevant in the future) can be distinguished from what is relevant in use and from what has been relevant in the past.

The paper shows that its new formulation of relevance brings improved conceptual and terminological clarity to the discourse about relevance in information science. It demonstrates that how relevance is articulated conceptually is important as its conceptualization can affect the ways that users are able to make use of information systems and, by extension, how information systems can facilitate or disable the co-production of creative outcomes. The paper also usefully expands investigative opportunities by suggesting relevance and creativity are interrelated.

The purpose of this paper is to examine Robert Pagès' 1948 conception of “auto-document” as a possible forerunner to the neo-documentalist conception of “documentality” as offered in Bernd Frohmann’s 2012 article “The Documentality of Mme Briet’s Antelope.”

This paper is conceptual and historical.

Robert Pagès' concept of the “auto-document” in his 1948 article proposed an understanding of documents that depends on the “uniqueness” of a document. His article proposed a post-Otletian theory of documents similar to a discussion of documents by Bernd Frohmann in 2012 with the concept of “documentality.” Further attention to Pagès work and to Frohmann’s works could result in new understandings of Briet’s works, could illuminate other works and authors understood as belonging to neo-documentation and could yield new understandings of documents and information from the perspective of documentality as a new philosophy of information and documents.

Further attention to Pagès' work and to Frohmann’s works could yield new understandings of documents and the relation of documentary types across natural and sociocultural domains and bring renewed attention to documentality as a new philosophy of information and documents.

Attention to these issues could broaden the study of documents and documentation, increase the historical understanding of Suzanne Briet’s works and bring light to other works in neo-documentation, particularly in regard to the concept of documentality as a new philosophy of documentation and information.

Attention to these issues could broaden the study of documents and documentation to include more broadly animal and other natural entities and our relationships to them. The works cited also illuminate an empirical science understanding of documents, documentary evidence and information.

This is one of the first papers commenting on Robert Pagès’ works and brings renewed attention to Bernd Frohmann’s works, as well as to neo-documentation and its concept and philosophy of documentality, as a new philosophy of information and documents.