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Ajiferuke showed that observed author distributions can best be described by a shifted inverse Gaussian‐Poisson distribution. Yet, in the framework of a model to explain observed fractional distributions of authors it is important to know whether a simple one‐parameter distribution such as a geometric or a truncated Poisson can adequately describe observed author distributions, at least in those fields where the single author is still dominant. In this article it is shown that for the field of information science this is indeed the case.

AS J. L. Hobbs shows so clearly in his recent book, the interest in local history is growing enormously at present. The universities, training colleges and schools, as well as the institutions of further education, are all making more use of local studies—geographical, economic, social and historical—in their regular courses, in their advanced work, and in their publications.

LIBRARIES NEED NO APOLOGY. They do not need to be justified by platitudes about the heritage which books convey from one generation to the next. They prove their value by daily service in education, in research, and—most important of all in the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland—in the spread of literacy. Of the three curses of Africa—ignorance, poverty and disease—one may argue that the greatest is ignorance, because the absence of knowledge prevents the elimination of the other two. The school can teach the elements of reading, can bestow on the pupil the basic tool of learning, but unless he has access to a suitable store of books on which to exercise this skill, it will steadily decay. The patient work of the teacher will have been wasted. This truth is gaining increasing recognition in Rhodesia and Nyasaland. Since the Second World War, urban and rural library services have grown up in all three territories of the Federation to supply reading material to the African population. In Nyasaland the British Council, in Northern Rhodesia the newly created Northern Rhodesia Library Service, in Southern Rhodesia the African Literature Bureau, have spread their activities far into the bush. Government, municipalities and mining companies have also attempted to satisfy the tremendous thirst for learning which exists among those Africans who work in the towns. No one would pretend that these library services are perfect. They have great difficulties of cost, distance and poor communications to overcome, difficulties which are scarcely conceivable by the librarian working in Europe. But there is a strong conviction of the need to bring the benefits of books to an ever larger proportion of the people.

PARLIAMENT passed the Equal Pay Act in 1970 and it comes into full force at the end of 1975. In the meantime a Government order could increase the pay of women to at least 90 per cent of men's by December 31st next year. Like other legislative forays into the industrial world in recent years, this Act, despite its deceptively simple title, bristles with problems and will greatly change the country's economic life.

The curvilinear shape of a bond price‐yield curve implies that risk management based on a linear approximation using duration is only viable for very small changes in interest rates. Not accounting for convexity when there are large yield changes can result in critical errors in measuring or hedging interest rate risk. The linear approximations will under‐or overestimate the value at risk (VaR) for non‐linear financial instruments. Nonlinearity can be particularly problematic if there are large changes in market risk factors. The large changes are more likely to occur when VaR is computed for high confidence levels and/or longer time horizons. Even if the movements in risk factors are small, estimation errors in VaR would get larger as the degree of non‐linearity in financial instruments increases.

Subcontracting of manufacturing work in the electrical/ electronics industry was surveyed. It can provide competitive advantage and is increasingly used for production of multi‐element components, and by younger more go‐ahead electronics manufacturers who make a clear distinction between what are “core” activities and therefore to be kept in‐house and what are not. The article discusses what type of work to contract out, the strengths and weaknesses of subcontractors and the stage at which to involve them.

The author of the Paint Testing Manual: Physical and Chemical Examination of Paints, Varnishes, Lacquers, Dr. Henry A. Gardner, has been honoured post‐humously by the establishment of the Henry A. Gardner Award by Committee D‐1 on Paint and Related Coatings and Materials of the American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM).