Home | Multimedia digital service delivery (Summary)
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SCOPE

Issues dealt with in this guideline include:
Filtering and blocking
Chat-lines
e-books
e-serials
Streaming video
Videoconferencing
Geographic information systems

POLICY ISSUES

The IST programme explicitly supports movement towards high-quality, affordable general interest services and the e-Europe action plan promotes access to such services.

The Report from the European Commission's Task Force on Educational Software and Multimedia included a recommendation that all public libraries should offer free access to multimedia resources so that citizens can benefit from information services, arts and cultural activities and education and training facilities.

Specific national strategic approaches such as the Peoples’ Network in the UK embody and seek to implement this approach.

Public libraries have a strong modern tradition of supplying access to materials in non-print formats. The LibEcon2000 Millennium survey shows that in 1998 the total stock of audio-visual items in European public libraries was 1,233 million (5.2% of the total holdings).

The balance between print, multimedia holdings and access to Internet resources has continued to change rapidly since then, raising new issues about the future role of the public library in providing and managing ‘virtual’ rather than physical resources. The move towards digital content will also have an impact on space allocation within libraries as users will require PCs and other equipment in order to be able to make use of it on the premises.

Policy makers and managers of public libraries across Europe need to assess the extent to which they are in the business of providing multimedia services which are partly or wholly delivered electronically to the home and develop strategies accordingly.

Public libraries, museums and archives themselves hold and create some digital or multimedia content, often in special local collections which may include newspapers, photographs, maps manuscripts, sound recordings (e.g. oral history), local art collections and film or video. (See digitisation for guidelines on digitisation). Collections of ‘virtual’ Internet (e.g. local or thematic) resources can be created and packaged at little cost and are a way of extending the library's conventional functions.

It may be attractive in countries with a large, long and rich legacy of documented cultural history, to concentrate on such out-of-copyright collections as a way of minimising the need to deal with IPR problems. However, if public libraries, museums and archives are to compete in the longer term as content providers supplying services over wide networks, they will need to engage fully with the rights-holding community about licensing the re-use and repackaging of in-copyright content (see also copyright and legal issues).

The librarian has an important role as a selector and organiser of multimedia resources and as a user guide. Part of the public librarian’s role will be to bring order to the rich anarchy of the Internet, designing and creating good quality public library services which can be accessed remotely.

The challenge for libraries is how to integrate new formats into the traditional library service model where they do not involve physical items and so, for example, do not fit into existing acquisition or circulation model. Staff will require additional training and new resource management models will need to be developed

Public libraries may find that increasingly their users are no longer visiting service points or interacting with staff. A large percentage of borrowing services may become automated and take place through the catalogue only. Like banks, libraries may find that such automation brings a need for rationalisation and re-engineering.

Charging for multimedia services - see funding

GOOD PRACTICE GUIDELINES

The assurance of accessibility for all users to multimedia resources including disabled people is of key importance (see disabilities). Public libraries need to ensure usability including easy navigation, searching, help and functioning links.

Infrastructure
The delivery of effective multimedia services by public libraries requires bandwidth and a need for partnerships with telecommunications service suppliers to ensure the availability of adequate bandwidth for service delivery. (See delivery channels). Libraries also need to provide adequate numbers of PCs, printers and other equipment to enable their users to access multimedia resources within the library.

Formats and standards
Identification and application of standards is a crucial area. Standards for digitisation exist or are developing in a number of areas, i.e. technical standards for data capture and storage; description, cataloguing and indexing standards; metadata standards for cross-domain resource discovery, and preservation standards. (See resource description & digitisation (including file formats for digital images).) Full descriptive coverage of relevant standards is provided by the IST-funded Diffuse service.

The range of multimedia services which public libraries may seek to supply includes:

Internet resources
The Internet provides a multimedia environment for the enjoyment of entertainment, recreation and the arts, the exercise of imagination and the exploration of ideas as well as for the use of information, news and educational resources. The Internet has something to offer every service of a public library, not only reference and information. As public libraries start to provide public access to the Internet they are faced with a number of operational issues:

Home | Multimedia digital service delivery (Summary)
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