Does User Modeling Research Impact IR Systems Design? (SIG HCI)
Two main approaches exist for information retrieval (IR) research.  One has focused on retrieval systems and processes, referred to as the systems centered approach. It continues to be an active area of investigation, particularly among IR researchers in computer science. The other, known as the user centered approach, encompasses cognitive, interactive and contextual aspects of IR interaction. Both approaches have contributed significantly to the knowledge base of IR research; however, very little crossover has taken place between the two paradigms. 

The panel speakers will discuss their IR projects and how they have dealt with both approaches.

Designing Discipline Oriented Information Systems Two Models: Agriculture Network Information Center (AgNIC) and the Center for Electronic Resources in African Studies (CERAS)
The session provides two different subject oriented models of web-based collaborative development in designing and building distributed information systems, AgNIC and CERAS.

The Agriculture Network Information Center (AgNIC) is a distributed formation system created by an alliance of five institutions. Alliance members will discuss the history, management and funding of AgNIC, the process undertaken to create phase two, and the specific characteristics of this final design.

Digital Libraries in the K12 Environment (SIG CR, VIS)
The session will focus on developments in digital libraries for the K12 environment.  A number of projects have recently been undertaken, funded by the federal, state and regional governments, to help educators to make effective use of these materials. These projects address issues such as structure and organization of a multimedia database, retrieval issues associated with multimedia, and user issues related to sharing materials in a curriculum development environment, and student use of web materials for their schoolwork.  This panel will describe four projects.

Advances in Social and Organizational Informatics: Implications for Information Science
There has been a long standing interest in Information Science (IS) in the relationship between Information Technology (IT) and social change.  One approach which overlaps with IS in its focus on this relationship is Social Informatics (SI), defined as "the interdisciplinary study of the design and uses of information and information and communication technologies and their interactions with institutional and cultural contexts."  Recently, there has been interest among information scientists in building and strengthening the visibility of SI as an area of inquiry.

The purpose of this panel is to discuss current understandings of SI and their relevance for the IS community. The Social Informatics home page is at: http://www.slis.indiana.edu/SI

Research on New Interfaces for Information Visualization (SIG VIS)  VIS-Research
In their 1997 ARIST review article on Visualization of Literature, White and McCain regarded visualization techniques as the latest technology to help create "the interface between people and literatures." In this session, four research groups will present their recent research results and implementation on how they apply visualization techniques to connect users with the information.  From a different perspective, each group will describe their research backgrounds, approaches, and results.  Each group will also demonstrate their latest implementation of their respective visual interfaces.

Gary Marchionini, University of Maryland
Howard White, Katherine McCain and Xia Lin,  Drexel University
Robert Korfhage, University of Pittsburgh
Henry Small, Institute for Scientific Information

Theory and Practice in the Organization of Images and Other Visuo-Spatial Data for Retrieval: From Indexing to Metadata (SIG VIS, CR)
Image retrieval in the age of digital collections presents several major challenges to systems designers, among them being heterogeneous user groups, sheer numbers of images in these collections, and the need for new descriptive methods for digital images. There remains a great need for theory from which to proceed in the development of image retrieval systems. Two panel sessions will report on advances and explorations in the development of theory for the indexing and retrieval of both still and moving images (image typologies and ontology) and on utilization of this knowledge in practice (metadata for images and other types of visuo-spatial data), with particular emphasis on new organizational structures being proposed, developed and tested.

Session 1: Indexing and Retrieval of Images and other Visuo Spatial Data: Image Typologies in Theory and Practice

Mapping the visual universe: toward a typology of picture collections
James Turner, Université de Montréal
Image Typologies: Functional Representation
Brian O'Connor, Emporia State University
Accessing Image Collections by Browsing Through Standard Thesauri
Andrew Gordon, Northwestern University
Typologies of Images and Image Uses
Elizabeth Bellas, Corbis Corporation.

Andrew S. Grove, CORBIS, Moderator

Intellectual Property Hearings
Tom Kalil, National Economic Council, posed a question to ASIS at the '97 Annual Meeting — whether the membership of ASIS has a consensus on what the unrestricted property protection initiatives should contain. This is the second of two sessions for the purpose of hearing the viewpoints of ASIS members and other interested parties, to instigate productive discussions between possible disparate opinions, and to gather ideas that can be used in formulating a white paper on ASIS views on data base protection.

Hearings Panel:

Marjorie Hlava, Access Innovations
Bonnie Carroll, Information International Associates
Debora Shaw, Indiana University
Dick Kaser, National Federation of Abstracting and Indexing Services

Theories of Information Science
There are intermittent complaints that Information Science lacks theory. This session, the fifth annual session on theories of Information Science, provides a forum for theoretical work in Information Science.  Speakers from three different countries will examine theory relating to the conference theme:  "Intellectual property: An oxymoron" by Thomas Froehlich will challenge a fundamental assumption about the global information economy.  In "Cultural studies of Information Science,"  Bernd Frohmann explains why the generally assumed distinction in discussions of information access between technical advances and social and cultural constraints is fundamentally mistaken and counterproductive.  Pertti Vakkari, in "Theoretical growth in Information Science," will analyze the growth of our theoretical understanding of information seeking.

Accessing Full-text: Integrating Electronic Resources (SIG LAN)
Many libraries are increasing the A&I databases available to patrons while at the same time expanding access to electronic full-text.  Linking the bibliographic citation and the full-text improves patron ease of use.  These links can be created through collaborative relationships between database producers and publishers, or created locally based on the local library's electronic holdings.  Database vendors and academic libraries will present reports of implementation of linking projects. The usefulness of the Digital Object Identifier (DOI) in providing linkage to content held by various rights holders will be considered.

Margery Tibbetts, California Digital Library
Anita Cook, OhioLINK
Helen Atkins, Institute for Scientific Information
Myron E. Schirer, Edmund Stanley Library at Friends University

Accumulation Economics: Issues in the Economics of Web Link Collections
One of the methods for establishing and fortifying a World Wide Web presence is shopping for links to sites that complement or supplement an organization's site.  Usually this involves one or more staff surfing the WWW seeking 'interesting ' sites.  At issue is the economic value of such activities.  When there is no established policy to guide collection, how are they selected and how beneficial are such accumulations?  In cases where there is a collection policy, how effective is it and how is it monitored?  The economics of a site collection policy or lack of it and its implications will be examined.  A discussion of the type of criteria and the retrospective fit of a policy to an established site collection will be undertaken. 

M. J. Norton, University of Southern Mississippi
Marjorie Hlava, Access Innovation, Inc.
Douglas Kaylor, Wright State University
Vivian Hay, The Getty Information Institute

Using the Web for Global Business Intelligence (SIG MGT)
Company data that have been available in various formats are now being replicated in the Webbased, multimedia hypertext format. This format enlarges the information scope (e.g., the same piece of data can convey different information in print than if it is put in the Web format). Webbased company data can be updated more regularly than any other format, and are accessible to anyone who can access the Internet. The same companies that generate the data find themselves retrieving data from the Web on the regular basis, in order to learn about competition, customers, potential trading partners-- that is, performing activities of business intelligence (BI). In addition, the Web integrates the old communication channels, such as discussion forums for business purposes, providing, in effect, access to this source of BI as well. The Web is becoming a vehicle for global BI.

Just how useful is the Web as the source of company and other business data? What are the perspectives of users in different parts of the world regarding information, technical and other issues that pertain to collection of business data in the Web? What is the quality of business data that are located in/accessible thorough the Web? What should information seekers be aware of, given the complexity of the global cyberspace? What should information managers do once these data are collected; what validity tests are needed; what are the other issues specific to the Web data with regard to ordinary usual stages of information life cycle; is there anything extraordinary in the life cycle of information based on Web data? What are the technical capabilities and opportunities regarding the management of Web sites that have to do with collection and exposure of business data in the Web?

International Trends and Issues in Classification and Subject Analysis Research.  (SIG CR, III, ISKO)
As the global information economy expands,  solving problems needs increased international collaboration in both practical and theoretical research.  Structures necessary for information management and access in the global arena need to be determined.   Clearly, traditional classification and subject analysis systems need rethinking.   This session brings together internationally known and active speakers  to discuss  issues of  access and structure for documents in all information environments and for all kinds of users.  The session is sure to generate a lively and fruitful  discussion. 

Worldwide Dewey
Joan C. Mitchell,  OCLC Forest Press, Library of Congress Decimal Classification Division
Ten Years of International  Subject Analysis Research
Ia Mcilwaine, Editor, Universal Decimal Classification, Chair, FID/CR, University College London and Nancy Williamson, University of Toronto
Current Trends in International Classification Research: Implications and Recommendations for Future Developments
Hanne Albrechtsen, and Birger Hjorland, both The Royal School of Library and Information Science (Denmark)  

Classificatory Structures and the Construction of Reality: Applications and Integration into LIS Schemes
The very activities involved in representing information for later retrieval differ from the activities involved in developing the content of a field through that field's internal discourse.  The LIS classification, consequently, must both effectively draw on the world view and conceptualization of the field being described, and also add its own unique shaping and design of the material for effective information retrieval.  That different mix of requirements necessarily produces retrieval classifications different in character from disciplinary content classifications.  A fundamental question for our field is how can we design the best classification to resonate with the understanding of the disciplinary member, while at the same time achieving the desired good retrieval?

Dialogical Aspects of Mapping Interdisciplinary Concepts in Classification Schemes
Lynne Howarth, University of Toronto 
Reading Classifications:  Society, Values, and Classificatory Structure
Clare Beghtol, University of Toronto
Webs of Meaning: the Role of Lis Classification Schemes in a New Sociology of Information Systems
Hanne Albrechtsen, The Royal School of Librarianship (Denmark) 
The Unique Knowledge Domain That Is Classification for Retrieving Information.
Marcia J. Bates, University of California, Los Angeles

Globalization, Information Technologies and Evolving Partnerships Between Large Companies, and Small and Medium Size Enterprises (SMEs) (Information for Industry Committee for FID, cosponsored by SIG/III and SIG/MGT)
Large companies are now developing new relationships with small and medium size companies (SMEs).  What kinds of information exchange is take place between SMEs and the computers of large companies?  How does the Web broaden the information exchange between organizations?  The new processes and relationships represent a paradigm shift.  Companies must be concerned with how they can mutually make best use of staff and resources and strengthen one another.What will be the effect of the internet  in the relationship between SMEs and large organization? How will organizations change as a result, and what is the potential role of information managers?

Margie Hlava, Access Innovations
Don Gilbert, Information Technology, National Retail Federation
Koji Tamura, Manager (External Information),  Japan Science and Technology Corporation
Karl Kalseth, Norsk Hydro
Irene FarkasConn, Arthur L. Conn & Associates, Ltd.

Doctoral Forum

Barbara M. Wildemuth, University of North Carolina Chapel Hill

Improved Internet Access: Guidance from Research on Indexing and Classification   (SIGs CR, CRS, ALP and IAE)
How well the potential of the Internet and the World Wide Web can be tapped for providing information access in the global information economy depends, in the first place, on whether information on the global network is accurately and consistently represented via indexing and classification. In addition, it depends on whether the search tools and the interface to these tools adequately support exploration of the semantic space defined by the indexing. This panel will present research reports on Internet indexing and classification by hyperlinks, file/directory names, domain names and digital objects. It will also discuss the implications of findings regarding the design of search tools and the interface to these tools. The different perspectives of Internet indexing and classification discussed by the panel should enable Internet users to better understand how they can effectively organize and access information in this global environment, and to help designers of search systems develop more effective designs.   

Heting Chu, Palmer School of Library & Information Science, Long Island University
Shaoyi He, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Marisa Urgo, KRA Corporation
Janice P. McDonnell,  Information International Associates, Inc.
Wallace Koehler, Consultant
Philip J. Smith, Ohio State University

Cross-Language Applications and Large Scale Vocabularies
This panel will examine the design, implementation and employment of crosslanguage or multilingual vocabularies in various applications such as information retrieval, information routing, information summarization and text translation.  Recent years have seen  increasing attention given to multilingual resources such as multilingual thesauri and terminologies.  Important aspects being researched are the construction of such resources whether from existing vocabularies or from large corpora; their underlying ontologies; problems in keeping them up to date; challenges in dealing with ambiguities of various kinds; the evaluation of such resources and finally their effective integration into various applications.  This panel will focus on reports and demonstrations for works in progress; current issues and problems; as well as innovations and strategies for further research.

Large multilingual vocabularies: Structure and software requirements
Dagobert Soergel, University of Maryland
Cross-Language Information Retrieval and Automatic construction of multilingual lexicons
Noriko Kando, NACSIS (Japan)
Terminology in a Translation Context
Gertrud G. Champe, Director, Translation Laboratory
Logical relations of equivalence and inclusion in a multilingual/multicultural thesaurus
Michele Hudon, Universite de Montreal

Knowledge Discovery in Databases — Tools and Techniques to Assist in Collaboration (SIG ALP)
Knowledge Discovery in Databases (KDD) involves the application of data analysis algorithms to assist in the discovery of patterns in a particular for or set of data.  Data discovery can take place across several sources, making it an important technique for collaborative environments.  Data mining tools and techniques for mining free-form text for automated annotation and indexing, for creating algorithms, and for visualizing and explaining the knowledge derived in the mining operation.  While the potential for data mining is significant, the results are only as good as the tools, techniques, and the data to which they are applied.  This program features developers of data mining tools speaking to the techniques behind some of the best known tools and current applications.

Claude Vogtel, Chair, Semio Corporation
Rob Mattison, SPSS Inc.
Ramakrishnan Srikant, Data Mining Group, IBM

The Ethics of Access: Global Perspectives (SIG HFIS,TIS)
This session will address both ethical foundations and practical applications of ethical thinking to global access issues.  Access issues involve diverse political, sociological, and cultural contexts and ethical dimensions to be explored within those contexts.  Ethics can assist stakeholders with conflicting interests to find common ground and reach consensus in institutional and public policy making.

Fee or Free: Ethical Issues in Charging for Information Services
Thomas J. Froehlich, Kent State University
Global Information Justice: Reflections upon the Universal Declaration of Human Rights Article 19
Martha M. Smith, Indiana University
UNESCO's Information Ethics Initiative: Access for All
Rainer Kuhlen, German UNESCO Commission

UNICODE:  Present Standards, Implementation Issues, and Future Directions STNDS-Unicode

The digitization of information and its international distribution has been one of the driving forces behind the effort to develop an international character set that can be used as a universally recognized means of representing information.  This session will describe such a character encoding scheme called Unicode. The speakers will discuss its development, problems discovered in implementing it, how it was implemented in MARC, and present a survey of vendor implementation of the Unicode standard.

Kurt W. Kopp, University of Missouri, Moderator

© 1999, Association for Information Science
Last Update:February 22, 1999