responsibilities of authors, editors, publishers and...

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RESPONSIBILITIES OF AUTHORS, EDITORS, PUBLISHERS AND DOCUME NTALISTS IN QUICK TRANSFER OF INFORMATION Indicates the vital necessity and importance of quick tr ansIer of published information. Points out that this transmission is a chain-like procedure which has been aptly termed as 'Information Transfer Chain' by the Pr ••sident's Science Advisory Committee. Dis- cusses the fundamental responsibilities of the various people involved in this chain. Examines the existing praCtices which ultimately hampers the speedy and effective communication of information. Suggests some feasible methods for effecting improvement in existing practices. INTRODUCTION A common practice adopted now-a-days in almost every article on documentation is to highlight the problem of literature explosion and to point out the inability of the scientist to keep hirnseif uptodate with the current developments in his discipline. Whilst it is true that it is well nigh impossible to read everything that is published in one's field of activity, it is, nevertheless, essential to be aware of the latest developments and trends in the field; lest his knowledge would become obsolete and result in possibly mediocre efforts. For the scientist, to be abreast of his times in his field of activity, he needs to be informed, most effectively. To do so calls for a system of information services that . should provide the scientist with pertinent ; information as soon as it is available. The : system, simple as it appears, in volvesjat least ~t?.t!rparties, who bear the"'~'e;p~nsibi- ,T[iies for quick dissemination of information , 'from the source to the us e r, The Io ur' parties are the .-\r.thor , Editor, Publisher and Docu- rnen t al i s t who form the connecting links in the , information transfer chain. Before an analysis is made of the role and responsibilities of these four parties in the chain, it would be apt to quote Prof Derek J de Solla Price [1), who puts:- Vol I4 No 4 Decem be r 1 q 67 BALARAMA Electronics 6 Radar Development Establishment, High Grounds, Bangalore-l. :"It is probable that 80% of all scientific papers can be had from about 1000 periodicals and 80% of chemical' papers would corne from the biggest specialist journals, less than 100 in number, and even that better than 9510 of the chemi- cal literature could be had from less than 200 of the most eminent journals". This clearly indicates that among the 50,000 scientific and technical periodicals, only 1000 periodicals cover 8010 of useful litera- ture. Therefore, li te r atur e explosion is not such a serious problem. The main indication in Prof Sol la Price's statement is the enor- mous scope for selection. Therefore, if proper selection is made, the scientist will be able to read the selected literature in his field of specialisation, thereby greatly reduc- ing the degree of obsolescence. The main problem of literature explosion is to bring pertinent published information to the notice of respective users within the shortest possible time. Howe ver , the required information is scattered in various types of publications and ,this has to be located, collected, stored, retrieved and disseminated, which, in essence is 'documentation'. Several people are involved in the pro- cessing of information right from the creator of thought, the author, and the various agencies in between the author and the actual user. This entire information process is chainlike and has been aptly called 'Informa- tion Transfer Chain' in the President's Sci- ence Advisory Committee Report[2J. This chain which is shown diagrarnatically (see 'p.188) operates like a switching system. \ The ultimate aim of this procedure is to iconnect the user to the proper information as quickly and effectively as possible. It, there- fore, becomes apparent that people involved in this chain bear equal responsibilities for ,quicker dissemination of information. 187

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Page 1: RESPONSIBILITIES OF AUTHORS, EDITORS, PUBLISHERS AND ...nopr.niscair.res.in/bitstream/123456789/28403/1/ALIS 14(4) 187-194… · publishers and authors is of utmost impor-tance. Authors

RESPONSIBILITIES OF AUTHORS, EDITORS, PUBLISHERS ANDDOCUME NTALISTS IN QUICK TRANSFER OF INFORMATION

Indicates the vital necessity and importance ofquick tr ans Ier of published information. Points outthat this transmission is a chain-like procedure whichhas been aptly termed as 'Information Transfer Chain'by the Pr ••sident's Science Advisory Committee. Dis-cusses the fundamental responsibilities of the variouspeople involved in this chain. Examines the existingpraCtices which ultimately hampers the speedy andeffective communication of information. Suggestssome feasible methods for effecting improvement inexisting practices.

INTRODUCTION

A common practice adopted now-a-daysin almost every article on documentation is tohighlight the problem of literature explosionand to point out the inability of the scientistto keep hirnseif uptodate with the currentdevelopments in his discipline. Whilst it istrue that it is well nigh impossible to readeverything that is published in one's field ofactivity, it is, nevertheless, essential to beaware of the latest developments and trends inthe field; lest his knowledge would becomeobsolete and result in possibly mediocreefforts.

For the scientist, to be abreast of histimes in his field of activity, he needs to beinformed, most effectively. To do so callsfor a system of information services that

. should provide the scientist with pertinent; information as soon as it is available. The: system, simple as it appears, involvesjatleast ~t?.t!rparties, who bear the "'~'e;p~nsibi-

,T[iies for quick dissemination of information, 'from the source to the us e r , The Io ur' parties

are the .-\r.thor , Editor, Publisher and Docu-rnental is t who form the connecting links in the

, information transfer chain.

Before an analysis is made of the roleand responsibilities of these four parties in thechain, it would be apt to quote Prof Derek Jde Solla Price [1), who puts:-

Vol I 4 No 4 Dec e m be r 1q 67

BALARAMA

Electronics 6 Radar Development Establishment,High Grounds, Bangalore-l.

:"It is probable that 80% of all scientificpapers can be had from about 1000periodicals and 80% of chemical' paperswould corne from the biggest specialistjournals, less than 100 in number, andeven that better than 9510 of the chemi-cal literature could be had from lessthan 200 of the most eminent journals".

This clearly indicates that among the 50,000scientific and technical periodicals, only1000 periodicals cover 8010 of useful litera-ture. Therefore, lite r atur e explosion is notsuch a serious problem. The main indicationin Prof Solla Price's statement is the enor-mous scope for selection. Therefore, ifproper selection is made, the scientist willbe able to read the selected literature in hisfield of specialisation, thereby greatly reduc-ing the degree of obsolescence. The mainproblem of literature explosion is to bringpertinent published information to the noticeof respective users within the shortest possibletime. Howe ver , the required information isscattered in various types of publications and,this has to be located, collected, stored,retrieved and disseminated, which, in essenceis 'documentation'.

Several people are involved in the pro-cessing of information right from the creatorof thought, the author, and the variousagencies in between the autho r and the actualuser. This entire information process ischainlike and has been aptly called 'Informa-tion Transfer Chain' in the President's Sci-ence Advisory Committee Report[2J. Thischain which is shown diagrarnatically (see

'p.188) operates like a switching system.

\ The ultimate aim of this procedure is toiconnect the user to the proper information asquickly and effectively as possible. It, there-fore, becomes apparent that people involved inthis chain bear equal responsibilities for,quicker dissemination of information.

187

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BALARAMA

AUTHORS •• PUBLISHtRS...

EDITORS, ,.

• • ~ •• ••I I II I I .,.rI I I REUREES

I I I I

I I I II

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I II I •• STORAGE

L HRETRIEVAL

H----- DOC J1MENTA LISTS USERSDISSEMI-.,.. NATION I

1 RESPONSIBILITIES OF THE AUTHOR

IConatruction of Titles

The tendency of authors to give fancytitles to articles should be minimis ed, if notaltogether stopped. The author should con-struct the title using 'meaty' words in thetitle so as to make it self-expressive. Thispractice is vital for many reasons. First,some abstracting and indexing periodtcals like'Chemical Titles' provide subject index thl'oUgl.Keyword-in-Context and other Keyword index-ing methods. Keywords are selected and per-muted only from the title of the articlesindexed. Second, the user comes across onlythe title of the article in indexing periodicalsand bibliographical references which are sup-posed to aid his literature selection by reveal-ing the thought content of the article forfurther study. Thus if the title is not self-expressive there is a great danger of missingthe articles by the concerned user:

Preparation of Abstract

All the salient features of the articleshould be presented in the abstract. In someauthor abstracts it is found that the author'claims several things while not all of themare actually to be found in the article. This

188

I_.JIL _INFORMATION TRANSFER CHAIN

practice greatly misleads the user. It is,therefore, essential that the author has toprovide an indicative/informative abstract tothe article for the following reasons:

(a) to auist the user in decidingwhether or not he should read theoriginal article; and

(b) to act as a substitule for the originalarticle in case the original is notavailable.

One of the reasons for the inadequaciesin author abstracts is that authors are nottrained in the techniques of preparing abs-tracts. These shortcomings in the content ofthe abstract thus stand against their directinclusion in national and international abs-tracting periodicals. In an endeavour to faci-.litate better abstracting, Unesco initiated and .sponsored an international conference on Sci-ence Abstracting in 1949. An important out-come of the Conference was the publication ofa guide for the preparation of synopses (3).Some of the important rules from 'Guide forthe preparation and publication of synopses'are:

(a) Synopses should comprise a brieiand factual summary of the contentand conclusions of the paper. It

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RESPONSIBILITIES OF AUTHORS, EDITORS, PUBLISHERS &. DOCUMENTALISTS

should enable the busy reader todecide more surely than he canfrom t.he mere title of the paperwhether it merits his reading;

(b) Synopses should be intelligible initself without reference to the paper;

(c) Synopses should, only in exceptionalcases, exceed 200 words.

At present there is six months to oneyear time lag in reporting published informa-tion in abstracting periodicals. Severalreasons such as inadequacies in author abs-tracts cause this delay. If the authors prac-tice all the rules of the guide, the time lagcould be appreciably reduced.

Presentation of the Article

The effective communication of thethought content of the article to a great extentdepends upon the method of its presentation.Therefore, the author should lay great em-phasis on the manner in which the article ispresented. The author should make a cleardemarcation between the various parts of thearticle such as introduction and text (textcould be further divided into different sub-headings), Summary, Conclusions, Biblio-graphical References, Appendix, and arrangethem in a logical sequence. Interspersingthe article with diagrams, charts or tableswill enhance understanding of the article.

To bring all articles to conform to somestandard mode of presentation, the Interna-tional Organisation for Standardisation (ISO)brought out its recommendations which couldbe modified according to local conditions andneeds. If the ISO recommendations are prac-ticed, communication of information at inter-national level could be streamlined.

Bibliographical Citations and their Presentation

In the field of research, fundamental orapplied, new developments and innovations aregenerally the result of existing knowledge inthat particular area. This clearly indicatesthat existing knowledge facilitates the formu-lation of new thoughts or helps lead to newdevelopments. It is, therefore, necessarythat in all articles wherein already recordedinformation has been used, the references tothose should be given mainly to show theassociation of ideas between his and pastliterature. Citation of recorded informationis also necess.ary for the following reasons:

Vol 14 No 4 December 1967

'(a) to provide a list of relevant docu-ments on the subject concerned forfurther study;

(b) to show the authenticity of any state-ment that has been made in the text;

(c) to acknowledge the sources consultedand to show that listed items havebeen used as source documents.

From these reasons it will be observedthat each cited bibliographical references (BR)carries a message. It is therefore necessarythat citations should be communicated clearly.But normally authors are instructed to citeBR according to publishers' pattern. Authorsare often required to restrict information inBR to a minimum because of space limita-tions in the periodical. To counter thesedifficulties several plans, have been sug-gested, particularly by McCasland, Reid(Sigil System) and Charles Bishop (CodenSystem). All these plans formulated a codewith information such as Title (host periodi-cal), volume and page number in its extremeabbreviated form.

These plans were criticised by Dr. Boaz,who pointed out that a single printing mistakewould mean a total loss of information. Also,these plans violate the basic tenets of citingBR.

Therefore each cited BR should be com-plete in itself. But presently there is nouniform practice followed in citing BR. Somejournals provide author and locus while insome only locus is given. Authors and periodi-cals who provide incomplete informationregarding BR are defeating the very purposeof BR, since the principle function of BR isto proviJeiTistof relevant documents whichcould be profitably used by the user to selectdocuments useful from his point of view.Further, if complete information in a BRsuch as author, title, locus, inclusive pagina-tion is provided, it not only helps the user in·selection but also gives an idea of cost in-volved for its procurement, if it is not avail-.~~le locally.

ISO soon took up this problem and for-mulated recommendations which were issuedas ISO/R77 which were later adopted byBritish Standards and Indian Standards intheir publications B~ 1629/1959 and IS 3281/1963 respectively. -

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BALARAMA

In this context cooperation between thepublishers and authors is of utmost impor-tance. Authors. unfortunately. are bound bythe practice followed by the periodical towhich they submit their papers for publica-tion. It is. therefore. necessary that pub-lishers change their practice. if cited BRhave to be purposeful. and the best means isfor publishers and authors to follow the re-commendations given in I BibliographicalReferences' (ISO/R77).

The recent exploitation of the BR em-phasizes the extreme importance of quotingreferences - these are Bibliographic Couplingand Citation Index. Bibliographic Couplingwhich was developed by MM Kessler [4]. isan objective study of finding out the relationbetween two or more papers on the basisof their bibliographic citations in common.IThe utility of this study is to find out the! possibility of listing all the articles togetheron the basis of their coupling strength whichreveals the relevancy of the thought contentor association of ideas. Citation index. whichis part of 'Science Citation Index' developedby Eugene Garfield[5] is a kind of subjectindex in a new dimension. to the selectedsources of literature. It is an ordered listof cited articles each of which is accom-panied by a list of citing articles.

Abbreviation of Titles of Periodicals

The titles of periodicals for rn an im-portant part in bibliographical citations. TheStandards for BR recommend abbreviation ofthe title of the periodical. The main objectof abbreviating the title is to save somelinear space. It is also argued that theprimary purpose of abbreviation is economicfrom the point-of-view of scientists and thatit saves time and effort of the user. However.the authors can take full advantage of the re-commedations made by different standards toabbreviate the title of the periodical. but theabbreviations thus made should be self-evident and be easily decodified by the users.

So far several standards to facilitate auniform code of practice to abbreviate titleshave been published. Notable of these arethe 15/18 and lSO/R4. Besides. AmericanChemical Society and WorId List of ScientificPeriodicals (WLSP) have formulated theirown atandar ds, In fact ISO recommendationsare based on WLSP practice. ISO has also

190

suggested to various countries to modifylsO/R4 to suit their own requirements. Withthe availability of these standards. authorsshould follow any of these and in this context.cooperation of publishers is very muchrequired. Publishers. instead of establishingtheir own method of abbreviation. shouldadopt anyone of these standards. This willgreatly avoid confusion and difficulties toeveryone involved in the 'Information Trans-fer Chain'.

Listing Bibliographical References

There is no uniform practice followed inthe order of listing BR. Some per iodtcal alist author's surnames in alphabetical order.while others list chronologically. The for-mer method serves little purpose. The usefulorder would be the one wherein items of theBR are referred to in the text. Each referreditem may be numbered serially and thenarranged accordingly at the end of the article.As far as possible. citing BR as a footnote orwithin the text of the article should be mini-mi sed, if not avoided altogether. It will bemore useful if all citations are consolidatedtogether and given at the end of the article.

'Keywords' for the article

It will be observed that the authorcannot use all the keywords pertinent to thearticle in the title. But it will be useful ifauthors supply all important keywords apartfrom those used in the title. This will beparticularly useful in providing subject indexto the article. In order to quickly preparesubject index and to provide all possible ap-proaches to the user. authors should choosekeyterms from the standard subject headingsor Thesaurii. AlEE. AlCheE and WRUhave ibrought out tllesaurus in the field of Engi-neering, Chemical Engineering, and Metal- ilurgy respectively.

Implementation of the 'Code'

A liaison Committee was set up byFID/ICSU/lFLA/lSO/UNESCO to study anddevise international measures to improve thepresent position regarding scientific informa-tion and its publication. The committeeobserved that absence of universally accepteddiscipline for drafting and publishing scienti-fic information was one of the reasons thatcaused unnecessary additions to the volume

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RESPONSIBILITIES OF AUTHORS, EDITORS, PUBLISHERS & DOCUMENTALISTS

of documents published and to the expenur-ture involved in printing, abstracting, listingand locating them.

According to proposals made by theInternational Council for Scientific Union(ICSU) Abstracting Board, the Liaison Gom-rntttee issued a code entitled 'Code for GoodPractice for Scientific Publications [6, 7). Therules laid down in this code should be obvious-ly rno r afly binding on every author of scientificpublication and its editor. The vital impor-tance of adopting uniform international stand-ard in documentary scientific information ise rnph as ized , The standard which is appl ic abl euniversally will make it possible to arrive ata single method of drafting author's sum-maries, a single code for abbreviating per-iodical titles, a s in gl e code for BR citationsend a single code for transliteration of cha-racters of one alphabet into those of others.

I The 'Code for Good Practice' has been!published by Unesco with the conviction that

observance of the rules of the code will en-hance the value of the information containedtherein and reduce the enormous expenditur eincurred by s clentiftc and technical documenta-tion c en tr e s of all countries. Some of theimportant rules of this code are that:

a) All original texts shall be aCCOIn-pani ed by an abstract, to be com-piled by the author himself.

b) Abstracts shall be drawn up in con-formity with the 'Guide for the pre-paration of synopses' (Unesco docu-ment NS/37D lOa).

c) The category of the pap~r should bespecified as stated below:

1. an original scientific paper;2. a short communication; and3. a subject review article.

d) The text shall fully describe themethods employed and significantresults obtained.

e) Explicit reference shall be made toany work previously published inorder to evaluate how the presentedtext fits into the general picture ofscientific progress.

.f) The international rules governing theabbreviations of titles of periodi-cal s , the order of bibliographicalreferences, symbols and abbrevia-

Vol 14 No 4 December 1967

tions, transliteration, terminologyand the layout of articles should befollowed.

2 RESPONSIBILITIES OF EDITORS 8<PUBLISHERS

Non-self-expressive Titles

Publishers should reject, if they find thetitle of the article is not revealing the thoughtcontent of the document or should ask theauthor to retitle it. Also, the responsibilityof publishers is to see that the article iscarrying synopsis and bibliographical refer-ences. Although, it is the responsibility ofthe editors and referees to ascertain thequality of the synopsis and adequacy of biblio-graphical citations, the publishers at any cost,shoul d not accept articles for publication·;,;h.ichcarry no synopsis.

\\.

Sub Standard Articles

Publishers should not approve the arti-cles which are sub-standard. This is one ofthe ways of controlling the exponential growthof literature. This point has been clearlybrought out in the Unesco document 'Code forgood practice'. Also, the Presidents' Sci-ence Advisory Committee suggested to theauthors to refrain from unnecessary publi-cation. The Committee felt that the inade-quate means of switching between informationsystems is one of the causes for redundant.publ ic attoris , If the switching device - titleannouncements, abstracts, referral services-were fast and efficient, the redundancy couldbe eliminated. However, the publ ishe r s withstrict editorial policy should establish goodstandards and any contribution below thatstandard should be discouraged.

Page-proof Articles to Secondary Publications

The responsibility of publishers is tosend the page-proof copies of articles to theabstracting and indexing periodicals, so thatthe time delay between the publication of theoriginal articles in the primary periodicalsand its inclusion in the abstracting and index-

·ing periodicals will be minimised. This is theactual recommendation made by the Inter-national Council for Scientific Union (ICSU)Abstracting Board.

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Announcernent of Accepted Articles

The publishers should announce in per-iodicals, the article accepted for publicationin the subsequent issue. This is most desir-able as there is a considerable amount ofdelay in the publication of articles. If thepublishers follow the above said practice, itcan definitely provide manifold advantagessuch as creating current awarene'!!s, mini-mising duplications etc.

RESPONSIBILITIES OF EDITORS

Synopses

Synopses (also called homotopic abs-tract) is a term adopted by the Royal Societyof London and by the Unesco InternationalConference on Science Abstracting, 1949, todescribe an authors' summary of a scientificpaper which is published simultaneously withthe paper itself, after editorial scrutiny. Ashas already been indicated, that the authorsare not trained in the techniques of abstractingand also they view the article from theirpersonal angle. This necessitates the editorto delete or supplement information and pub-lish it under his responsibility.

Bibliographical References

This is the most important item and thebasic purpose of this has already been indi-cated. Editors must ensure that it fulfils thebasic purpose and check each cited item for itscorrectness and adequacy. Normally, theciting author commits mistakes in givingVolume Number, Issue Number, Date ofPublication and some times the title of thehost periodical itself. All these items are tobe checked carefully and corrected if neces-sary. r-

Order of Listing Including Mode of Citation

Editors have to check the order of listingof bibliographical references including itsmode of citation. As has already been indica-ted, alphabetization according to surnames ofthe authors serve little purpose. Hence therecommended method has to be strictlyfollowed.

Reformation of Contents Page

Processing of technical information canbefurther quickened, if editors and publishersreform the contents page. The exi etIng prac-

192

BALARAMA

\!tices with regard to providing information inthe contents page vary widely and there is noFHorm practice. Contents page is an impor-~ant part in a periodical for the documentalistIso far as the current awareness service isfonsidered. The current awareness service'will be most effective only when the contentspage is complete in itself. Therefore, therole to be played by editors and publishers inreformation of the contents page is vital andthey have to consider the following items for

/incorporation in the contents page, if notalready being done.

(a)

(b)

Title of the periodical;

Volume Number, Issue Number,Date of Publication;

Inclusive pagination for each ar itcl e;

Dividing the contents page into broadsubject headings.

Some of the periodicals do not indicatethe title of the periodical on the contents page.This is a great handicap, since some docu-mentation centres at local level or nationallevel are bringing out 'current awareness list'by just procuring contents pages in advance.If the contents page is not indicating the titleof the periodical, then the documentationcentres have to procure the title page also toidentify the contents page.

Or, according to the recommendationsmade by the International Conference on Sci-ence Abstracting sponsored by Unesco, if thesynopses of all the articles appearing in asingle issue are printed together either insidethe cover or with advertisements on the backin such a way that it can be cut without muti-

. lating the pages of the journal, then it can beeasily detached and circulated among scien •.Hsts. Apart from these, if the contents pageiis divided according to broad subject headings,lit will be further useful in scanning through!the contents quickly.

Some journals are providing classifica-tion numbers at the top of respective articlesand almost all periodicals provide synopses. Ifeditors and publishers could provide thesedetails in the contents page itself (which theycando without wastage of space as it will beonly change of place), it would be most usefulfor the documentalist as he can bring out cur-rent awareness list in a classified form withabstracts within the shortest possible time.

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RESPONSIBILITIES OF AUTHORS, EDITORS, PUDLISHERS &. DOCUMENTALlSTS

1

Some current awareness services like. 'Current Contents', are providing authordirectory with the intention of establishingcontact between the author and the us er , Thiswork can be quickened if the author's address

; is also provided in the contents page.

I .Location of Contents Page

There is no fixed place for the contentspage in a periodical. Some publishers printthe contents on front cover, while others onthe recto of back cover. But providing thecontents page in this manner, especially onthe front cover may cause difficulty in gettinggood photoduplicated copy for the purpose ofcurrent awareness service. This is due tocolour contrast. Therefore, it is alwaysbetter to provide contents page in a separatesheet inside the periodical with all therequired details.

3 RESPONSIBILITIES OF THE DOCU-MENTALIST

Creating Current Awareness

The documentalist share s greate st re s-ponsibility in the quick dissemination of infor-mation, or, 0 to speak, in switching infor-mation between the author and the user. Infact, the documentalist has to create thecurrent awareness in the concerned fieldamong the scientists. He has to constantlystudy the requirements of his clientele andas soon as the required information is pub-lished, it should be brought to the notice ofthe respective users within the shortestpossible time.

This can be accomplished, by procuringthe advanced contents page of the relevantperiodicals as soon as they are published andcirculating it in the form of photo copies ormimeograph. These services which are pro-ject-oriented services and are also termed asSelective Dissemination Service at local level.At local service library, reprographic equip-ment is not held as they are very expensiveand also they will not be in a position to pro-cure advance contents page by air mail. Insuch cases, the current awareness service hasto be rendered as soon as the periodicals arereceived in the library. The contents page ofimportant periodicals could be typed, omittingpuffs if any, in the alphabetical order by thetitle of the per iodical and quickly circulatedin the mimeographed form.

Vol 14 No 4 December 1967

The current awareness list can take anyform such as, contents -by-journal, ar range-ment of title under broad subject heading (e.g.Index Medicus) etc , Quickness is the essenceof such services. The current awareness listbased on contents-by-journal type is found toDe the quickest method in bringing the pub-lished information to the notice of the potentialuser. Any attempt at classifying articles andproviding feature headings including support-ing indexes hampers the speedy disseminationof information. Delay is caused by attemptingto provide a comprehensive coverage. In

'

fact, the current awareness service is a kindof temporary palliative for the user beforehe gets a comprehensive coverage of theitems in a classified form. This point hasbeen brought out by Mr PL Broadhurst[8]and he called it as one of the 'public pallia-tives'. The author actually recommendedthree public palliatives for the scientist whichare, current awareness service, KWIC index-ing and Citation indexing.

Circulation of Periodicals

Some of the local service librariesforward the current issues of the periodicalsitself to the scientist for current awarenesspurpose. There are several methods existingat present for routing of periodicals such ascircular routing, radial routing etc. Thereare several drawbacks in such practices. Forexample, in circular routing, the periodicalmay be stuck up at one place and all the timethe documentalist should be constantly vigilantand see that the periodicals are moving. Inthe case of radial routing also, the documenta-list has to be vigilant and get back the periodi-cals and pas s it on to the next us er. In boththese practices the time required is consider-able and by the time the periodical reachesthe last user, the currentness of periodicalsthemselves may be lost. The appropriatemethod would be to circulate a few copies ofthe contents page.

Pursuing Editors and Publishers

The documentalist should pursue theeditors and publishers to facilitate speedy dis-semination of information it is felt that exis-ting practices work at cross-purposes.Editors and publishers must be made to followthe code regarding the following particulars ofan article.

19)

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BALARAMA

(a) Pres entation of articles;

(b) Contents pages (including its occur-rence in the periodical);

(c) Titles of the articles;

(d) Synopses;

(e) Bibliographical references, itsorder of citation and the m.ode ofcitation; and

(£) Place of occurrence of biblio_graphical references.

4 CONCLUSION

Thus, if all the re sponsibilities of thevarious groups are carried out properly, thetim.e lag prevailing in bringing the publishedinform.ation to the notice of potential userscan be m.inimized, though not com.pletelyelim.inated. Also, the effective utilization ofpublished inform.ation can rem.arkably beenhanced. This undoubtedly elim.inates dupli-cation and stimulates further research whichultim.ately facilitates in bringing the econom.icgrowth of the country.

REFERENCES

[1] PRICE (D J De S): Is technology his-torically independent of science?Paper presented at a sym.posium. onHistorical Relations of Science andTechnology. Montreal. Dec 1964.

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[Z] U.S., PRESIDENT'S SCIENCE AD-VISORYCOMMITTEE: Science,Governm.ent and Information. Areport of the Presidents' ScienceAdvisory Com.m.ittee. The WhiteHouse. 10 Jan 19';3.

[3] UNESCO: Guide for the preparation andpublication of synopses. UNESCOdocum.ent NS/370 lOa.

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