****Begin File******************Begin File*******************Begin File**** *************************************************************************** ISSN 1069-7799 ALAWON ALA Washington Office Newsline An electronic publication of the American Library Association Washington Office Volume 3, Number 65 October 28, 1994 In this issue: (160 lines) ALA PRESIDENT CURLEY PROPOSES LIBRARIES AS KIOSK TEST SITES SEATTLE PUBLIC LIBRARY PROVIDES WHITE HOUSE ELECTRONIC CITIZENS HANDBOOK LIBRARY OF CONGRESS RECEIVES $13 MILLION TO DIGITIZE COLLECTIONS *************************************************************************** ALA PRESIDENT CURLEY PROPOSES LIBRARIES AS KIOSK TEST SITES In a statement by ALA President Arthur Curley on October 27, ALA proposed that public libraries be designated as trial sites for new electronic information kiosks to be developed by the U.S. Postal Service (USPS). The "Citizen Kiosk" Pilot Program, announced last week by the USPS, would provide basic information about postal and governmental services such as stamps by mail, zip codes, commemorative stamps, job bank information, applications for local, state and federal services. (See ALAWON, Vol. 3, No. 63.) "It's a great concept but a wasteful one if they don't take advantage of what's already here," said ALA President Arthur Curley. His statement was supported by the ALA executive board which met this week in Chicago. "Public libraries collect, organize and distribute information at more than 16,000 sites. We have more outlets than McDonald's. And we have staff who are professionally trained to assist the public with their information needs." Curley noted that 773 million people turn to public libraries each year for the information they need. Some 1,400 libraries across the country already serve as government depositories for a wide range of documents. Many offer a wide range of electronic information services, including government information through the Internet, to the public. "Libraries are where people are used to getting the information they need. We're optimistic that the Clinton Administration and Postal Service will recognize it makes good sense to build on the system that's already there." Curley said that ALA supports the Administration's goal of connecting every library to the National Information Infrastructure by the year 2000 and has proposed preferential telecommunication rates, federal legislation and other strategies to help achieve this goal. "Our nation's libraries are the foundation of our nation's information infrastructure. They make information affordable, available and accessible to people of all ages and backgrounds. In the Information Age, that means providing information online as well as in print. As librarians we are concerned that public' right to know be guaranteed through their public libraries." ALA has initiated inquiries into the feasibility of libraries becoming kiosk test sites with the Postal Service. Librarians from across the country have also inquired about the USPS proposal and the potential role of libraries in such a broad scale information project. Many library supporters have contacted the White House and their Congressional representatives to emphasize the existing and critical role libraries already play in providing public information. Some libraries in the Washington, D.C. test area are considering trying to become test sites. *************************************************************************** SEATTLE PUBLIC LIBRARY PROVIDES WHITE HOUSE ELECTRONIC CITIZENS HANDBOOK The Seattle Public Library (SPL) is already one of the first two libraries in the country to initiate the expanding gateway program through GPO Access. Now SPL has added the _Welcome to the White House_ information service to its variety of electronic offerings. SPL was one of 11 sites around the country given the opportunity to preview and evaluate _Welcome to the White House_ prior to its official announcement by Vice President Al Gore. The White House service, sometimes called _The Citizens' Electronic Handbook_, provides access to indexes of White House publications as well as federal information on job opportunities, retirement benefits, U.S. national parks, and a wide variety of other information. According to a recent press release, SPL was the first library system in the country to provide free citizen access to the Internet through a public network of terminals and dial-in modem ports. The library system links users with the library's own data bases and with local information services. SPL is also one of handful of test sites for the Washington State Citizen Kiosk project. For further information, call Andra Addison, public information officer, at 206-386-4103. *************************************************************************** LIBRARY OF CONGRESS RECEIVES $13 MILLION TO DIGITIZE COLLECTIONS The National Digital Library project at the Library of Congress was given further momentum with the announcement of three major donations. On October 13 Librarian of Congress James H. Billington announced a three-year grant from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. He also announced a $5 million grant from the Lucile and David Packard Foundation and a $5 million gift from John Kulge (chairman and president of Metromedia), both earmarked for a major program to digitize the Library's historical collections in the public domain for eventual electronic dissemination. The Kellogg grant will help the Library identify instructional uses of digital library materials to develop research skills and critical thinking. LC will form a coalition of major institutions to convert important collections to digital formats. By the year 2000, the coalition plans to have digitized 5 million images. This coalition will work on copyright issues relating to electronic dissemination. The Library will continue to work with various private sector companies on digitization projects because of serious cost constraints. LC will not package and sell its digital collections, but make them freely available to all in what Billington referred to as the _plain vanilla_ version. The new Digital Library Visitors' Center was previewed at the October 13 press conference. The Center will open to the public in January 1995 with demonstrations scheduled as staffing and funds allow. There will be 14 workstations capable of demonstrating various LC services including: images and text from LC's major exhibitions, more than 26 million records from their card catalog, and American Memory, the Library's five-year digitization project. Visitors to the new center will also be able to see demonstrations of the Global Legal Information Network, a cooperative data base of foreign laws, LC MARVEL, which offers access to the Library's data bases, and other new technology to enable blind and physically handicapped users to access on- line collections. For further information contact: Jill Brett at 202-707- 2905 or Guy Lamolinara at 202-707-9217. *************************************************************************** *************************************************************************** ALAWON (ISSN 1069-7799) is an irregular publication of the American Library Association Washington Office, 110 Maryland Avenue, N.E., Washington, DC 20002-5675. Internet: alawash@alawash.org; Phone: 202-547-4440; Fax: 202-547-7363. Editor: Lynne E. Bradley (leb@alawash.org). ALAWON is available free of charge and is available only in electronic form. To subscribe, send the message "subscribe ala-wo [your name]" to listserv@uicvm (Bitnet) or listserv@uicvm.uic.edu (Internet). Back issues and other documents are available from the list server. To find out what's available, send the message "send ala-wo filelist" to the listserv. The ALA-WO filelist contains the list of files with the exact filename and filetype. To get a particular file, issue the command "send filename filetype" to the listserv. Do not include the quotes in your commands. All materials in the newsletter subject to copyright by the American Library Association may be reprinted or redistributed for noncommercial purposes with appropriate credits. For other reprinting or redistribution, address requests to the ALA Washington Office (alawash@alawash.org). *************************************************************************** ***End of file******************End of file******************End of file***