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- Subject: N-1-4-020.20.1
-
- Gopher and Electronic Journals
- Billy Barron, UNT/CICNet
- <BILLY@vaxb.acs.unt.edu>
-
- The Internet Gopher and its cousin World Wide Web (WWW) are the first Internet
- systems that really allow the easy distribution of electronic journals
- to readers. A variety of sites ranging from UNT to NCSU to CICNet to MSEN
- have worked in this field already. The level of cooperation has been nothing
- less than amazing up to the present. However, in this article, I will focus on
- one project at CICNet.
-
- CICNet is the NSFNET regional provider for the Midwestern portion of the US and
- has agressively providing information resources to its members. CICNet and its
- members have seen that the archival and access of electronic journals is an
- important task.
-
- One of the beliefs of this project is that we are in the early stages of
- electronic journals. Many of the journals are experimental in nature, and
- these early efforts will provide early insights into the changing nature of
- communication. It is also felt that we should not depend on the journal
- producers to maintain historical archives anymore than we currently depend
- on publishers or authors to maintain archives. CICNet will be attempting
- to fill a part of this role.
-
- Electronic journals will be collected in two methods. The first is a member
- library will collect journals and ship volumes to CICNet for archival and
- general access by CICNet members. The second method is that CICNet will be
- directly collecting other journals via mostly automated procedures.
-
- The project is also considering access issues. Is gopher hierarchies based on
- a library classification scheme such as Library of Congress acceptable? Should
- MARC records be cut for these items? What other access methods, such as WAIS,
- are useful?
-
- If you would like to look at the project, it is available via Gopher at
- gopher.cic.net port 70 under the E-Serials item. Any specific questions or
- comments can be directed to me at my CICNet account (billy@cic.net).
-