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AUKML Conference 2003 |
THE NEWS LIBRARIAN: THE VISION, INSPIRATION AND ACHIEVEMENTS
A talk by Professor Charles Oppenheim at the AUKML Conference 2003
Good morning ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the 2003 annual AUKML conference. It's very nice weather and we've picked a good spot. My name is Charles Oppenheim and I am the conference chairman. Jill and Fiona very kindly invited me to chair a AUKML conference even though I've chaired quite a few. I will do so with my usual mixture of bulls*** and humour. For those of you who have not been before the AUKML conference is basically informal , friendly, an exchange of experience and lots of fun. Particular welcome to those of you who have come from overseas and of course to our speakers. I've got one or two domestic issues to raise before we go on to our first speaker. Ian Gleave has suffered a flood. Thus, the programme on your chairs is newly revised and correct and the old programme - the one sent to you in the mail - should be torn up into very small pieces and swallowed. Secondly those of you have brought items for the silent auction please leave them on the auction table as soon as you can. The auction will take place during today's breaks and the winners will be announced tonight. I hope you have a really fun time as I know I intend to. So lets start with the first speaker. The first speaker really needs no introduction at all because he's Charles Oppenheim.
I remember the very first conference I went to which was an ASLIB conference in 1971 (shows how old I am!) I won't say much about myself except that I am Professor of Information Science at Loughborough University and I joined AUKML in 1987, when I worked for Reuters. When I left Reuters I remained a member of the group and have been an active member for more than ten years.
Okay, so the title of this talk is : 'News Librarian: The Vision, Inspiration and Achievements.' This is also as you may have gathered the first ever Justin Arundale Memorial Lecture. Justin as you'll know was not merely a committed member of AUKML and a past cited entrepreneurial news librarian but also an inspirational teacher. When he died, little over a year ago, and there was a memorial service for him at Brighton University where he lectured, the number of students who turned up there was really quite prophetic. I went down to Brighton a couple of times when he lectured there and saw a deeply committed lecturer with a real passion for his students and a great interest in promoting NVQ's and Professional Qualifications. He was also a deeply committed member of AUKML. At the time of his death he was chair of CILIP's (The Library Association) chartership board which decides which students can become chartered information professionals. His interests were incredibly wide as those of you who knew him would be able to recall. Just one example, after his death his partner Barrie, invited me to their house to take my pick of a range of books that were Justin's and which Barrie felt might be of interest to me. It was incredible the range of books; a treasure trove of subjects which kept me there all day. Indeed there are books of Barrie's which I am still delightfully ploughing my way through today. Justin's wide general knowledge would have won him money on Who wants to be a millionaire? Guaranteed! (had he been so inclined to try it). In fact we had an agreement that if I got on to the show he would be my 'friend' to phone (I have actually applied twice for the 'twin contestants' part of the show because I have a twin brother, but alas always to no avail). Anyway, more than all that, he was a very dear friend who was also best man at my wedding. Therefore it is a real honour to be giving this first lecture in his name.
I first became aware of Justin when I attended a talk he gave on news librarianship in the 1980s to the Institute of Information Scientists. However, our first proper meeting, was, bizarrely enough in a graveyard. This was Bunhill Fields, a graveyard just a stone's throw away from the offices of The Independent, where Justin worked at the time. It is famous because it is not associated with a church and is the last resting place for about 120,00 nonconformists, including William Blake, John Bunyan and Daniel Defoe. It seemed an appropriate place to meet, as Justin was in so many ways a non-conformist himself. At that time I worked for Reuter Textline and was involved in negotiating to get the full text of a number of newspapers onto Textline. We wanted to discuss the loading of The Independent onto Reuters Textline, but we also discussed copyright and many other information issues of the day: all in the setting of a graveyard! Surreal, but one of the most memorable experiences of my life.
In this talk I want to reflect on issues that Justin would have been most interested in: the professional status of news librarians, their vision and where they are going.
News Librarianship and how it has changed
I am not, and never have been, a news librarian (even when I worked at Reuters). Therefore you might think what I am about to tell you is very much based on second-hand experience. But if you like, this is my perception. So here goes…get comfy, sit back straight and listen (as I say to my students!)
Once upon a time there were news morgues. They got their bizarre name because they were repositories of dead news, news that had been and gone. The earliest ones seem to have been founded in the late 1800s. (Although I did some research I couldn't find out the very first date of the first ever news morgue - sorry). In many ways the word was appropriate - these were dark, dust-laden areas on the bowels of the newspaper's earth, with crude and cumbersome methods of storing and filing materials. My first visit to one was in the late 1950s or early 1960s when, as a school kid, I was invited to see Reuters' news library by the then head of it who was a friend of my parents. This was not you understand the makings of my future occupation, rather an over-eager schoolboy duly keen to see what big adults do for a living. All I can remember is that it had an air of total gloom. That was the abiding recollection I have: I was probably only eight or nine at the time. Dear God. Anyway…
There are many anecdotes about the temperament and style of the early news librarians, but I cannot comment how true they were, except to say that if Reuters morgue were typical, news morgues would never have attracted any extroverts or people who really enjoyed life - in other words, they would never have attracted the typical AUKML member. The ravers that you all are.
One crucial feature of course was that journalists were in those days totally dependent upon the news librarian to get any background material; the librarian represented a genuine intermediary between the end user and (those previous bits of news) the mass of information the end user needed.
All this changed with the development in the mid 1970s of online databases, followed by CD Rom databases in the early 1980s, and then, as computer power increased, databases of full text materials, including , of course, the full text of newspapers in the mid 1980s. Suddenly it was possible for journalists to get hold of the information they needed without having to use an intermediary. Articles and rumours began to appear with wild predictions about the imminent demise of the news librarian. One of the most notorious examples of this approach was a book entitled 'Journalism for the 21st Century.' Written in 1991 by Tom Koch, a journalist who did not understand the strengths and weaknesses of online and whose own research was flawed, the book predicted a future where the news librarian was no longer needed as journalists, and indeed the general public, could obtain all the information they needed for themselves directly from the desktop. He was not alone, of course, in his predictions, and the fact that his book was riddled with factual errors is neither here nor there to my fundamental thesis, which is that news librarians faced a critical turning point with the advent of online full text systems. I re-read the book for the purpose of today but it doesn't get any better (I believe he was actually a journalist so I shudder to think what his actual news stories were like!) However there must have been many senior managers and editors who looked forward to their journalists undertaking their own research on the desktop and thereby they could make cost cuttings in the newspaper library and amongst library staff. Indeed, this happened frequently. Unfortunately, many would say…
Changes
The biggest change I have seen in recent years is the decline of the clippings function and its replacement by full text databases and other formats. The next change I have seen is the selling of such full text materials on services such as LexisNexis and Dialog. Sometimes, as in the case of Justin's meeting with me, this has been the responsibility of the head of the news library. The next change I have seen is a decline in the importance of physical books and journals in the library. The next change I have seen is an increase in the research function, that is to say, in depth analysis for editorial content, and a decline in quick reference searching for simple facts. This leads on to what the journalists relationship with the news librarian is and what is expected from them. The next change I have seen is less-sufficiency and a greater interaction with IT departments and external producers from the news library.
There are two areas where there does not appear to have been that much change. The first of these has been in news photos. Although there are a number of real time news photo services used by newspapers, the indexing and retrieval of photos remains a somewhat arcane art. The problems of how to index images for easy and effective retrieval remains largely unresolved despite many years of effort (digital photography seems to have made little difference with regard to this either). The second area where I perceive little change is in the urgency of requests. Journalists, like so many other demanding patrons, always need answers instantly yesterday. This is both part of the excitement of a job in news librarianship and also a frustration. Although for most of the time the advice is 'don't take a blind bit of notice of what they say' : it's never as urgent as they make out.
What about the practical impact of these changes? When I arrived at Reuters as an information manager in 1987, the news library - the one I had visited 25 years earlier - was just being closed down on the grounds that the back files of all Reuters news stories were coming available on an online system for all journalists to read. Talking to some of the journalists, I found that most were deeply unhappy with the new system for two reasons. In fact they hated it. Why? Firstly, they had to learn a new system, which wasn't particularly user-friendly and which they hadn't been taught on. Secondly, they had not been consulted at all about these changes; they had just happened - journalists hadn't been consulted and they felt they should have been consulted. Thirdly, journalists enjoyed a relationship with the news library staff who genuinely seemed to enjoy doing searching on the journalists' behalf, and did so quickly and efficiently. Journalists had an excuse for a wander and a chat and some social interaction with the news librarians. However, other research, such as that conducted by Dave Nicholas, indicates that journalists have happily taken on basic research functions using electronic databases and feel comfortable with it. I'm quite prepared to believe that the journalists I spoke to didn't like the change because they hadn't consulted either about the demise of the library or about the look and feel of the system that replaced it.
In conclusion, I would say that Reuters journalists' views were probably untypical, and most journalists have welcomed the change in role for them.
Are media librarians happy with the changes? Overall, my impression is that media librarians have welcomed the change in their status and routine jobs because they have been left with the more interesting jobs, namely in-depth research and negotiation with licensors. They are now hip techno-heads rather than the conservative shooshers I was familiar of when I was a kid. Indeed looking around news libraries now, compared to my first visits, I can see a degree of rejuvenation in the profession. The libraries are much brighter, friendlier places to visit that they used to be. The library staff are pro-active lively ravers that one associates with AUKML. They spend less time on filing and retrieving text manually - though photographs remain a major pre-occupation - and more time on interesting queries and drinking. The journalists themselves handle simple queries. I must say I myself am finding it hard to keep up and you must realise I am getting older and more knackered by the hour. How we doing for time by the way? Fine. Fine, fine….
Okay, the title of my talk refers to 'achievements'. What have media librarians achieved? They have reinvented themselves in the light of a complete change in job function, and have done so with relatively little pain. To me that is an enormous achievement, and one that you should all be proud of.
The Vision
Let me move on to my next theme - what is the vision for news librarians today? One way to see it is to review the objectives of the two leading professional associations in the field, namely SLA News Division (Special Libraries Association) and AUKML itself. I would like to read out two mission statements from their websites as to what the role and functions of these groups is :
Objectives for SLA: "The objective of the SLA News Division shall be to encourage and promote the utilization of knowledge through the collection, organisation, and dissemination of information to its members; to develop usefulness and efficiency of news media libraries; to publish and stimulate research; to promote high professional standards; to facilitate communication and cooperation among its members and with organisations that have similar allied interests."
Objectives for AUKML: "The AUKML aims to improve the professional standing of information workers through exchanging knowledge and experience and by organising meetings, events and conferences to keep members up-to-date with emerging techniques in information management."
Both these sets of aims and objectives are strong on pragmatic co-operation and assistance and weak on aspiration and vision other than maintaining high professional standards. I don't feel this is a matter to be disappointed about; traditionally, professional associations have been primarily concerned to protect their own members' interests by means of conferences, newsletters etc. What is surprising is that AUKML has not undertaken any research or planning for a vision for the role and function of media librarians in the future. I will now outline an analysis of where I see AUKML is right now and where it might go in the future.
In 1986, AUKML was founded to provide a support organisation for those working in newspaper, radio, television and magazine libraries. It has developed a loyal membership and a reputation for the quality of Deadline (the group's electronic newsletter) and regular meetings (not just in London either). I think it is perceived as giving good value for money in terms of its membership fee. AUKML flirted with becoming SIG (Special Interest Group) of the IIS at one point early on in its existence. Since then, AUKML has considered affiliating with CILIP (The Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals). I know there was a recent meeting at which CILIP staff suggested ways of possible collaboration, which I would welcome. I would not, however, recommend, that AUKML becomes an SIG of CILIP. This is because CILIP's priorities, objectives and ways of working are fundamentally different to those of AUKML. Basically CILIP is still dominated by the public sector, particularly public libraries and also, it has to be said, is an incredibly bureaucratic organisation. It's ways of doing business are at opposite ends to AUKML's. I was once of the view that with enough dynamic members on CILIP Council, CILIP could be made less rigidly bound by concerns of professional chartership and exclusive chartership. However I don't ever see this happening.
Market Environment
As I have indicated, the marketplace has been undergoing rapid changes for the past several years. In particular, with the rapid growth of the world wide web (especially google) the concept of 'online information' has ceased to have any particular connotation. The whole developed world now 'does' online. There is nothing 'special' about searching for information anymore: everybody does it. I search for myself now and again just to make sure I have vanished from the face of the earth. Why not? I've always been on an ego trip of some sort! One has to distinguish the general run of the mill type searching from what AUKML can offer. This is a serious issue because it is a changed market now from when AUKML started over twenty years ago. The membership of AUKML is largely passive; that is to say, you don't have a large amount of active involved members. However they are loyal and they are satisfied members, which is not untypical for a mature organisation. Thus, it is no longer clear what niche AUKML fills, now that so many journalists do the same sort of searching that you do.
The sense of excitement, dynamism and change that was certainly present in the early years of AUKML has vanished. Whilst this is hardly surprising - it applies to all organisations - maybe it is time for AUKML to think about how it can re-invigorate itself. Where is the buzz and excitement when AUKML started out gone to? Where are all the things to be done and ideas to be made? Perhaps AUKML should re-invent itself as a virtual community (such as Freepint, although Freepint is still losing money) using the best of current technology (such as Blogs and Wiki) to disseminate its publications and discussions? More contribution from members is also needed. From all you lot.
Vision and Mission
I think AUKML should commit itself to the following mission: to provide innovative, practical top-quality services and products, and to lobby effectively, in order to improve members' effectiveness.
What do these fine words mean in practice? That AUKML should be:
(the tape finishes half way through and a little story from Oppenheim begins about dictaphones, lecture theatres and shadows which is hard to understand in print!)
Anyway, where was I? Yes, I suggest that the focus of the group should be on four points:
Market Analysis
Due to the change in role of media librarians that I discussed earlier, AUKML has to adapt. A combination of high-quality, innovative and practical solutions to solve members' problems, together with appropriate lobbying and workshops could be the answer. Although there are many relevant professional groups around, including CILIP and Aslib (although I don't see much of a future for Aslib and I suspect it soon will wrap up), and organisations offering training courses such as TFPL, they do not offer many courses that are specially appropriate for AUKML members. The analogy I would draw here is with AIOPI (The Association for Library and Information Staff in the Pharmaceutical Industry). For many years, since 1973, they have run excellent short training courses for new entrants into their profession. The charges for these courses, normally held over a day, are very modest. The way it is setup and operated is something AUKML might wish to look at and consider for their own members.
Conclusion
Would Justin approve of all these changes? I am sure he would be very happy with the changes. He was always forward-looking and excited about change. Indeed he embraced change the way so many people shy away from it. Please don't get the impression that I am criticising AUKML. I am not. I have always been a fan of AUKML and am delighted that it continues to prosper. It, and you, its members, have adapted to the changes of the past 17 years extremely well. However, now might be the time to take stock, and consider how AUKML can re-invigorate itself by taking on new roles and responsibilities. Needless to say, I have a vested interest in all of this. The longer AUKML goes on as a successful organisation, the more of its wonderful conferences I get to chair. I wish all of you well and have a great conference! (Rounds and rounds of applause).
Tape ends
Transcribed by Graeme Boyd 20/12/2003