II. Name the key-words that help you to catch the main idea of the text.

Lesson 23

Read the text: Information as a resource

Information forms the major base on which the growth of knowledge and so much else depends. Without information decisions will be random ad-hoc choices, projects are unlikely to meet set objectives; reports will not adequately reflect situations. Imagine this situation occurring daily and then multiply it by the numbers of the population because information is used at all levels and everyone has information needs. In general we can suspect that these will not be met. In an atmosphere of almost constant change, however, new services, and new approaches and centres will need to be created if information is to contribute to national development.

So far, in formulating national development plans little attention has been paid to the systematic organization and dissemination of information as one of the vital resources of the country.

The "resource" displays the following features:

1. Information has only recently been accepted as a national resource that is susceptible to study using techniques that have been developed and applied to other areas of human endeavour.

2. Current information systems at both local, national and regional level are really a collection of uncoordinated entities that loosely link information producers to users. There is no overall system in the sense in which the term is normally used.

3. Individuals and organizations are at the same time producers and consumers of information.

4. The value of information is in its utilization.

5. National information infrastructures in developing countries are often non-innovative, fragmented and under-used.

6. Looking at information as a product that must be designed, developed, packaged and promoted on the basis of identified user needs is a new concept that is gaining ground with the application of information technology.

7. Information is potentially a plentiful resource and is also potentially inexhaustible.

At the base level are the conventional library operations of acquiring and organizing materials that form the information resources and providing access to them for users.

With the application of information technology the amount of effort and time that needs to be applied to these basic operations is reduced. This allows staff time to provide higher level services as illustrated in the higher reaches of the figure. As higher levels are reached the tasks will involve dealing with the information contained in the sources and in analyzing, consolidating and repackaging it. Thus time is saved by the user and the benefits provided by the information increases. However, such changes will require an improved cadre for provision of service and there would be a need for a deeper knowledge of the subject fields of the users and closer collaborative work with them. Training for information personnel, who would now need a subject background, will need to include techniques of information analysis, consolidation and repackaging and also of developing expert systems.

The development of this group constitutes an important aspect of government thinking. They can contribute significantly to the gross national product and to employment. They will utilize local materials and reduce the drain on foreign exchange. However, they need a wider range of information in order to be innovative or operationally effective but are unable to support this information work on their own. The solution in several developing countries is for a government centre or centres to be responsible for their support. On-going research is also being linked with the needs of industries. The required technology transfer involves a number of stages and good information flow can reduce the time lags between such stages and result in the more effective start up and continuing functioning of such enterprises.

Planning requires a wide range of information on a whole range of factors. Countries require mechanisms to collect process and make available the required data, such as National and Provincial Data Systems. These data systems are usually outside of the library and information services set up. However, the possibility of links between the two would enhance the capacity of both to provide required development information, especially if information from current research is included in the system.

There is promise of improved availability and access to information sources through national and international networks. The use of CD/ROM will allow rapid access to information within individual units. Staff should be able to concentrate on value added services and become more involved with the user and their problems and projects. The image of the service will be enhanced from improved and wider ranging services.

Libraries will become involved in the creation of non-bibliographic databases in addition to the customary catalogues. These new databases will compromise statistical, geographical, graphic and other data needed for scientific, planning and project implementation work.

Through electronic mail, facsimile and other technologies -as well as improved telecommunications infrastructures information services will be enabled to better provide for document delivery and access to remote databases and networks. In addition CD/ROM will allow for the greatly extended availability of information nationally and across regions especially in cooperative arrangements.

I. Answer the questions:

1.What is the role of information?

2.What features does the “resource” display?

3.Why does the application of information technology allow to provide higher level

4.services?

5.What does the CD-ROM allow?

6.Why will training for information personnel be necessary?

II. Pick out the basic information of every paragraph.

Література

Lesson 1

1. http://www.drcath.net/toolkit/document.html

2. http://srmo.sagepub.com/view/the-sage-dictionary-of-social-research-methods/n57.xml

Lesson 2

1. https://www.msu.edu/~jdowell/135/Synthesis.html

2. http://welcometomabiesworld.com/MabieClassroomSiteDocuments/APLangDocuments/IntroductionToSynthesis.pdf

Lesson 3

1. http://www.fact.ru/www/arhiv6s9.htm

2. http://www.library.com/information_analytics.htm

Lesson 4

1. http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-information-analytics.htm

Lesson 5

1. http://ru.scribd.com/doc/36650481/Personality

2. http://www.helium.com/items/2084484-an-introduction-to-freuds-personality-theory

Lesson 6

1.http://www.hoganassessments.com/_hoganweb/documents/What%20Is%20Personality%20Psychology.pdf

Lesson 7

1. http://www.sociology.org/whatissociology

2. http://engtopic.ru/english-language/what-is-sociology-mgimo-teaching-aids

Lesson 8

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sociology

2. http://www.cognopedia.com/wiki/Sociology

Lesson 9

1. http://www.adobe.com/enterprise/pdfs/idc_active_documents.pdf

2. http://www.idc.com/active_documents.pdf

Lesson 10

1. http://ohrpp.research.ucla.edu/file/10110/12-1.pdf

2. http://www.research.nhg.com.sg/wps/wcm/connect/5c4d72804da016c782f1fe1e497da9ab/CatalystOct-Nov2012-Issue.pdf?MOD=AJPERES

Lesson 11

1. http://llt.msu.edu/vol7num2/thorne/default.html

2. http://www.oocities.org/c.lankshear/steve2003.html

Lesson 12

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communication_Theory_as_a_Field

2. http://www.stes-apes.med.ulg.ac.be/Documents_electroniques/MET/MET-COM/ELE%20MET-COM%20A-8191.pdf

3. http://www.jackwhitehead.com/teesonphd/004c3.pdf

Lesson 13

1. http://www.amazon.com/Theories-Communication-Networks-Peter-Monge/dp/0195160371

2. http://www.google.com.ua/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=theories%20of%20communication%20networks%20%5Bpaperback%5D%20peter%20r.%20monge&source=web&cd=2&cad=rja&ved=0CDoQFjAB&url=http%3A%2F%2F94.23.146.173%2Fficheros%2Ff7e0ae5bf4196000c88fff5e3b2e8e8d.pdf&ei=E3LCUMz9O4HFtQa8_4HABA&usg=AFQjCNEnTmRQYVKlZ4VQTWNV9VWExnwn0Q

Lesson 14

1. http://jobsearchtech.about.com/od/careersintechnology/p/ITDefinition.htm

2. http://www2.marilia.unesp.br/revistas/index.php/bjis

3. http://www2.marilia.unesp.br/revistas/index.php/bjis/article/viewFile/48/275

Lesson 15

1. http://link.springer.com/article/10.3103%2FS0147688212020050?LI=true

2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_and_communications_technology

Lesson 16

1. http://www2.marilia.unesp.br/revistas/index.php/bjis/article/viewFile/48/275

2. http://en.scientificcommons.org/58147599

Lesson 17

1. http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs11984-008-1007-5?LI=true

2. http://rd.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11984-008-1007-5

Lesson 18

1. http://www.polity.co.uk/giddens6/lecturer/lecturer_guide_01.pdf

2. http://sociology.berkeley.edu/sites/default/files/documents/student_services/writing_guide/Writing%20for%20psy%20Guide%20Edition.pdf

Lesson 19

1. http://www.socialpsychology.org/

2. http://www.trinity.edu/mkearl/socpsy.html

Lesson 20

1. http://chiron.valdosta.edu/whuitt/col/cogsys/infoproc.html

2. http://www.edpsycinteractive.org/topics/cognition/infoproc.html

Lesson 21

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_processing_theory

2. http://www.simplypsychology.org/information-processing.html

Lesson 22

1. http://natureoflearning.wikispaces.com/Information+Processing+Model

2. http://www.buzzle.com/articles/information-processing-theory.html

Lesson 23

1. http://www.pngbuai.com/600technology/information/info-as-resource1992.html

2. http://capita.wustl.edu/me567_informatics/concepts/infores.html

Ключі

Lesson 1

1. Document analysis is a social research method and is an important research tool in its own right and is an invaluable part of most schemes of triangulation.
2. Sources of documents are public records, the media, private papers, biography and visual documents.
3. The term 'biography' has two meanings in social research. Firstly, it is a particular style of interviewing, where the informant is encouraged to describe how his or her. Secondly, 'biography' refers to a work that draws on whatever materials are available to an author to represent an account of a person's life and achievements.
4. I know 7 types of analysis. They are quantitative, content analysis, semiotics, discourse analysis, interpretative analysis, conversation analysis and grounded Theory.
5. Language is viewed as the topic of the research and how people use language to construct their accounts of the social world is important.

Lesson 2

1. A document synthesis is a written discussion that draws on one or more sources.
2. The skills you've already been practicing in this course will be vital in writing syntheses. Clearly, before you're in a position to draw relationships between two or more sources, you must understand what those sources say; in other words, you must be able to summarize these sources. It will frequently be helpful for your readers if you provide at least partial summaries of sources in your synthesis essays. Because a synthesis is based on two or more sources, you will need to be selective when choosing information from each.
3. Because a synthesis is based on two or more sources, you will need to be selective when choosing information from each.
4. There are two types of synthesis. The argument synthesis: the purpose of an argument synthesis is for you to present your own point of view. The explanatory synthesis: an explanatory synthesis helps readers to understand a topic.
5. The easiest method for the document synthesis is way of organizing a synthesis essay.

Lesson 3

1. Analytical activity was widely adopted in XX century.
2. Information analytics is engaged in production new knowledge on the basis of processing of available information with a view of decision-making optimization.
3. There are 10 procedures of algorithmic sequence. They are definition of object, a subject and an analysis problem, creation of ideal model of object and subject, collecting factual data, assessment of a factual material, disclosure of value of the facts, hypothesis, choosing analysis type, proof, conclusions and authentic and clear statement of results of research.
4. Information and analytical activity (IAD) is a process of semantic data processing as a result of which separate data turn into finished information production – the analytical document.
5. Information analytics, relying on scientific knowledge, the general regularities, deals with life phenomenology more often, carrying out an assessment of the facts and events, predicting their development with the account not only the generalized typical parameters, but also the whole range of factors, including subjective and personal, casual influences, and also conscious actions of competing forces, an antagonism of interests, active intervention of social technologies.

Lesson 4

1. The most common use of information analytics is to study business data with a combination of statistical analysis and data mining techniques.
2. Every company interested in information analytics needs to invest in both staff and technology.
3. Database is universal. Because it’s play important role in our life, helps us to communicate with computer.
4. The Semantic Web is a collaborative movement led by the international standards body, the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). The standard promotes common data formats on the World Wide Web.

5. The exceptional benefits of Semantic Web technology include communication between systems is simpler, data can be extracted and integrated across organizational boundaries and varied data sets, systems are significantly less likely to need expensive software changes, changing data requirements are easily managed through pluggable ontologies or vocabularies, previously undiscovered relationships between data can be visualized.

Lesson 5

1. Personality psychology is a branch of psychology that studies personality and individual differences.
2. "Personality" can be defined as a dynamic and organized set of characteristics possessed by a person that uniquely influences his or her cognitions, emotions, interpersonal orientations motivations, and behaviors in various situations.
3. Gordon Allport described two major ways to study personality.

4. Lewis Goldberg proposed a five-dimension personality model, nicknamed the "Big Five": openness to Experience, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness and neuroticism

5. Trait models have been criticized as being purely descriptive and offering little explanation of the underlying causes of personality.

Lesson 6

1. Mayer believes that personality psychology has an identity framework problem.
2. Allport’s and Mayer`s theories are described in the text.
3. I know 4 root ideas from the substance of personality psychology.
4. Allport’s theory was created in 1963.
5. In contrast with Mayer’s structuralist framework for personality, author propose a functionalist framework.

Lesson 7

1. Sociology is the systematic study of human groups and social life in modern societies.
2. Sociology tries to understand how these various social institutions operate, and how they relate to one another, such as the ence the family might have on how well children perform in the education system.
3. In trying to explain human social life, sociologists have built up a body of concepts (or key ideas) and terms (a specialized vocabulary). Central to the study of sociology are concepts such as culture, subculture, values, norms, status, roles and socialization.
4. The term ‘culture’ refers to the whole way of life in a particular society.
5. It is a branch of social science (with wich it is often synonymous) that uses varios methods of empirical investigation and critical anaysis to develop and refin a body of knowlege about human social structure and activity.

Lesson 8

1. For many sociologists the goal is to conduct research which may be applied directly to social policy and welfare, while others focus primarily on refining the theoretical understanding of social processes.
2. Social analysis has origins in the common stock of Western knowledge and philosophy, and has been carried out from at least as early as the time of Plato.
3. The word sociology (or "sociologie") is derived from both Latin and Greek origins. It was first coined in 1780 by the French essayist Emmanuel-Joseph Sieyès (1748-1836) in an unpublished manuscript.
4. Research methodology Sociological research methods may be divided into two broad categories: quantitative designs approach social phenomena through quantifiable evidence, and often rely on statistical analysis of many cases (or across intentionally designed treatments in an experiment) to create valid and reliable general claims and qualitative designs emphasize understanding of social phenomena through direct observation, communication with participants, or analysis of texts, and may stress contextual and subjective accuracy over generality.
5. Areas of sociology are social organizations, social psychology, social change and disorganization and population or demography.

Lesson 9

1. Electronic documents are evolving into unprecedented roles. New technologies that utilize XML (eXtensible Markup Language) are emerging that enable documents to become more than the static, passive containers of words, graphics, and images they have been historically. They are business process plus information - archive and interactive knowledge base rolled into one.
2. These new documents are living and dynamic.
3. They can be found today in various forms and sizes, and they serve a variety of purposes.
4. Documents are discrete containers of information expressed in words, sounds, orpictures.
5.  Today’s active document author must know where the desired content resides, how to make calls on that repository or ERP system, how to write scripts, and how to create a logical flow of actions or workflow.

Lesson 10

1. The office prepares and maintains records and documents associated with its oversight of research and the administration of the boards.
2.  Investigators and research staff submit research applications (initial, continuing, amendment, and post-approval reports) requiring UCLA IRB/OHRPP review via the online, web-based webIRB application.
3.  Records for each protocol will include the following (as applicable): all materials as described in Materials Required for IRB Review, documentation resulting from any reviews by the exempt or expedited procedure, copies of all correspondence between the IRB and the investigators and key personnel, including substantive email communications, copies of study-related correspondence between the IRB and other entities, including regulatory authorities, other review committees and study subjects and any additional documents deemed appropriate on a case-by-case basis.
4.  Six months to one year webIRB records will be archived and may be retained indefinitely.
5.  The trend towards a paperless office is more realistic for some businesses than for others.

Lesson 11

1. One early and quite robust line of CMC research describes the medium as "not rich enough" for many task-related needs, nor is CMC effective for interpersonal exchanges as there is "scant social information" available.
2. The Internet can now be used to facilitate direct interaction with expert speaker3 age-peers over much of world holds great potential for foreign language students.
3. Children who have difficulties in this area may have problems with taking turns in a conversation or in gamesbe unable to change the style of conversation to suit the listenerbe unable to interpret tone of voice in othershave difficulty interpreting non-verbal communication (ie. facial expression, gestures) have difficulty keeping to the topic of a conversationhave problems with judging the amount of previous knowledge that the listener has when relating informationhave difficulty understanding other points of viewhave strengths in specific area of the curriculumhave a particular interest or hobby which can sometimes act as a stimulus to learninghave a good memory for rote learning.
4.  Activities to develop social communication skills are role play, puppets, take part, tell me, making faces, board games, parachute games, circletime, reactions, speech bubbles, social stories and comic strip conversations.
5. Board games – these involve turn-taking.

Lesson 12

1. Communication theory is a field of information and mathematics that studies the technical process of information and the human process of human communication.
2. Craig argues that communication theorists can become unified in dialogue by charting what he calls the "dialogical dialectical tension," or the similarities and differences in their understanding of "communication" and demonstrating how those elements create tension within the field.
3. At that time, communication theory textbooks had little to no agreement on how to present the field or what theories to include in their textbooks. This article has since become the foundational framework for four different textbooks to introduce the field of communication. In this article Craig "proposes a vision for communication theory that takes a huge step toward unifying this rather disparate field and addressing its complexities."
4. Craig proposes these traditions: rhetorical, semiotic, phenomenological, cybernetic, socio-psychological, socio-cultural and critical.
5.  Craig proposes seven suggested traditions of communication.

Lesson 13

1. These theories were formulated during the study of communication and mass media: Authoritarian Theory, Libertarianism or Free Press Theory, Social Responsibility Theory, Soviet Media/Communist Theory, Development Communication Theory and Democratization/Democratic Participant Media Theory
2. Freedom of thought was jealously guarded by a few people (ruling classes), who were concerned with the emergence of a new middle class and were worried about the effects of printed matter on their thought process.
3. What the theory offers, in sum, is power without social responsibility.
4. The book “Four Theories Of the Press” was written in 1956.
5. The weakness of this theory is that "development" is often equated with government propaganda.

Lesson 14

1. We use the term information technology or IT to refer to an entire industry.
2. Some of the most popular information technology skills at the moment are: Computer Networking, Information Security, IT Governance, ITIL, Business Intelligence, Linux, Unix and Project Management.
3. Because it’s a very important thing in IT world.
4. This author refers to a body of knowledge denominated bibliographic sciences defined as: production, material fabrication, distribution, listing, statistics, conservation and utilization therefore, including compilation, printing, publishing, bookselling, bibliography and librarianship.
5. Phase 1 involves automation or mechanization of basic clerical and accounting techniques and change is relatively limited - many offices here will have faced and overcome such changes successfully. Phase 2 involves extending service provision and makes possible the introduction of services hitherto uneconomic by manual means through the use of technology. With phase 3 totally new services that are impossible without the technology are made available.

Lesson 15

1. Because the word "computer" has just recently entered our vocabulary and today life without this device appears unthinkable.
2. The Internet has 530 million users.
3. Computer technologies have enriched humanity with a host of new and unexpected opportunities. A magnificent tornado of communication technologies came down on mankind, whose consequences are often unpredictable.
4. Because already by the end of 2001 the total number of users and the gradual embrace of all aspects of public life were one of the most global structures in the world and the most vivid manifestation of globalization and informatization of socio-economic processes.
5. Internet communication gives people ample opportunities in terms of the dynamics of the need- motivational sphere (educational, recreational, com­mercial, gaming and even illegal activities, as well as the preparation to overcome emerging problems).  We can communicate with each other, share information and knowledge.
6. This payment is in the form of the new, currently only emerging problem of pathological Internet use, or Internet Addiction Disorder.

Lesson 16

1. The discipline of documentation science emerged in the late part of the 19th Century in Europe.
2. Otlet designed the Universal Decimal Classification, based on Melville Dewey’s decimal classification system.
3. Lafontaine won the Nobel Prize in 1913.
4. Otlet used the term documentation in 1905 in the article “L’organisation rationale de I’information et de la documentation en matière economique”.
5. Nowadays constituted by a series of distributed operations among different people and organisms: the author, the copier, the printer, the editor, the bookseller, the librarian, the documenter, the bibliographer, the critic, the analyst, the compiler, the reader, the researcher and the intellectual worker. The documentation follows the document from the moment it arises out of the author’s pen until the moment it impresses the brain of the reader.

Lesson 17

1. In her works, the "scientific disci­pline of documentation, as an integrative scientific dis­cipline, is closely connected with document production, book, library, bibliography, and archives sciences, as well as informatics, etc.
2. For the general scientific discipline of documentation these are represented by sciences of the documenta­tion-communicative cycle, semiotics, informology, lin­guistics, informatics, philosophy, culturology, sociol­ogy, the general theory of communication, historic sources study, the history of writing, the history of cul­ture, the general theory of classification, and psychol­ogy. For the special scientific discipline of documenta­tion these are represented by archives science, linguis­tics (document linguistics), theory and practice of management, law science, historic sources study, tech­nology of office work, informatics, information, theory of communications.
3. Because is has too much connections with other sciences.
4. The scientific discipline of documentation serves as a methodological platform for bibliography.
5. Connections of the scientific discipline of documen­tation with other sciences are conditioned, first of all, by the origin of documentological concepts, in particular, from bibliology funds science, scientific information activity, bibliographology and the science of management activity

Lesson 18

1. Durkheim viewed society as a supra-individual spiritual reality based on the collective representations. According to Max Weber, the company - it is human interaction, which is a social product that is focused on other people's actions.
2. Social psychology - the science that studies the mechanisms and patterns of behavior and activities of people because of their involvement in social groups and communities, as well as the psychological characteristics of these groups and communities.
3. One of the negative effects and costs of scientific and technological progress is the removal of the discrepancy, and from each other technical and humanities, the sciences of "dead" nature and the sciences of living man.
4. Because it studies the psychology of individuals and society as a whole, which helps us in our lives.
5. First, the clinical setting. Secondly, there have been changes in the general atmosphere of the spiritual life of society, which was due to some softening of ideological pressure that began "thaw" and allowed to discuss the fate of social psychology (as well, however, as, and sociology) is no longer as a "bourgeois science "but in fact the problem.

Lesson 19

1. The social sciences are dedicated to understanding the human condition, ideally to the extent that the singular and collective behaviors of human beings can be understood and even predicted.
2. In approaching the problem of why some people do certain things, psychologists are inclined to give greater attention to the bearing of thought processes, personality characteristics, and their changes across the life-cycle. The closed, stereotypic thinking of authoritarians, for instance, make them more likely to be prejudiced and to join extreme right-wing political groups.
3. As opposed to psychology's atomization of the human condition, focusing on the self and its inner workings, sociologists' attention is directed toward human connections.
4. It is for these reasons that sociologically-inclined social psychologists are more likely to examine how individuals' perceptions, belief systems, moralities, identities, and behaviors are determined by their positions in social space: the culture of their primary socializations; the slice of social history intersecting their biographies, such as coming of age during a time of depression or war; their locations within the stratification orders of gender, age, race, and social class; their roles within the institutional orders of religion, work, community, and family; the geographic context of their childhoods, such as region of the country or the size of cities wherein they lived and their memberships in and relative identifications with various social groups.
5. In determining the subject of social psychology has developed three approaches.

Lesson 20

1. Information processing is the change (processing) of information in any manner detectable by an observer.

2. Information processing may more specifically be defined in terms used by Claude E. Shannon as the conversion of latent information into manifest information.

3.  Information processing may be sequential or parallel, either of which may be centralized or decentralized (distributed).

4. In the 1970s, Abraham Moles and Frieder Nake were among the first to establish and analyze links between information processing and aesthetics.

5. Information processing (IP) is a cognitive processing theory (see, Ashcraft, 1994). While other theories in this book are learning or instructional in nature, IP theory seeks to explain how the mind functions.

6. As proposed by Hummel and Huitt (1994) if students are not required to demonstrate the results of elaboration on meaningful tasks such as examinations or projects, they are not likely to adequately develop the skills required for higher-level thinking.

Lesson 21

1. The theory is based on the idea that humans process the information they receive, rather than merely responding to stimuli.

2. This theory addresses how as children grow, their brains likewise mature, leading to advances in their ability to process and respond to the information they received through their senses. The theory emphasizes a continuous pattern of development, in contrast with Cognitive Developmental theorists such as Jean Piaget that thought development occurred in stages.

3.  Beginning in the 1950s, a major change occurred in the field of Psychology that has come to be known as the Cognitive Revolution.

4. Many psychologists and researchers believe that the Information Processing Theory was influenced by computers, in that the human mind is similar to a computer. However, today the metaphor of mind as computer has faded. The analogy has much strength, in that humans have different memory stores and information is transferred from one store to another, however it does little to actually explain how.

5. Long-term memory consists of explicit and implicit long-term memory systems.

Lesson 22

1. There are some type of memory human has: short-term memory, long-term memory.

2. Information comes from the outside world into the sensory registers in the human brain.

3. Interest in information phenomena increased dramatically in the 20th century.

4. The American philosopher, mathematician, and physicist Charles S. Peirce is credited with having pointed out the three dimensions of signs.

5. The processor has several functions: (1) to carry out elementary information processes on symbolic expressions, (2) to store temporarily in the processor’s short-term memory the input and output expressions on which these processes operate and that they generate, (3) to schedule execution of these processes, and (4) to change this sequence of operations in accordance with the contents of the short-term memory.

Lesson 23

1. Information forms the major base on which the growth of knowledge and so much else depends. Without information decisions will be random ad-hoc choices, projects are unlikely to meet set objectives; reports will not adequately reflect situations.

2. The "resource" displays the following features:  Information has only recently been accepted as a national resource that is susceptible to study using techniques that have been developed and applied to other areas of human endeavour. Current information systems at both local, national and regional level are really a collection of uncoordinated entities that loosely link information producers to users. There is no overall system in the sense in which the term is normally used. Individuals and organizations are at the same time producers and consumers of information.  The value of information is in its utilization. National information infrastructures in developing countries are often non-innovative, fragmented and under-used. Looking at information as a product that must be designed, developed, packaged and promoted on the basis of identified user needs is a new concept that is gaining ground with the application of information technology.  Information is potentially a plentiful resource and is also potentially inexhaustible.

3. With the application of information technology the amount of effort and time that needs to be applied to these basic operations is reduced. This allows staff time to provide higher level services as illustrated in the higher reaches of the figure.

4. The use of CD/ROM will allow rapid access to information within individual units.

5. Training for information personnel, who would now need a subject background, will need to include techniques of information analysis, consolidation and repackaging and also of developing expert systems.