Connecting users with their information

Abstract

The article counters the popular claims that librarians and information professionals are threatened by the continued expansion of the quantity of information that is available on the World Wide Web, by noting that many of their skills, such as classification and taxonomy, will be increasingly demanded by the information services that are available online. The author discusses the issues involved in the work of librarians/information professionals in online information services in the context of her experiences at Factiva, a provider of current and archival business and news information, with thousands of newspapers, magazines and newswires searchable by a web interface, which is staffed by traditional library and information science (LIS) or Master of Library Science degrees. The important role of librarians/information professionals at Factiva is further illustrated by a listing of the job titles of staff in the main departments of: Content Services; Customer Service and Sales; and Marketing. The author concludes that the continued expansion of information on the web and the need to understand what information is needed by various user groups will ensure that the traditional skills of librarianship and information science will always be in great demand.