IT ALL STARTED with the American Library Association (ALA) which wanted to celebrate its centenary in 1976 at its headquarters in Chicago. With five American librarians and non-librarians I was invited to give a centennial paper. I declined the flattering offer because I had left the profession and had no time to do any research. I added innocently, however, that I would be delighted to speak out of personal experience, for instance on the impor tance of American librarianship in my professional life. This pro posal was accepted; I delivered the lecture and my text was printed in Libraries and the Life cif the Mind. Before I had read my paper in Chicago I received a request from the International Federation of Library Associations (IFLA) to contribute with Recollections of a President to the fiftieth anniver sary volume of IFLA (1927-1977). For reasons with which I agreed IFLA did not publish my paper in full, such as it is given here as chapter 10. I am confident that no one will compare the two versions in order to try to find out \\That has been left out in the earlier printing. Two other papers have appeared in German Festschrifts, one for Kurt Koster from Frankfurt-aiM (chapter 7) and one for Gerhard Liebers from Munster (chapter 5) the former being focussed to accord with the interest of the recipient on medieval Dutch manuscripts, the latter, for similar reasons, on library buildings."

The nucleus of this volume consists of a number of papers presented at the Advanced Research Workshop on liThe Impact of New Information Technologies on Library Management, Resources and Cooperation" , held in Luxembourg fran 19-23 November 1984. The oorkshop was a joint effort of four international organisations. The Scientific Affairs Division of the North .Atlantic Treaty Organization, through a personal canmitment and interest expressed by Dr. H. Durand, Assistant Secretary General for Scientific Affairs, was the first and major sponsor acting as a catalyst in enabling the Workshop to take place. Through its support for travel and subsistence costs of some of the North American participants, the Workshop could become a platfo~in for the exchange of ideas between parties concerned with information handling and transmission and information policy in Western Europe and North America. The Directorate General for Information Market and Innovation of the Canmission of the European Communities hosted the Vlorkshop in its facilities - the Jean l'bnnet Building in Luxembourg - also providing for simultaneous translation in the main languages of the European Community. Moreover, the Canmission generously funded the participation of key participants fran Community countries and provided participants with ample info~ination on existing Community programmes related to electronic publications, electronic transmission of documents, copyright problems, problems of standards, telecanmunication, and so on. 'I'he Council of Europe supported attendance fran Sweden, Austria and Spain. And lastly, the European Cultural Foundation organised the event on behalf of all these organisa tions.

IT ALL STARTED with the American Library Association (ALA) which wanted to celebrate its centenary in 1976 at its headquarters in Chicago. With five American librarians and non-librarians I was invited to give a centennial paper. I declined the flattering offer because I had left the profession and had no time to do any research. I added innocently, however, that I would be delighted to speak out of personal experience, for instance on the impor tance of American librarianship in my professional life. This pro posal was accepted; I delivered the lecture and my text was printed in Libraries and the Life cif the Mind. Before I had read my paper in Chicago I received a request from the International Federation of Library Associations (IFLA) to contribute with Recollections of a President to the fiftieth anniver sary volume of IFLA (1927-1977). For reasons with which I agreed IFLA did not publish my paper in full, such as it is given here as chapter 10. I am confident that no one will compare the two versions in order to try to find out \\That has been left out in the earlier printing. Two other papers have appeared in German Festschrifts, one for Kurt Koster from Frankfurt-aiM (chapter 7) and one for Gerhard Liebers from Munster (chapter 5) the former being focussed to accord with the interest of the recipient on medieval Dutch manuscripts, the latter, for similar reasons, on library buildings."

The nucleus of this volume consists of a number of papers presented at the Advanced Research Workshop on liThe Impact of New Information Technologies on Library Management, Resources and Cooperation" , held in Luxembourg fran 19-23 November 1984. The oorkshop was a joint effort of four international organisations. The Scientific Affairs Division of the North .Atlantic Treaty Organization, through a personal canmitment and interest expressed by Dr. H. Durand, Assistant Secretary General for Scientific Affairs, was the first and major sponsor acting as a catalyst in enabling the Workshop to take place. Through its support for travel and subsistence costs of some of the North American participants, the Workshop could become a platfo~in for the exchange of ideas between parties concerned with information handling and transmission and information policy in Western Europe and North America. The Directorate General for Information Market and Innovation of the Canmission of the European Communities hosted the Vlorkshop in its facilities - the Jean l'bnnet Building in Luxembourg - also providing for simultaneous translation in the main languages of the European Community. Moreover, the Canmission generously funded the participation of key participants fran Community countries and provided participants with ample info~ination on existing Community programmes related to electronic publications, electronic transmission of documents, copyright problems, problems of standards, telecanmunication, and so on. 'I'he Council of Europe supported attendance fran Sweden, Austria and Spain. And lastly, the European Cultural Foundation organised the event on behalf of all these organisa tions.

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