THIS ANNOUNCEMENT IS BEING POSTED TO MULTIPLE ARTS AND HUMANITIES LISTS. PLEASE EXCUSE THE DUPLICATION PLEASE REPOST FREELY. The Getty Art History Information Program The American Council of Learned Societies The Coalition for Networked Information *ANNOUNCEMENT* Date: October, 1994 For Immediate Release: CULTURAL HERITAGE CRUCIAL TO DEVELOPMENT OF INFORMATION SUPERHIGHWAYS SAY NATIONAL LEADERS IN NEW REPORT Washington, DC -- An alliance of major humanities and arts organizations has issued a report calling on the federal government to recognize the crucial value of the American people's cultural heritage in planning the National Information Infrastructure (NII). "Humanities and Arts on the Information Highways - a Profile," coincides with the release of a related position paper by the White House Information Infrastructure Task Force at a Council on Competitiveness conference (September 7-8, 1994). The federal paper, "The Information Infrastructure: Reaching Society's Goals," presents strategies for applying information technologies to the cultural sector. The alliance, led by the Getty Art History Information program, the American Council of Learned Societies, and the Coalition for Networked Information, has issued its "Profile" to stimulate and guide response to the Administration's call for public comment. "The coming information highway has the potential to revolutionize the way we study and appreciate our cultural heritage," said Eleanor Fink, director of the Getty Art History Information Program. "Making the complex resources of the humanities and arts accessible on the networks would contribute profoundly to the most difficult technological challenges in computing." The "Profile" is the result of an ongoing process aimed at meeting the urgent need for the humanities and arts to gain a voice in the planning and development of the NII. Created by working groups of nationally recognized experts, the report defines the special challenges and opportunities associated with digitizing cultural heritage information. The "Profile" highlights ways in which a fully interactive and exploratory environment would transform the NII from a link between computers to a link between people. Speaking for the American Council of Learned Societies, president Stanley Katz observed that "Electronic technologies have the potential to transform information from a scarce, inequitably distributed and fragmented commodity into a true public good." Paul Evan Peters, executive director of the Coalition for Networked Information, expressed the hope that "our community-based process -- the "Profile" being the first outcome -- will generate the type of lively and open exchange of visions and needs that the Clinton administration is seeking." With the completion of this landmark document, the alliance plans to expand its base of organizational partners to encompass the full breadth of the cultural heritage sector. # # # (Note: electronic copies of the Profile are available upon request from the Coalition for Networked Information. Electronic copy can be accessed via FTP, Gopher, or the World Wide Web [see below]. Hard copies are available free of charge from Publications, Getty AHIP, 401 Wilshire Boulevard, Suite 1100, Santa Monica, CA 90401 or <[log in to unmask]>. Editors, please note the attached description of the Profile sponsors and names of individuals available for interviews or comment.) To access via FTP URL: ftp://ftp.cni.org/CNI/projects/humartiway/humartiway-rpt.Word.hqx URL: ftp://ftp.cni.org/CNI/projects/humartiway/humartiway-rpt.ps URL: ftp://ftp.cni.org/CNI/projects/humartiway/humartiway-rpt.txt ftp ftp.cni.org login: anonymous [send e-mail address as password] cd /CNI/projects/humartiway get humartiway-rpt.Word.hqx [Microsoft Word - BinHexed] get humartiway-rpt.ps [Postscript] get humartiway-rpt.txt [ASCII text] To access via Gopher URL: gopher://gopher.cni.org:70/00/cniftp/projects/humartiway/humartiway-rpt. Word.hqx URL: gopher://gopher.cni.org:70/00/cniftp/projects/humartiway/humartiway-rpt. ps URL: gopher://gopher.cni.org:70/00/cniftp/projects/humartiway/humartiway-rpt. txt gopher gopher.cni.org Coalition FTP Archives (ftp.cni.org) Coalition Projects (/CNI/projects) Humanities and Arts on the Information Highway (Final Report) To access via WWW URL: http://www.cni.org/docs/humartiway/www/humartiway-rpt.intro.html # # # Sponsors of "Humanities and Arts on the Information Highways - a Profile" The Getty Art History Information Program The Getty Art History Information Program (AHIP), one of six operating programs of the J. Paul Getty Trust, seeks to make art- historical information more accessible to scholars and researchers through the use of advanced computer technology. It does so by promoting common perspectives and standards among international institutions and organizations on projects in four general areas: working to affect policies that will enhance access to electronic information; coordinating vocabularies to facilitate consistent data entry and retrieval; providing bibliographic services; and assembling art historical databases. Among AHIPUs projects are the Art & Architecture Thesaurus, the Art Information Task Force, the Image and Information Standards Initiative, the Bibliography of the History of Art, the Avery Index to Architectural Periodicals, the Provenance Documentation Collaborative, the Witt Computer Index, the Union List of Artist Names, and the Thesaurus of Geographic Names. The Getty Art History Information Program, Director, Eleanor Fink, 401 Wilshire Boulevard, Suite 1100, Santa Monica, California 90401-1455, (310) 395-1025, ext. 1164, (310) 451-5570 fax, e-mail: [log in to unmask] The American Council of Learned Societies The American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) is a private non-profit federation of 52 national scholarly organizations. The purpose of the Council, as set forth in its constitution, is "the advancement of humanities studies and the maintenance and strengthening of relations among the national societies devoted to such studies." Included in the program of the Council are awards to individual scholars to advance research in the humanities and humanistic aspects of the social sciences, support for international scholarly research and exchanges; activities concerned with the identification of present and future needs of humanistic scholarship, and planning and development to meet these needs; and organizational functions. In addition, the Council has fiscal and administrative oversight for the Council for International Exchange of Scholars (CIES), which administers the Fulbright program. The American Council of Learned Societies, President, Stanley Katz, 228 East 45th Street, New York, NY 10017-3398, (212) 697-1505, (212) 948-8058 fax, e-mail: [log in to unmask] The Coalition for Networked Information The Coalition for Networked Information was founded in March 1990 to help realize the promise of advanced networks and high-performance computing for information access and delivery. The Coalition was established by three associations: The Association of Research Libraries (ARL), CAUSE and EDUCOM. ARL is an association promoting equitable access and effective use of recorded knowledge supporting teaching, research and scholarship. CAUSE and EDUCOM are dedicated to introducing, using and managing information technology and related sources in research in general and higher education. The Coalition of Networked Information promotes the creation of access to information resources in networked environments in order to enrich scholarship and enhance intellectual productivity. A Task Force of institutions and organizations able and willing to contribute resources and attention to the mission of the Coalition was created in 1990 and continues to grow. This Task Force now provides a common vehicle by which more than 200 institutions and organizations pursue a shared vision of information management and how it must change in the 1990s to meet the social, educational and economic opportunities and challenges of the 21st century. Members of the Task Force include higher education institutions, publishers, network service providers, computer hardware, software, and systems companies, library networks and organizations, and public and state libraries. The Coalition for Networked Information, Executive Director, Paul Evan Peters, 21 Dupont Circle, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20036, (202) 296-5098, (202) 872-0884 fax, e-mail: [log in to unmask]