The Information Society

It says a lot about the pace of change in recent years that The Information Society, first published in 1994, is in its fifth edition. Methods of publishing and accessing information remained largely static for hundreds of years, but the past 14 years have been more about change than continuity.

The aim of the book, by John Feather, professor of library and information studies at Loughborough University, is to look at how changes in the way information is provided are inextricably linked to questions of economic development and state control.

The latest edition has been updated to discuss the impact of e-publishing and web-based technologies on how information is published, accessed and managed.

Feather’s view is that the internet has restricted as well as widened access to information. Publishing a document electronically makes it possible for many more people to view it, but it also makes it more expensive.

The gap between the information-rich and information-poor countries is growing, Feather argues, and that should give us cause for concern.

He tackles difficult questions about who “owns” information and how access should be managed. As the web has made it much easier to publish and disseminate, so these questions have become harder to answer, he argues. Copyright, essential to protect the owners of information from theft, is threatened by the ease with which files can be copied and downloaded from the internet.

Similarly, the relationship between the state and the individual has become more complex. Governments can collect and retain large amounts of data about its citizens on electronic databases. And while the internet has made it easier to access information, some governments use the war against terrorism as a reason to restrict that access.

Striking a balance
Feather is good at comparing the different ways in which governments have approached subjects such as censorship, copyright and freedom of information. In each case, a balance has to be struck between different groups and their requirements ­ the right to speak freely, for example, against the right to be protected from libel.

In his last chapter, he looks at how the changes in the management of information have affected information professionals. The library, he argues, is no longer a physical entity but a concept. As libraries become virtual, the function of the librarian will be to “manage information resources so that they are available to all legitimate network users”.

This is a book that is, as Feather himself puts it, “pragmatic and empirical” rather than theoretical in scope. Its wide-ranging overview will be useful to anyone interested in the political, economic and social implications of the changing ways information is produced and managed.

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