O Mercosul, o mercado comum que reúne Argentina, Brasil, Paraguai e Uruguai, está se consolidando rapidamente em nível comercial. O possível impacto do Mercosul sobre a indústria da editoração é discutido e fatores de relevância para bibliotecas e sistemas informacionais são examinados. Materiais que promovem a expressão cultural devem circular livremente entre os quatro países, desde que os direitos de propriedade intelectual forem respeitados. O Brasil precisa promover sua própria produção literária, musical e cinematográfica e, ao mesmo tempo, dar maior atenção à cultura dos seus parceiros no novo bloco econômico.
A study of the major automated libraries and bibliographic information systems in Brazil showed that the most important problems were, in ranked order, lack of experienced personnel, lack of financial resources, lack of official guidelines and government policy, and lack of networks and cooperation. Purely technical problems were ranked much lower. Lack of education and training was also ranked much lower than lack of experience. No distinction was made by respondents be tween the experience of systems analysts with libraries, and the experience of librarians with computers; in other words, what was occurring was a problem of communication between the two professions. Lack of finance was demonstrated by the simplicity of systems, lack of inhouse computer equipment, and the high level of errors in input to automated systems. There was a lack of national planning, in what was often considered a peripheral area, and the central organs of library and informa tion science were weak. Information was transferred between institutions in an almost random manner. Most automation was done in isolation, and there was no exchange of biblio graphic data between libraries. The author proposes a series of small-scale initiatory projects to spread practical experience around the country.
Automated systems can be found in about forty locations in Brazil, including both libraries and information systems; they are usually simple systems, developed and operating in isolation. An in‐depth survey of twenty‐two automated library systems revealed seventeen automated catalogues, nine circulation systems and five acquisition systems; in all cases the number of transactions was low by anglo‐American standards. Seven internal indexing systems were also noted; public indexing systems were not always appropriate for the needs of specific institutions. Brazilian libraries have made a firm start in the automation field and will doubtless continue to automate, although this will rarely be their major priority.
The Internet came to Brazil early, and was quickly recognized as an exciting new means of communication, highly appropriate for a technologically advanced and recently democratized society. This paper identifies and characterizes the principal Brazilian digital library initiatives in science and research; education; literature and the humanities and history and politics. Government financing was critical for the implementation of Brazilian digital libraries. Institutions with a strong background in advanced technology had an advantage when entering the digital library field. Cooperative projects have also had significant impact.
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