Barriers in front of information
Ayhan Kaygusuz
Istanbul Şehir University
First examples of intellectual productions
• First examples of intellectual productions go back to 20-30 thousand years ago.
Human being started painting cave walls for communicating with others. At that
time the media was cave walls and communication method was visual
communication.
• After then people found other ways for sharing, storing and preserving their
knowledge and ideas. They used different tools and medias for that purpose.
• There were a variety of information carriers from clay tablets to papyrus and
parchments. Then paper has a long life for about 2.000 years up to now.
• Paper and printing machine have played an important role in the history of
humanity. Inventing printing press was one of the most important revolution in
the history. The importance of this revolution is dissemination of information to a
wider audience.
• Between 15th and 20th centuries main media was books and periodicals.
• Storage and preservation of information were primitive and easy comparing
today.
First examples of intellectual productions
• The Venus of Willendorf - 24,000 BC
• Man from Brno, Czech Republic - c.30,000 BC
• Mammoth from Vogelherd Cave, Germany c.25,000 BC
• Mother Goddess from Laussel, France - c.22,000 BC
• Woman's Head from Brassempouy, France - c.22,000 BC
• Clay Bison, Tuc d'Audoubert, Ariege - c.15,000 BC
• Mother Goddess of Catal Huyuk - c.6000 BC
• Man and Woman from Cernavoda Romania - c.4000 BC
• Stone Henge, Salisbury England - c.2100 BC
• Moai Statues, Easter Island, Chile - Disputed Time Range
• Lascaux France Cave
• Lascaux France Bull
First examples of intellectual productions
Production and recording information
Production and recording information
Production and recording information
Production and recording information
Production and recording information
Circulation of information
Circulation of information
Liber Chronicarum (Nuremberg Chronicle)
The Gentleman’s Magazine
Storage and preservation of information
1990s
• Widening access to information has contributed to the speed of
science and developments.
• After 1990s almost everything has changed.
• 1990s are the beginning of a new era and internet has had a great
impact on our daily lives.
1990s
After Internet
• Instant messaging,
• Voice over Internet,
• Two-way interactive video calls,
• World Wide Web
• Discussion forums,
• Social networking,
• Online shopping
• And production and publishing scientific information are the most
affected areas.
Main differences between the old times and now
• Amount of information is not comparable
• The media, -information carriers- are different
• Delivery method of information has completly changed,
• Storage and preservation of information are much more complicated
and expensive than the old times.
Information Growth
Information Growth
• I agree with the definition that was made 19 years ago. ICT are
primary reason for information overload. Speed of dissemination of
information has caused snow ball effect on production of information.
• Information technology may be a primary reason for information
overload due to its ability to produce more information more quickly
and to disseminate this information to a wider audience than ever
before (Evaristo, Adams, & Curley, 1995).
How much information?
Release date: October 27, 2003. © 2003 Regents of the University of California
It is a difficult task to estimate the amount of
information production. There are several studies to
estimate how much information is produced.
A study carried out by University of California showed that 5
exabytes new information was produced in 2002 and %92 of it
was stored on magnetic media.
In that study it was estimated that new stored information
increased about 30% a year between 1999 and 2002.
Size of digital universe
The Expanding Digital Universe : a Forecast of Worldwide Information Growth Through 2010, IDC White Paper, March 2007
According to the report published by
IDC the amount of digital information
created, captured, and replicated was
161 exabytes in 2006. Estimation for the
year 2010 was around 1.000 exabytes in
this study.
Size of digital universe
• In the latest version of the study
estimation for the size of digital
universe was around 3.000
(2837) exabytes by 2012 and it
will reach 40.000 exabytes = 40
zettabytes in 2020.
Size of digital universe
Two-third of the total
amount of information is
produced by USA,
Western Europe and
China.
Rest of the world
produces only one-third.
Very latest version
of the report
published in April
and the estimation
was revised from 40
ZB to 44 ZB for
2020.
Scientific Information
• Scientific information is also increasing very rapidly.
• Only three major publishers have more than 22 million
articles in their databases.
• OA publishing is growing too. It is not at a desirable level yet
but by the May 2014 only DOAJ has more than 1.6 million
articles.
Scientific information
Scientific information
Scientific information
OA publishing
Digital divide
• Enormous information growth has made it much more complicated to
access information. One has to have ICT infrastructure, money and
necessary competencies and skills to access information.
• Description of digital divide explains the gap between geographic
areas and societies.
Digital divide describes the gap between those who have already
access to information and communication technology and the skills to
make use of those technology and those who do not have the access or
skills to use those same technologies within a geographic area, society
or community. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_divide
Barriers to access information
There are several barriers in front of information varying by
countries, regions, societies and genders. Some of them are;
• Technical barriers,
• Financial barriers,
• Information literacy issues
Internet usage statistics is one of the important indicator showing technical barriers. Only 15 percent of
population has internet access in Africa, this rate is almost 80% in North America. This creates a big gap
between the societies in terms of accessing digital information. Only 34 percent of the world’s population
has internet access by June 2012.
Barriers to access information
• There is a big difference between least developed countries and developed
world
• Growth is higher in the developing world than the developed world but it
seems it will take too long to catch up.
• Following comparisions are from International Telecommunication Union
showing inequalities between poor and rich.
• 14 most expensive broadband out of 20 are in Africa.
• In 9 poorest countries internet is 2 times expensive than the average
monthly income.
• 14 most affordable economies out of 20 are in Europe in terms of
broadband costs.
Broadband Commission Statshot - September 2012
Growth between developing and Developed World
Between 2010-2011
Broadband Costs
Processing and protecting information
• There are other technical difficulties information professionals have
been facing. These are processing and protecting the information.
According to IDC’s study only 3% of the digital information is "tagged"
and half a percent of the digital information is analyzed by 2012.
• Estimation for the size of digital universe was 3.000 exabytes for 2012
and a third of that data requires protection. But only half of the data
was protected that requires protection.
Processing and protecting information
The amount of information in the digital universe
that is "tagged" accounts for only about 3% of the
digital universe in 2012, and that which is analyzed is
half a percent of the digital universe. IDC's Digital Universe Study
Much of the digital universe is unprotected. IDC
estimates that about a third of the data in the digital
universe requires some type of protection.
Interoperability
• The other technical barrier is the lack of interoperability between
systems. Tens of different systems are working in an organisation to
achive the goals of the organization. But in general there are
interoperability problems at all levels, institutional, national and
international.
Interoperability
Interoperability refers to how well two or more
systems work together to achieve a common goal.
Interoperability is multilateral by nature and is best
understood as a shared value of a community. European
Investigation of Information Systems Interoperability in UK universities,
Menzies, Birrell and Dunsire, 2011.
Interoperability Framework (EIF) for European public services, Bruxelles, le
16.12.2010 COM(2010) 744 final
European Interoperability Framework (EIF)
Needs for Interoperability;
Benefits of
interoperability;
• cooperation among public
administrations with the aim to
• improved public service
establish public services;
delivery to citizens and
• exchanging information among
businesses by facilitating the
public administrations to fulfil
one-stop-shop delivery of
legal requirements or political
public services;
commitments;
• lower costs for public
• sharing and reusing information
administrations, businesses and
among public administrations to
citizens due to the efficient
increase administrative efficiency
delivery of public services.
and cut red tape for citizens and
businesses.
European Interoperability Framework (EIF) for European public
services, Bruxelles, le 16.12.2010 COM(2010) 744 final
Financial Barriers
• Scientific information is very expensive. Latest survey showed that
average price per title varies by discipline between 1401-4450 USD.
According to the ARL statistics expenditures for serials has increased
400 percent between 1986-2011. Profit margins of major academic
publishers are going up.
• Price of information is increasing but library budgets are getting less
every year. Library expenditures have come down from 3.7 percent to
1.8 percent. There is a 50 percent cut in last 32 years time.
Financial Barriers
Library Expenditure in Total University Expenditure
ARL Statistics
2007-2008
2010-2011
Information literacy
• Information literacy has become an important issue in the
information age.
• An internet search may retrieve over one billion hits on a subject like
climate change. Without having necessary competencies and skills it
is almost impossible to review the results.
• Unfortunately information literacy is not a part of teaching systems in
most of the schools.
Literacy Issues
Language Barriers
The language is another
barrier in terms of accessing
information. 56 percent of
the web content is in English.
Languages which are spoken
by large population are
represented with a small
percentage in web content.
The following content languages are used by less than 0.1% of the websites
Conclusions
• As a result, ICT have had a great impact on production and
distribution of information. But all individuals and societies do not
have equal opportunities to access the information because of
technical, financial and literacy barriers.
• Growth and circulation of information are positive developments and
we see the effects and contributions of these developments in our
everyday lives. Unfortunately these positive developments will widen
gap between societies and digital divide will be one of the most
important issues of the world.
National Academic Repository Project
Figures about Turkish HEI
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76 million people, % 43 under 25 years old
2 million students take exam to enter university
104 state and 72 foundation, 176 universities
99 of the universities established after 2006
5.4 million students in all levels of higher education
280.000 master’s and doctoral students
142.000 teaching and reserach staff in HEI
Around 30.000 articles are published in citation indexes per year
National Academic Repository Project
• At the beginning of 2014 a project has been started by the HEC of
Turkey.
• The aim of the project is to establish instituonal repositories in all
universities and a harvesting system will be created in the HEC.
• In October 2014, in the open access week, the project will be
evaluated and best practicies from other countries will be reviewed.
National Academic Repository Project
• Training materials have been prepared and published on the website of the HEC in February 2014.
• A training program was organised for 327 librarians and IT staff of 176 universities on 3rd of March.
• A frame Policy document has been created on IR&OA for the Higher Education Council and all universities have been
asked to create their own policies in accordance with that frame policy in April 2014.
• In addition to the provisions on instituonal repositories and open access HEC encourages the universities to create
Research Data Management policies.
• For sharing the experiences and easily exchanging and harvesting data Dspace has been recommended to universities.
• Universities will install, register and test Dspace until end of May 2014.
• Second seminar will be organised for the librarians and practical issues, such as creating accounts, data entry, copyrights
issues will be disscussed in the seminar on 30th of May.
• Libraries will create or convert their data into Dspace between June-October 2014.
• The HEC will design a platform for harvesting all IR of the universities until October 2014.
• Thesis and dissertations will be gradually converted into the new system in the HEC.
• First results of the project will be evaluated in the “open access week” on 20-21 October 2014.
• At the end of that project the HEC will take initiative to suggest a national OA Policy, including research data, to the
related institution.
e-Türkiye
• Turkey has a portal called e-state and it is in service since December 2008.
• From 44 public institutions 380 services are accessible through e-state
portal by the May 2014.
• Every Turkish citizens can access to the portal using their
unique personal identification number.
• By the May 2014 around 18 million citizens have been using the system.
• All public institution have been carrying their services under that portal.
These institutions have to use the guide that sets out standards and
principles of interoperability.
•
e-Türkiye
e-Türkiye
The main goals of the project are;
• To improve delivery of public services to Turkish citizens through a single platform.
• Reduce the costs for public administrations and citizens by delivering efficient
public services.
e-Türkiye
e-Türkiye
Thank you for your attention
ayhankaygusuz@sehir.edu.tr