The Information Infrastructure - Evolving Global Information Infrastructure and Information Transfer - page 59

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The Information Infrastructure
Chapter Overview
In this chapter we define “information transfer” as a model for examining the
information infrastructure. The processes of information transfer—creation, record-
ing, mass production, dissemination, bibliographic control, organization by discip-
line, diffusion, utilization, preservation, and discarding—are described. Technology
and other factors in our environment have changed these processes over time. The
body's vascular system is used as a metaphor for the complex interactions within
the information transfer processes, and the transportation system is presented as a
way of conceptualizing the very complex information infrastructure.
Defining Information Transfer
“Information transfer” is a type of communication, as shown in Figure 4.1. It can
be defined as the communication of a recorded message from one human to an-
other. While communication assumes that the sender and receiver(s) of a message
are contemporaries, information transfer requires a recorded message transmitted
through a medium that enables senders to transmit ideas to people who are not
their contemporaries. In other words, information transfer is asynchronous.
The recorded message can be stored in an information system . This system can
be a library, a computer storage device, an iPod, a phone, or any kind of system
that collects, organizes, stores, and makes available the information created by the
sender and recorded as an information package.
Figure 4.1 Conventional Library Service Model