The terrorist attacks of September 11th on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon have had profound implications for many aspects of American and global society. This essay explores the many implications for library and information science schools educating the next generation of information professionals. The essay considers an array of opinions by the faculty located in one such school regarding how to reflect on the aftermath of the attacks for basic aspects of teaching, research, and curriculum design in library and information science schools. Topics examined include disaster preparedness and recovery, knowledge management, workplace design and location, technology and the human dimension, ethics and information policy, information security, information economics, memorializing and documenting the terrorist attacks, the role of the Internet, and preservation.

Contents

Introduction
Shifting Paradigms?
A Potpourri of Issues
Conclusion: Final Practical Thoughts

 

Introduction

On 11 September 2001 the terrorist hijacking of four domestic air flights led to the destruction of the World Trade Center in New York City, an attack on the Pentagon, and the loss of thousands of lives [ 1]. News reporters, commentators, various experts, and political leaders all commented, in sobering fashion, about our world changing in a matter of hours. The issue of the Economist (15-21 September 2001) appearing immediately after the disasters featured a dramatic photograph of the collapse of the World trade Center with a banner headline reading, "The Day the World Changed." The lead article in that issue compared the attacks to that of the 1941 attack of Pearl Harbor, stating, "This week has changed America, and with it the world, once again" [2].

We can argue about whether any such event, even one this horrific, can be given a moniker indicating such change at a point in time that is still so close to the events. Some commentators are already doing this. Stanley Hoffman focused on the terrorist attacks as the byproducts of a "global society," noting that this was particularly troublesome for the United States, the "country that has done most to destroy borders and walls, to shape a world market, to promote freedom of communications, information, and movement" [ 3]. Likewise, Lewis H. Lapham wondered why so many commentators thought these events were "unbelievable," asking, "Do the merchants of the global economy not read their own sales promotions?" Lapham mused, "whoever organized the attack on the United States clearly understood not only the arcane of postmodern finance capitalism but also the idiom of the American news and entertainment media" [ 4]. Some historians have indicated already that all of the hyperbole about the "newness" of what occurred on September 11th may be part of the general tendency by the media, politicians, commentators, and others to forget about previous conflicts that the United States has been engaged in [ 5]. Anyone trying to take the longer,historical view of the uses of information sources, repositories, technologies,and systems have also resorted to such conclusions that we need to be careful of in assessing the implications of a present event [ 6]. We would be remiss, however, if we ignored the consequences of these dramatic events on what we are about in a school of information sciences, especially since so much of the history of information science is tied up with wars, both hot and cold [7].

Faculty, staff, and students at the University of Pittsburgh School of Information Sciences did not need to be told about the transformation of their world. Haunting images on television and the World Wide Web of paper records drifting through lower Manhattan, reports of dramatic uses of cellular telephones by victims, and descriptions of law enforcement agencies tracking alleged terrorists through the use of credit cards and other records and information systems (related to activities at airlines, flight schools, automobile rentals and hotels) all attested to the role of and impact on modern information technologies and systems in these events. The unique role of information systems even led to some interesting efforts to memorialize the victims of the September 11th events by saving any recorded material chronicling history of the World Trade Center and the attacks that destroyed it, focusing on "sounds from dictation tapes, tourist videos made before Sept. 11, training films used by World Trade Center tenants, audio recordings of financial transactions or any other 'shards' of sound that capture the expressions, exchanges, and humanity that defined the buildings" [8].

Early indicators were that the events of September 11th had much to do with what goes on in a school educating future archivists, librarians, information scientists, knowledge managers, and other information professionals. We learned that libraries, archives, and computer systems were destroyed or severely damaged [ 9], but the impact was much more profound. The Economist perceptively noted that "counter-terrorism" dependson both the "pooling of information" and "international co-operation," and with this we have a glimpse of the possibilities of the first warfare in the Information Age [ 10]. An article in the peer-reviewed electronic journal First Monday described the concept of "netwar":

"Netwar is an emerging mode of conflict in which the protagonists - ranging from terrorist and criminal organizations on the dark side, to militant social activists on the bright side - use network forms of organization, doctrine, strategy, and technology attuned to the information age" [ 11].

Investigative reporters concentrated on intelligence gathering systems, an integral part of the Information Age and its origins [ 12]. We are a school intimately connected to whatever passes for the Information Age, even though our tendencies, those of the faculty and students, would be to debate the precise meaning of the Information Age. The meanings ofan "Information Age war" or a "netwar" might be even muddier and more debatable except for the fact that it was being played out before our very eyes. The technologies of a "netwar" suggest that no matter how we define such terms that the prospects of future warfare have much to do with what we teach and research at a typical school focused on the various components of information science, as terrorist and other groups "take advantage of networked designs" and we observe a "new generation of social revolutionaries, radicals, and activists who are beginning to create information-age ideologies, in which identities and loyalties may shift from the nation state to the transnational level of 'global civil society'" [13].

From the mid nineteenth century we have witnessed an increasing ability to record and report on warfare, from the early uses of photography to the later role of television, [ 14] but what we are now involved in may be the first war in which the media is used both to report on or document a war and to wage it. An article in the Economist reflected on precisely this link of war and technology:

"During the American Civil War, journalists using the then newish technology of photography traveled with vast arrays of equipment ... which had to be packed on to large, horse-drawn carts. Since then, many wars have been touched by improvements to the technology of reporting. In the first world war it was film; in the second, live radio; in Vietnam, television. The star of the current conflict in Afghanistan is the video satellite phone." [ 15].

The events of September 11th and their aftermath have numerous implications for a school of information sciences in curriculum, research, recruiting, and services to local, national, and international professional communities. Obviously, many other university faculties and professional schools also perceived the need to address the nature and impact of the September 11th events and the ensuing war on terrorism [ 16]. We concur, and we also believe it is important for us to consider the implications of these events. We believe that information science schools can play some important, positive roles in recovering from these tragedies and because they demonstrate, as effectively as anything, the unique contributions such schools can make because of their diverse expertise, interests, and programs and because of some of the unique aspects of information in this new war. Surprisingly, early descriptions of responses by professional schools to the September 11th events included every kind of professional school except information science [17].

This essay is intended to rectify this omission. What follows is a discussion of a set of broad topics relating to the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks and their aftermath in which a school like this already possesses expertise and can contribute in profound ways. There is no particular order to the topics, given that they are interrelated and, in most cases, of equal importance. There is also no profound conceptual framework for this discussion. We could place these concerns into some configuration of information documents, technologies, and communities (or something else like this) reflecting what we do and teach or what we theorize about and conduct research on, but this seems premature at this early date. As we will touch on below, there are also some more personal human costs to the September 11th events that are difficult to process as well. At this point we know of at least one graduate of our school who lost her life in the World Trade Center destruction. We are also witnessing some unfortunate losses in international students who are leaving to go home and some poor treatment of Islamic and Middle Eastern students. The personal dimensions of the World Trade Center destruction and the Pentagon attack themselves stimulate important issues about the uses of information, information technology, and other related matters intricately connected to a school like this.

 

Shifting Paradigms?

For decades, most of the world's enterprises - commercial, governmental, medical, and educational - have discussed moving their internal information from paper to electronic information and recordkeeping systems. This "paradigm shift" (however over used this phrase seems, it still appears valid [ 18]) was thought to be a gradual process - accelerated by the efficiency of the new technology, but slowed by the costs of equipment, converting archival data, and training. On 11 September, this process seemingly ceased to be gradual - the paradigm now seems to have fully shifted. It seems that firms that relied more heavily on information technology (and maintained appropriate off-site backups) will be the ones to recover most quickly from this disaster. More than ever, the watchwords of this new era will be digitization, decentralization, security, and survivability. Schools of information science must reflect this shift in its curriculum and research and acknowledge that they have roles to play in helping organizations, governments, and professionals to prepare for coping with this shift. Researchers were calling soon after theattacks for Congress to provide more funding for studies in cyberterrorism:"William A. Wulf, president of the National Academy of Engineering, said research into network security hasn't advanced much in the past two decades. 'Frankly, I was simply appalled by how very little progress had been made in the past 15 years,' Mr. Wulf said. 'Our research base in computer-network security is minuscule.' Most computer firewalls are about as effective as the Maginot Line, which France had hoped would protect it from Germany in World War II, he said" [ 19]. Again, we seem immersed in a new kind of war with direct ramifications for a school of information sciences.

As leaders in information applications and technologies, such schools have an obligation to the information industry, its clients, and all institutions (government, business, educational, and cultural) relying on increasingly sophisticated uses of information. They must convince everyone that the paradigm has shifted, and why - recognizing that there will continue to be needs for the maintenance of some traditional information sources for historical, cultural, and other reasons [ 20]. Such schools can research ways to ease the rapid shift that enterprises must make, and they can educate and train the people who will lead and implement the shift. Such schools can serve as both examples and as laboratories for research, reflecting their unique nature as professional schools within universities contributing to scholarship and education while sending out practitioners such as archivists, librarians, software designers, information policy specialists, managers of information systems, and Webmasters [21].

The events of September 11th and their aftermath provide another profound possibility for information science schools, that of explaining the nature and importance of information technologies and their uses to the public and policymakers in new ways. In the past information technologies have tended to be publicly discussed as either the route to the destruction of or salvation for society [ 22]. And, in most cases, the faculty of information science schools have not been involved in the public forum, at least in terms of writing widely for public debate and consideration [ 23]. Recent events may have changed this, opening up new possibilities for the involvement of information science schools and the opportunity for their faculty to explain what they do. Stephen Jay Gould wrote that he believed that "science is wonderfully accessible, that most people show a strong interest, and that levels of general learning stand quite high ..., but that we have mistakenly failed to include the domains of maximal public learning within the scope of science." Gould, in driving home his point, then remarked that the inability to play the violin does not diminish the capacity to enjoy music, that the inability to read ancient languages does not mean we cannot read and comprehend Homer, and that a lack of mathematical understanding does not mean someone can't learn about the differences between quarks in particle physics [ 24]. The use of the media, cell phones, the Internet, and other information technologies in the events of September 11th all suggest that information science schools have a distinct advantage in conveying the significance of what they are about because of the pervasive use of these technologies by a wide spectrum of individuals.

 

A Potpourri of Issues

Disaster Preparedness and Recovery

The images of paper records were haunting. A New York Times article started its report in this way: "A crumpled page of cleaning instructions with a reminder to damp-wipe smudges and smears. A blank check from a financial firm on the 101st floor. A tattered résumé, shreds of a faxed message, a cell-phone bill, a note about school, a bank statement, an expense report. A request for a promotion dated 1979." The article continued: "Personal and official, all shapes and sizes, bits of paper blanket Lower Manhattan with the mundane poetry of office life. They drifted from the sky on Tuesday and fell to earth miles away in Brooklyn, sheets and scraps that document the 28-year life and abrupt death of the World Trade Center" [ 25].

While immediate concerns focused on the loss and saving of human lives, the large concentration of major financial firms and government agencies in the World Trade Center also brought concern for the recovery of records (both paper and electronic) and information systems. Experts on the recovery of such systems estimate that within five years of major disasters, two of five companies go out of business,[ 26] indicating that the consequences of the terrorist attacks are indeed long-term ones.

The World Trade Center destruction is perhaps the most dramatic reminder of the need for companies, governments, and other organizations to be prepared for unforeseen disruptions in their normal activities and the sudden loss of information and records systems. Indeed, the World Trade Center occupants were perhaps better situated than most to deal with cataclysmic events because it was a terrorist target in 1993 [ 27]. One estimate suggests that this was the "largest-ever mobilization of computer backup tapes to help companies reassemble their business information," with as many as two million tapes sent to companies affected by the World Trade Center destruction [ 28]. Organizations need to plan in advance for the use of temporary facilities, alternative systems for communications, and risk analysis for the recovery of information and evidence. John Jackson, president of the disaster recovery division for Comdisco, of Rosemont, Illinois, while noting that electronic systems were routinely backed up and perhaps not affected, commented in one interview that "There's a lot of paper-based information in offices." Jackson continued, "We have really not, in the 17 years I've been in the industry, had a smoke-and-rubble event of this nature. This will test recovery plans in a way they have never been tested" [ 29]. On the other hand, there is a sense that many of the organizations and companies, especially the law firms and government agencies, located in the World Trade Center were just as dependent on the paper records that were destroyed and whose recovery had to take backseat to the rescue efforts of individuals injured and trapped in the buildings' collapse [30].

The implications of the destruction of paper and electronic information systems are immense for a school of information science. After all, technology and disaster have long been recognized as being co-dependent [ 31]. The faculty teaching in such schools need to understand why the enterprises inside the twin towers were still tied to paper-based commerce and documentation. Faculty in the School and their students need to research better techniques that ease the transition from paper to electronic systems, and they need to address whatever reasons are given for these enterprises' resistance. The importance of data replication and reliable network design was underscored by this disaster, and information science faculty and other experts must do more research in these areas.

They must also seek to understand the resilience of paper documents, both identifying aspects of work where paper seems to be superior (or at least relied on suggesting that it is the superior medium) and procedures for ensuring that there are adequate mechanisms for safely managing these documents and ensuring their recovery in times of disasters. Steve Hensen, the President of the Society of American Archivists, mused that "It is an eerie irony that virtually the only thing that has survived the mass destruction of the World Trade Center is paper - much of it singed and dusty, but intact nonetheless. The streets of lower Manhattan along with the graveyards of Trinity and Grace Churches lie several feet deep in memos, letters, resumes, accounting records, reports and other papers that were at the core of the business of early Tuesday morning and that would have eventually found their way to our repositories" [ 32]. The implications of the disaster have far reaching consequences, obviously, for the vast array of constituencies and disciplines that an information science school works with, serves, and educates people to work in.

Whether the paper records seen drifting about Manhattan were the official records of companies and government agencies or merely convenience paper versions of electronic records is intriguing, but it might be beside the point. In educating future records, library, and other information professionals, information science schools must prepare them to assume roles in which they can advise their organizations about how to best prepare and maintain their records and other information systems in case of natural and manmade disasters. Their faculties need to consider how disaster preparedness is integrated into the curriculum so that all students are equipped to assume such a function in their institutions and how they can design and offer workshops and public presentations about the importance of disaster preparedness in order to offer their expertise as a service to helping their regional companies, governments, and other institutions be prepared for disasters of any kind. We must be able to understand how disaster preparedness and recovery concepts and practices have been altered by the new threats of terrorism [33].

Reports about efforts to recover information and records systems also described the growth in this industry in recent years. One article noted that manufacturers of back-up and recovery software had $2.7 billion in revenues last year, and that figure is expected to grow to $4.7 billion in 2005. The World Trade Center destruction and Pentagon attack may increase this growth [ 34]. As a result, these faculties need to evaluate how its academic programs support students who might be interested in preparing for careers in recovery systems and disaster preparedness. There may be particular parts of the landscape of companies and organizations requiring special attention. For example, initial estimates concluded that 14,000 of New York City's 76,000 lawyers had lost or been displaced from their offices, hampering their work already compounded by the fact that many of the law firms did not have adequate disaster or contingency systems for recovery of loss information [35].

Disaster preparedness, and in fact sound management, must address true knowledge management as well. Many information science schools already had established or started developing knowledge management programs before the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. Some might contend that although the term is new, its practice and comprehension of its importance date back many decades or even longer. In addition to determining when and how to use paper and electronic information systems throughout an organization to manage the organization most effectively, the September 11th events also highlight the enormity of the loss of human life and human memory. While we continue to make great progress in developing information systems, the field of knowledge management is still in its infancy. Capturing knowledge held in memories and based on assimilation and integration of facts, information, life, and experiences, and determining how to incorporate this all into improving processes, procedures, and thinking within an organization are daunting challenges. Much of what was in the memories of the thousands killed on September 11th will never be recovered. What brings the notion of knowledge management together with the September 11th tragedy is that we now have technologies and systems that make the study and practice of knowledge management more feasible.

Knowledge Management

A central tenet of knowledge management (KM) is that humans are critical information resources for organizations, not only as complements for paper and electronic information sources but as unique sources that make these systems understandable and usable. The use of the KM term has gathered momentum in businesses and other organizations, most probably because it is convenient to use the term as an umbrella for efforts that seek to facilitate intra-organizational effectiveness through the utilization of informal, tacit knowledge possessed by human beings employed in organizations; facilitate intra-organizational effectiveness by providing the ability to discover and access knowledge in documents (documents are defined broadly as any intellectual artifact produced by an organization including data, databases, memos, technical reports, manuals, and presentations) [ 36]; and promote effective inter-organizational and customer relationships through such means as competitive intelligence and e-commerce.

Knowledge management addresses concerns prevalent in organizations today. The first concern is related to productivity and return on investment. A growing number of organizations, faced with evidence indicating that information technology alone does not increase productivity, seek to leverage their investments in information technology by focusing on the development of management information systems that provide users with access to relevant data and information resources, and that afford parent organizations with a sustained return on the investment made in the generation, procurement, and maintenance of data and information resources [ 37].

The World Trade Center destruction and Pentagon attack brought KM into stark relief. John Jackson, speaking from the perspective of a disaster recovery company that recovered data for companies affected by the 1993 World Trade Center, noted that normally lost data can be retrieved through paper records or employees' memory. Jackson stated about the recent World Trade Center destruction, "in this case, all the paper is gone because the building is gone. The employees who might otherwise been able to recreate the transactions might've been killed" [ 38]. Donald Haisman, a certified financial planner in Fort Myers, when interviewed about the potential chaos inflicted on individual investors by the attacks, was more concerned with the loss of the people than the records or systems, referring to this as "intellectual destruction" [ 39]. At the Pentagon a budget office staff was nearly wiped out, and office records for the past year had to be recreated through the use of volunteers, retired workers coming back, and other means. The office's director stated, "You couldn't get a fix on who was missing. In a normal process, you would rely on a supervisor where their employees might have been. In our situation, there were no more supervisors." Another office worker stated, "We lost every singlepaper in the office. We lost all three of the servers that stored all ourelectronic information, and so when we came in, the task was basically, reconstruct a whole year's worth of activity for $3.6 billion, and you've got 10 days to do it" [ 40]. The scale of such destructions is somewhat unprecedented, and it places a new demand on the concept of knowledge management and, as a result, a new demand on how the information science schools integrate knowledge management throughout their curriculum. The World Trade Center disaster provides a focus for how knowledge management connects with other tools and approaches such as artificial intelligence and data or document management.

With the September 11th events and the continuing discussions about the recovery efforts, most information science schools will recognize that they need to develop KM curricula, research and service programs at undergraduate, master's and doctoral levels and in continuing education opportunities. The importance of KM will very likely lead to a greater emphasis on it in other specializations in such schools. For example, the present stress in information science schools on archives and records management will emphasize more equipping students to be experts in records and recordkeeping systems and to understand their importance for purposes of evidence, accountability, and corporate or societal memory [ 41]. Knowledge management is an integral part of this curriculum, implicitly and explicitly, and archives and records management programs can be both a bridge to KM programs or be changed toaccommodate a greater KM emphasis. In all such efforts, there will be efforts to educate individuals to understand how human resources connect with technology, rather than stressing technology as an end in itself. Again, the human dimension of the September 11th events make this all the more obvious.

Courses in archives and records management, telecommunications and information systems, networking, policy, ethics, library and information services, security and many other areas need to re-evaluated in schools of information science as a result of the events. Knowledge Management is an area lending itself well to a set of short-term continuing education offerings, directed at the companies, governments, and other organizations located nearby such schools. The World Trade Center destruction and recovery efforts by companies for restarting their operations can provide numerous relevant case study materials for such workshops, while helping these schools to provide a real service to their regions. Such continuing education efforts can highlight the graduate programs at these schools and foster partnerships with regional organizations interested in the issue of the human intelligence aspect of records and information systems technologies.

Workplace Design and Location

The destruction of the World Trade Center, a symbol of American and international commerce and home of many leading financial and other companies, led to the loss of millions of square feet of prime Manhattan office space. The twin towers of the building represented ten million square feet alone and early reports indicated that the loss of this space would spike up costs for offices and leading to a scrambling by financial, government, legal, and other organizations to find replacement offices to continue operation [ 42]. Disaster-preparedness plans relating to electronic information systems provide for the staffing of temporary offices, called "hot" sites, fully equipped with computers, Internet access, and otheroffice equipment. The question looming in the background may be whether these companies will opt to relocate into large offices such as what the World Trade Center represented, and, indeed, debate about this began almost immediately after the destruction of the twin towers [ 43]. Matters of security and worker confidence may override matters of clustering large companies into single buildings even if the technology allows such concentrations. However, the reconstruction of new buildings at the World Trade Center site might provide an opportunity to build a facility drawing on all of the most advanced information and other technologies that address both workers' performance and safety. A new facility, with better integration of data, information, and knowledge systems might ensure the better protection of such information resources.

After these events, many companies may opt for the use of video teleconferencing as a means of restricting travel and clustering of large groups of staff into single locations. As one report suggested, the temporary displacement of the firms may lead to a dispersal of companies that may make it difficult for them to consider relocating in New York City since "commercial real estate brokers have begun looking as far away as Upstate New York for available space for some displaced companies" [ 44]. Another report noted, "It was largely because of the multiple communications options available to them, for instance, that executives and other professionals who found themselves far from home base because of the disruption to airports last week were able to do business in 'real time' even as they rented cars or hopped on trains for slow transcontinental trips home." This experience, even under such adverse and tragic circumstances, might persuade many companies to use such technologies in a more pervasive and organized fashion in order to minimize travel or the need for concentrated physical offices. The same commentator argues, "But in pure technology terms, the World Trade Center model of commerce seems no longer necessary. And if much of 'Wall Street' ends up moving permanently to its currently temporary quarters in Jersey City, or dissipates more than ever into cyberspace, it may indicate just how much the physics and physical realities of the modern financial system have truly changed " [ 45]. These tragic events may provide an opportunity for the predictions of virtual workplaces and even virtual cities to come to fruition, in a manner similar to what has happened in the past with urban and social planners facing other cataclysmic events [ 46]. Such matters reflect long ongoing debates about the centralization or decentalization of management and how supporting information systems are analyzed, designed, and implemented (again, the kinds of tasks that library and information science schools have long been concerned with).

Academic programs at schools of information sciences have long been concerned with how workplaces function, especially in the design regarding the use of information technologies and the storage and use of information. Interests range from the implications of new and emerging electronic information technologies for how organizations work and the kinds of spaces needed to the matter of how the need for organizations to use both electronic and paper documents affects the design of office space, workflow, and information storage and security. The use of video teleconferencing poses, for example, some interesting questions. While we encourage the use of videoconferencing technology, we must be compensating for the lack of direct inter-personal contacts and researching new ways to provide realism at low prices, much in the fashion that psychologists and others have cautioned us about the growing use of the Internet for human communication and interaction [ 47]. The September 11th events also suggested the strengths and limitations of other telecommunicationsystems. Damage to the New York Telephone Building, built in 1926 and housing Verizon Communications, demonstrated that the telephone system was vulnerable because of the concentrated location of the telephone infrastructure and the heavy reliance on dedicated data lines used by big corporations, financial institutions, the regional medical library program for at least three states, and other organizations [ 48]. In these and other aspects of the use of information technologies, faculties at schools of information sciences will need to re-evaluate how they teach, how students learn, the nature of their research, and the knowledge and skills they impart to their students. The experience many of these schools are gaining in web-based education also is adding to this area of inquiry.

In the aftermath of September 11th, one of the many interesting stories to emerge is the role played by the NYC Wireless. NYC Wireless ( http://www.nycwireless.net) is a community-based project designed "to take use of the airwaves for the purpose of providing distributed, free, always-on mobile Internet access through the IEEE 802.11b wireless local area networking standard," by providinga platform and medium for community-based networking and content development.Using inexpensive equipment that can be purchased off the shelf of most retail computer and electronic stores, e.g., the LinkSys Wireless Access Point, NYC Wireless provided Internet access to emergency and rescue workers in the immediate aftermath of the collapse of the WTC Towers, and in the days thereafter also assisted businesses and individuals who needed Internet access and had the means to employ NYC Wireless's capabilities.

What is the significance of NYC Wireless in the context of LIS education? It may be twofold. First, it speaks to the value of open, community-based services (and while NYC Wireless does not unto itself suggest this, it serves as an example of the type of community service that should be viewed as integral part of LIS education). Second, the fact of its existence is an indication that wireless technology is quickly going to form an important platform for information service, and yet another technology environment in which libraries in particular will be challenged to compete.

At present, library and information science schools often focus primarily on traditional information providers, such as libraries, archives, museums, and organizations of all types. They need to assess whether the present curriculum is supporting serious discussion and education for students about how present workplaces need to evolve to provide security, delivery of information and other services, and adequate environments for individuals working in the offices. The faculties of these schools bring many different perspectives on such matters, ranging from ergonomic issues to the uses of telecommunications, and this area opens up many topics for research and development projects as well as teaching and curriculum revision.

Technology and the Human Dimension: Cell Phones and Children

Traditionally, the information science faculty have had varied opinions about the importance of the human dimension in information technology systems, if not in the ultimate use and intention of these systems at least in how and what they stress in the classroom and in their research. The events of September 11th bring into focus just how information content and information technologies possess a real human face and what the various faculty and programs have to offer about understanding the human dimension. Even programs such as telecommunications, the most technically oriented of these school's degree programs, often have courses in "human communications" and all programs include the human dimension to varying degrees.

The important role that cell phones played in the events of September 11 illustrates that wireless communications is more than a technology and reflects the importance of courses such as what has been offered in telecommunications programs and in information science schools. These and other library and information science disciplines need to offer courses describing the impacts of communication that is broadband (fiber) and mobile (wireless), teaching their students the potential applications and the social and societal impact these technologies bring. This presents opportunities for more cross departmental and cross-university development of courses or cross-listing of courses, bringing together faculty from the many specializations represented in such schools to focus on topics of mutual interest. Studying the impact of the failure of such reliance on teletransmission and telecommunication systems is an important component in determining how such systems should be designed with backup and recovery plans.

The aftermath of the September 11th attacks brought reminders of the issues related to the use of telecommunications technologies, especially the human dimensions of the use of the technologies. On television, we saw many talking heads whose lips were not synchronized with the accompanying audio. We must learn which communication technologies the broadcasters are using and understand why some of them performed so poorly for this application. We also need to understand the economics that made the broadcasters abandon satellite feed, which didn't have this problem. We must research ways to make this new technology work or we must invent an even newer technology that can provide acceptable and economic communication of talking heads. Amidst the tragic aspects of the events, we were handed a laboratory regarding how information technology performs when pushed to its limits and this provides the information science school faculties both an opportunity to develop useful, practical teaching case studies and to identify topics and issues for them and their graduate students to research in the future.

The human dimensions were also evident beyond the flaws and problems of the uses of information technologies in reporting on the events of September 11th. One of the most profound aspects was the concerns and issues generated about meeting the information and resources needs of young people, reflecting a long-standing area of teaching in many information science schools, especially those that have built off of the older library schools and continue to maintain programs preparing people to work in public and school libraries. The human dimensions also can serve as a vehicle for bringing disparate parts of these schools together in different ways. For example, the traditional departments of library science often have had a long-time stress on children and youth services. There was considerable discussion about the impact of the television and newspaper images on children, and this opens up the possibilities for considering across the curriculum how such matters can be introduced to the wide range of students in all specializations. Unfortunately, in many schools students with more technical rather than service orientations and vice versa tend not to mix or to work together as often as they could. The school children suggest why we need to do better in bringing the diverse students and faculty together in more creative ways.

On the morning of 11 September 2001, 5,629 students in seven elementary, middle, and secondary schools in the immediate vicinity of the World Trade Center were in class [ 49]. Within hours their world also had changed as well. Dismissed from school, some reunited with their families,some waited for word of a parent; formal learning was abruptly interrupted. When they returned in a week, it was to different schools with different students. By the beginning of October, it was clear from observed behavior that many students were experiencing emotional upheavals [ 59]. Teachers and parents - also facing feelings of fear, anger and grief coupled with deep concern for the children - needed help and needed it immediately. It was clear that not just the young people and teachers in these schools but young people and teachers and parents throughout the New York area and across the country were profoundly affected by the events of September 11th.

School librarians and public librarians who work with young people are not professional counselors, but they are skilled in selecting and evaluating information and resources in many print and electronic formats for students themselves and for their teachers and families and skilled in promoting their independent use; in other words, they serve important support for and other roles in counseling. With this immediate and urgent need for information and resources, librarians and other information professionals can contribute by retrieving and evaluating information and resources in two different yet complementary areas. The most immediate need is for information and resources to help make sense of the event itself, the tragic deaths, and the context for the attacks and their aftermath (and some useful Web sites supporting this have already developed) [51].

The events of September 11th followed less than two years after the shooting of students and teachers at Columbine High School by two classmates. In that instance, the unthinkable happened in a school - much of it in the school's library. Would kids ever feel safe in school or a library again? More importantly, could kids treat any perceived "outsider" among them with understanding? Librarians helped students by identifying and evaluating resources that promoted understanding and by putting those resources into student hands as soon as possible. The events of September 11th have shaken the very foundation of the lives of young people. As teachers and parents cope with helping their students and their children, librarians can work collaboratively with them to provide the resources and information for understanding and solace and information science schools where many of the future librarians are educated need to re-evaluate their role in how they prepare these professionals for their careers and unexpected events such as what occurred on September 11th. These events can provide our students a significant case study to build their competencies in the retrieval, evaluation and use of information and resources in all formats that can be of real and immediate benefit to young people, their teachers and their parents.

Ethics, Policies, Responsibilities and Rights in the Post 9/11 World

While many people watched television for long periods, there was also a significant increase in the use of other media, especially radio, newspapers (both print and online), and magazines. How the story was told by the different media, why individuals relied on some forms rather than others, and what the implications are of these uses are among the research questions needing to be addressed by faculty and their students at schools of information science. The incessant television, radio, and other media coverage of the September 11th events has burned into our minds the graphic images of and voices related to the hijacked planes' attacks, the collapse of the World Trade Center, the victims of the attacks struggling to escape, the efforts by rescuers to find the injured, and the subsequent investigations into who carried out the attacks. Not long after the terrorist attacks, all of the major television news networks agreed to review videos prepared by bin Laden and his network before airing them because of concerns about the content and even coded messages. This was an unprecedented agreement, one justified by one network executive (Andrew Hayward, CBS News president) because "This is a new situation, a new war and a new kind of enemy. Given the historic events we're enmeshed in, it's appropriate to explore new ways of fulfilling our responsibilities to the public" [52]. This agreement also raises, of course, considerable concerns about television news coverage and access to news information.

Much of the media coverage has been chilling and some of it has raised concerns about the role of the Fourth Estate in reporting on such events (a topic that has long been discussed by many commentators on society, public policy, and other areas) [ 53]. If anything the journalistic coverage of these events demonstrates that information is not merely a neutral element in our society. We must reevaluate America's positionon legislating taste and enabling public access to certain forms ofinformation. Diversity must be allowed to influence the study of the ethics of information. Many questions have been raised concerning why some individuals and groups hate America so much, what their objections to their perceptions of American's lifestyle are, how "norms" of taste and "common values" vary among countries and groups, and how diverse opinions and views influence definitions and understandings of ethics. These and other related questions need to be addressed, especially in schools with a high percentage of international students (as is the case with many of the information science schools in North America).

For years other professional schools have been considering how areas like ethics and more humanistic aspects of the uses of technologies need to be included in their educational programs. Our school was a pioneer in introducing information ethics, starting with a lecture series, and then introducing a course (in one term also a doctoral seminar), a Web site and a fellows program. Ethical issues are also addressed in many other courses as well, and an examination is needed to determine how these issues can be addressed in other courses and what courses should be cross-listed. In the archives and records management specialization, for example, there has been a course on Archival Access and Advocacy considering similar matters such as the ethics of access, the accountability of records for organizations and society, and case studies documenting the impact of open or restricted access on particular societal groups. The introductory core course in the MLIS degree program, Understanding Information, also provides some orientation to such concerns. Faculty should consider whether the orientation of undergraduate and graduate students to ethical issues is satisfactory. Other information science schools need to evaluate how ethical dimensions are integrated into their curriculum. Faculty should consider how best to orient both undergraduate and graduate students to information ethics and to related ethical issues. Intertwined with information ethics are the areas of information and telecommunications policy.

Among key policy issues that have been included and must continue to be addressed are those related to privacy, access (including "digital divide" concerns), the protection of rights of intellectual property owners and users, and security. Again, these have been the subject of many scholars and have generally been featured in courses in information science schools [ 54]. Both rights and responsibilities of the stakeholders are considered, and it is evident that the interests of various stakeholders around the world are often in conflict. Balancing these interests, especially security and privacy protection, in the aftermath of the terroristsÌ attacks is challenging. One early commentator on the media coverage of the September 11th events reflected on television coverage going back to the Vietnam conflict and noted: "In our innocence [during the Vietnam war], we thought we were the real reporters; television was show business. But we were seeing a new kind of asymmetrical war, in which the weaker side on the ground bypasses the stronger, exploiting technology to impact directly on hearts and minds on the other side. No one wrote about that, and television, the least self-critical of media, still hasn't grasped how easily it can be hijacked by terrorists" [ 55]. Such a statement suggests that an information science school is not only teaching about how to build and run information systems or how to use and preserve information, but it is also trying to instill into its students a critical sense of how to evaluate these systems and sources. Lest webecome too self-critical, this same veteran newsman ended his commentary bynoting, "And these dry words, published a week after the event, are too soon to possess historical authority, too late to advise caution before the images have soaked into our collective memories. Nevertheless, it's worth noting the defenselessness of great cities before determined attackers. Recall those axe-wielding barbarians, our own ancestors, who turned the opulent cities of the late Roman empire into uninhabitable ruins. Jutes, Saxons, Vandals and the rest had no television, or even writing, only word of mouth to spread terror. It was quite enough" [56].

Some of these challenges will require that faculty in information science schools not only look outward for examples and case studies about such policy and ethical issues, but it also seems to be the case that the aftermath of the September 11th events has thrown university faculty themselves into a more critical light about how they can discuss such controversial and critical issues and sustain free speech when they are themselves sharply divided about the United States' role and response. Stanley Kurtz recently wrote, "Most of the criticism leveled at professors in the wake of the September 11 attacks has come not from other faculty members, but from students, administrators, and media commentators. Among faculty members themselves, there has been little real debate on the causes of this war. That fact, more than any other, explains why recent condemnations of professorial opinion have sometimes gone so far as to challenge or contravene our traditions of free speech. If the professoriate was diverse enough to allow for an authentic debate over the causes of the war; if our tradition of free speech had not for years been under challenge as a mere cover for the oppressive power of the social elites; if we had not been so recently subjected to codes, written and unwritten, in which sensitivity trumped free speech; then we would now have far less to fear from the pent-up anger of students, administrators, or the public over controversial comments about the war" [ 57]. Focused on information science issues and the education of future information professionals, we might need to be studying ourselves (and to a certain extent, faculty in such schools have been doing this as they introduce and revise courses in such areas as the sociology of information or understanding information). We probably should have been doing this more strenuously long before now.

Information and Other Security Issues

Information science educators also need to be watching others, as well. Politicians, journalists, and public policy experts and human rights advocates almost immediately began discussing needs for increased security in airline and other travel, surveillance to counteract terrorism, and other mechanisms related to matters such as granting student visas, hiring for jobs with potential security implications at places like airports, and other activities with important implications for personal privacy and rights. One commentator on these issues notes, "There is no doubt that the nation is in a new era," with a "shift in balance to security over privacy " [ 58]. Within a few days of the September 11th attacks, the Bush administration was moving to roll back former restrictions on activities such as wiretapping, generating quick responses from civil rights groups worrying about the efforts to make changes so quickly without serious deliberation by Congress. James X. Dempsey of the Center for Democracy and Technology argues, "Some of these proposals would seem to involve a fundamental rewriting of the wiretap laws." Rather, Dempsey stated, "We need deliberate, open scrutiny by the legislative process." Laura W. Murphy of the American Civil Liberties Union had a similar response: "We cannot let our grief and anger overwhelm our democracy. Now is the time for the people's representatives to be even more thoughtful and deliberative than usual." [ 59]. Ethical and policy questions,often interrelated, were raised throughout the United States and in othercountries, as well.

The most obvious and dramatic legislative effort (at least so far) was the Combating Terrorism Act of 2001, an amendment to an appropriations bill passed by the Senate on September 13th, with a controversial section allowing the government to capture information related to a suspect's activities in cyberspace. A version of this bill ultimately passed and was signed into law. Stewart Baker, head of the technology practice at Steptoe & Johnson, a Washington, D.C., law firm, and former general counsel of the National Security Agency, notes that this would allow the government to obtain a list of "everyone you send e-mail to, when you sent it, who replied to you, how long the messages were, whether they had attachments, as well as where you went online." Some argue that this allows more information gathering than any other provision in government at present [ 60]. Moving quickly in reacting to the terrorist acts, the anti-terrorist legislation seems to have implications going far beyond terrorist threats. A Business Week reporter ascertained that "Hackers, virus-writers and Web site defacers would face life imprisonment without the possibility of parole under legislation proposed by the Bush Administration that would classify most computer crimes as acts of terrorism." This reporter concludes, "Most of the terrorism offenses are violent crimes, or crimes involving chemical, biological, or nuclear weapons. But the list also includes the provisions of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act that make it illegal to crack a computer for the purpose of obtaining anything of value, or to deliberately cause damage. Likewise, launching a malicious program that harms a system, like a virus, or making an extortionate threat to damage a computer are included in the definition of terrorism" [61].

New bills are being introduced almost daily in both houses of the U.S. Congress, and the Administration's views are being observed in strategies to preclude votes from taking place on either of the latest two bills. One recent effort (at the time of writing this essay) is a push for a "pre-conference" which means that House and Senate staff and key members would meet behind closed doors to get the House to accept provisions of the Senate bill, thus obviating the need for a conference. Several efforts for compromise are underway, but these may not reach the floor in either chamber.

Not only do these recommendations and ideas have implications regarding traditional rights such as privacy, but they also have implications for the uses of information technology with suggestions for things like the issuance of smart cards: "Such cards, with computer chips, would have detailed information about those they were issued to and would identify them when read by a computer. The cards could be coordinated with fingerprints or, in a few years, facial characteristics, and be programmed to permit or limit access through turnstiles to buildings or areas. They could track someone's location, financial transactions, criminal history and even driving speed on a particular highway on a given night." Obviously, this would mean an entirely new era of surveillance unlike anything the United States has faced [ 62]. Proposals for such identity cards have already drawn protests in Great Britain and Australia [ 63].

On the other hand, these smart card technologies, as envisioned in the medical informatics community, offer a powerful assistance to emergency medical workers. As those who survived the harrowing attacks were dispersed to medical centers and burn specialty units in New York and New Jersey they were often separated from their personal medical histories, their health insurance records and their emergency contacts. Smart cards, presently being pilot tested by a number of health care providers and insurers, might have offered information otherwise unavailable to EMTs and ER staff. Increasingly, information science schools offer the opportunity for students to study medical informatics, and its subspecialities in electronic patient records, bioterrorism surveillance systems, and consumer informatics. The situation generated by the events of September 11th offers a new and positive concept to explore this technology. The reactions to information technologies such as smart cards, ranging from criticisms by civil libertarians to advocates like health care professionals, reflect how complex information machinery can be in societal applications and the need for information science schools to explore how its students can be better oriented to such a wide range of uses and discussion.

Such schools need to reconsider just how effectively it is dealing with such threats to personal and societal freedoms, especially regarding the use of information technologies and even dealing with their own students. The events of September 11th might cause, for example, a tightening of access to government information that was already being restricted. Bruce Craig of the National Coordinating Committee for the Promotion of History recently reported that the Central Intelligence Agency was pressuring State Department officials to "destroy the inventory of 1,500 copies of volume XVI of the Foreign Relations of the United States (FRUS) series dealing with U.S. policy towards Greece, Cyprus, and Turkey during the 1960s and to replace it with a sanitized version." The reason given is that this volume contains a "handful of documents that allude to CIA intervention in the electoral process in Greece some 35 years ago. CIA officials claim that release of such documents could upset current relations with Greece or even provide a pretext for terrorism" [ 64]. Also quickly after the terroristbombings, Attorney General John D. Ashcroft issued a new FOIA policy statementdirecting federal agency heads to be cautious releasing records to journalists and others, citing national security [ 65]. Citizens advocacy groups, such as OMB Watch, have created special Web sites to document what kinds of information we are being blocked from in the new intensified environment of the war on terrorism [66].

Such allusions to potential terrorism might also provide an opportunity for the federal government to restrict information in unprecedented ways because of Congress' and the public's concerns for safety. Colleges and universities were also being asked to reveal normally confidential information about its students to federal agencies such as the FBI, and given the nature of information science schools it is expected that students in these schools also will be targeted [ 67]. This is additional evidence that information science schools can use their own institutions to try to understand some of the more complicated matters regarding the creation, use, and maintenance of information.

The terrorist attacks also brought heightened concern about computer viruses, security, and hacking. Reports about both how the terrorists had used the Internet and the investigators were tracing their steps also appeared. The terrorists apparently used computers in public libraries in an effort to cover their tracks [ 68]. Within days of the events, information technology experts were being consulted about the implications of technology supporting terrorist and anti-terrorist activities. The New York Times,for example, brought together six experts to discuss these issues: Ray Kurzweil, an expert in artificial intelligence; Peter Neumann, expert on security; Bruce Sterling, a science fiction author and writer on technology; Lawrence Lessig, a law professor; Severo Ornstein, hardware engineer who worked on the original Arpanet; and, Whitfield Diffie, the inventor of public key cryptography. Their discussion about the implications of technology on the September 11th events was far-ranging and featured many differing opinions, but also attested to the value of bringing together such diverse expertise on the complex causes and results of the terrorist attacks [ 69]. Because of their mission and history, information science schools also can draw on such expertise from among its own faculty, especially to consider the role of the Internet/World Wide Web. Such schools include engineers, librarians, archivists, historians, psychologists, and a wide array of other disciplines. Some of these schoolsalso feature interdisciplinary connections across the campus enabling it toexamine an event such as what occurred on September 11th in a multiplicity of ways.

Computer security is certainly one aspect of the kind of programs offered at an information science school, like ours, that has grabbed more media and public attention, in a way that is perhaps far more lasting than all the concerns about the Y2K concerns. Bruce Schneier devoted a special issue of his newsletter Crypto-Gram to the September 11th events. In it he wrote, among other things, the following: "Computer security experts have a lot of expertise that can be applied to the real world. First and foremost, we have well-developed senses of what security looks like. We can tell the difference between real security and snake oil. And the new airport security rules, put in place after September 11, look and smell a whole lot like snake oil" [ 70]. Such discussions represent opportunities for faculty and student research not just about the technical aspects of security and related concerns but about what separates real solutions of lasting use from rhetoric and political posturing. The events of September 11th provide ample opportunity for case studies for teaching about how to distinguish snake oil and workable, practical approaches.

Beyond computer security are issues of information security. While it is critical to protect computer networks and systems, it is also essential to protect information content from invasion, corruption and distortion. The protection of the integrity of information and the privacy of individuals is an area of great interest to information science schools, offering courses in different areas such as medical information, library records, electronic government, and others. The role of governments at all levels in creating, gathering, organizing, managing, preserving and disseminating information is increasingly important, especially for disaster preparedness, healthcare, and informing the public about the actions of government. E-government is one of the most rapidly growing and important domains within KM and will deserve ever-greater attention in the future.

Economics of Information

One of the long-term implications of the World Trade Center destruction relates to the economic health of American high-tech companies. Before the attack many of these companies were facing economic problems, and the events of September 11th added disruptions because of shipping problems, travel restrictions reducing sales efforts, and other similar problems. While there may be a temporary increase in business due to the needs to replace destroyed computers, the manufacturers of semiconductors, microchips, and computers all face difficult times ahead according to industry analysts [ 71].

The destruction of the World Trade Center and attack on the Pentagon highlight the vulnerability of any major company, government agency, or academic institution. The loss of life, of course, is always the main concern. However, other major organization resources are lost as well, not the least of which is the knowledge of those lost and the information and internal information services that are destroyed as well. Faculties of schools of information sciences faculty have done numerous studies of the economics of information and information services in organizations [ 72]. These studies have focused on the usefulness and value of information and information services, as well as their effects on organization goals, productivity and profitability (where appropriate). It is abundantly clear that the disappearance of these resources can have a devastating, if not fatal, effect on any organization. This is true even if only one site of a multi-site organization is involved. The economic implications of the loss of knowledge and information extend well beyond any one organization to the local community and to the nation. Some of our economic studies have focused on those higher order effectsof the economics of information.

Given the current health of the American economy it is obvious that information science schools will focus more on the economics of information. These schools have often been seen as advocates for the acquisition of new technologies. Nicholson Baker, in his diatribe about American library policies for the preservation of books and other printed materials, points to these schools as a principal source of the problem in producing professionals who are more interested in creating technocrats committed to playing with high-tech toys and solutions than in devising ways of maintaining the resources of our cultural heritage housed in libraries and archives. Other information technologists have examined the claims made about computers and found them coming up far short of what they are purported to support [ 73]. The situation is, of course, more complicated than this simple characterization. The events of September 11th reflect a complex society in which international events, global politics, the stock market, terrorists, government, and the media all have profound implications for what information professionals do and how they are educated for their positions. Economics of information production, management, and use will need to assume a more central place in the curriculum of all kinds of information professionals.

Memorializing and Documenting Violent Events and Their Aftermath

As the events of September 11th unfolded, discussions ensued about how these events would be or should be remembered and understood. The role of records and public memory has been both an important area of scholarship and a feature of some information science schools, especially those with archives, history of the book, and related programs. Memory can be considered an aspect of both information and evidence systems, and records and information systems certainly play critical roles in how sources are created and ultimately made available for future memory purposes. University library collections are often referred to as repositories of knowledge, archives are often seen as having functions comparable to museums, and information scientists refer to memory needs in both technical (memory capacities of computers) and more cultural (the World Wide Web as memory of the world) ways. While information scientists might look at the problem in most practical ways - Stewart Brand notes that "digital storage is easy; digital preservation is hard" [ 74] - the nature of the terrorist attacks complicate the situation even more. Now we are not just concerned with rescuing data from the destruction sites, but we are concerned with how, or whether, we should memorialize the sites [ 75]. And memorializing battles of the new Information Age war pose new challenges and opportunities because of the nature of the events and the documentary sources created of these events (this is discussed more fully in the next section on the Internet and its role).

Observers of the events of September 11th were quick to begin thinking about the long-term implications of understanding the destruction of the World Trade Center. The New York State Archives and Records Administration, located a few hours away in Albany but with regional networks located in New York City and adjacent areas, announced plans to try to document the tragedy through the records of state government agencies involved as both victims and agents of rescue and recovery, local governments, and non-governmental organizations and institutions (such as charitable, social, religious and political agencies) [ 76]. The events of September 11th also were documented by moving images in unprecedented ways. The video of the first plane attack wascaptured by two French documentary filmmakers who happened to be in the WorldTrade Center area working on another project. The story about this started, "Being in the wrong place at the right time has led a documentary filmmaker to record what may be to the September 11 terrorist attack what the Zapruder film was to the Kennedy assassination" [ 77]. A number of writers also wrote about the film images of the World Trade Center destruction and considering how, for many people, these images were reminiscent of Hollywood disaster films [78].

Such topics can fit comfortably within an information science school. At our own school, the archives and records management specialization has focused on public memory for some years, leading to dissertations, articles, and courses with such an emphasis. Recently, Richard Cox and four of his current or former doctoral students presented papers at the Society of American Archivists annual conference on archives and memory, and they are now collaborating on a lengthy article exploring this area. This emphasis has included both societal and organizational memory, and the aforementioned KM area also needs to include a focus on organizational memory. Information technology courses have often focused on technical aspects of machine memory as well, and this provides another means by which to consider the various implications of memory. Faculty in our own school might consider various ways they have been teaching about aspects of memory and how these relate to the aftermath of the World Trade Center destruction.

Earlier in this essay we considered the matter of workplaces and the question of whether the World Trade Center buildings would need to be reconstructed or not, given the differences in technologies now involved in fabricating such structures. This re-emerges in a discussion of memory. The World Trade Center was attacked and destroyed as the result of its being a symbol of Western capitalism and a global economy. However, when the World Trade Center was originally constructed it was controversial and not universally loved or appreciated [79]. This certainly impacts on the issue of memorialization. At the least, it suggests how a building passes through stages of public recognition and can be changed quickly by events affecting it. A school of information science has the ability to consider the nature, role, context, and value of memory from the technical to the cultural.

The Internet and Its Role

One of the most obvious aspects of the events of September 11th was the role of the Internet/World Wide Web in providing information about what was happening and even being a device for those planning and carrying out the attacks. The search engine Google reported that on September 11 searching for news-related content increased by a factor of 60 [ 80]. Studies are beginning to appear about how listservs and other Internet resources are being used to respond to other disasters, [81] and it islikely we will see a number of such studies related to the events of September 11th. A curricular case study in the use of the Internet by medical librarians is already under preparation by Ellen Detlefsen, one of our schoolÌs faculty. Within a day of the attack, practicing medical librarians were sharing, via their e-list called MEDLIB-L, resource lists of materials such as on the forensic identification from burned remains, bioterrorism resources for hospital preparedness and public health planning, consumer health resources in English and in Spanish for post-traumatic stress and the availability of verified Web sites for locating World Trade Center survivors in metro New York and New Jersey hospitals. The shared resources and collective professional knowledge brought together information specialists from as close to the World Trade Center as the New York Academy of Medicine, and as far away as a naval hospital on Guam. Such efforts provide opportunities for faculty and students to work together on research studies and in building case studies for future teaching.

Even before the attacks, however, it was obvious that the Web was a venue where one could read directly the statements of those who were thought to have planned and carried out the attacks. Many of the basic texts and principles of Osama bin Laden are readily available on the Web, providing the unique opportunity for individuals to go around the news reports and interpretations and to go straight to the primary documents in a way the public has generally had the opportunity to do [ 82]. Because of the importance of the Web, shortly after the attacks, Brewster Kahle announced that the Internet Archive in collaboration with Alexa Internet, and SUNY, Library of Congress and the University of Washington was archiving pages and sites relating to the terrorist attacks in New York and the District of Columbia in order "to make sure there is a solid historical record of this time" [ 83]. Other scholars determined that Americans' responses to the attacks was being documented in unique ways via the World Wide Web, and these scholars started to build archives of aspects of relief or support being provided by sites on the Web [ 84]. A Washington Post reporter started an article about this in the following manner: "Minutes after suicide planes crashed into the World Trade Center and opened a hole in the American psyche, researchers began capturing electronic snapshots of how the world was responding via the World Wide Web." In this article Kahle was quoted as saying that this effort to document the September 11th events on the Web was part of "trying to build ... a new kind of library." Diane Kresh, the Library of Congress' director of public service collections was also quoted: "We think the Internet is absolutely as important as print media for these events. Why? Because the Internet is immediate, far-reaching and reaches a variety of audiences. You have everything from self-styled experts to known experts commenting and giving their spin" [ 85]. Not only does the role of the World Wide Web fall squarely within the research interests of the information science faculties, but such research can be carried out remotely far from the scenes of disaster in New York City and Washington, D.C.

Preservation

Information science schools have long featured an emphasis on preservation management, often building on the established archives and records management curriculum. The events of September 11th also have drawn new attention to preservation issues, in addition to matters like disaster preparedness. A number of New York City area museums, archives, and libraries were affected by the massive destruction at the World Trade Center site. A report on this aspect of the terrorist attacks noted, "By one count, in New York City there are 42 museums, 57 libraries and archives, and some 245 outdoor sculptures that possibly have been touched by recent events." The report continued, "The greatest continuing threat in New York is the dust and ash from debris that still blankets much of the city. The National Museum of the American Indian (located just a few blocks from Ground Zero), for example, is covered in a few inches of ash. Reportedly, the dust is granular and greasy and may scratch delicate surfaces. Untold number of books, delicate fabrics, historic photographs and prints, as well as art works may need careful cleaning and conservation" [ 86]. The library at the Pentagon alsowas badly damaged and several of its staff members injured, and the rebuildingof this library operation also includes some serious preservation challenges [ 87]. The United States Customs Service also lost of its reference libraries at the World Trade Center site.

Already, for example, the World Trade Center destruction has generated some interest in long-existing standards related to records and information systems. The Association of Information and Image Managers (AIIM) offered, at no charge, use of its standards on materials related to disaster recovery and preparedness such as on the quality assurance and preservation of microfilm, optical disks, and records requiring legal acceptance [ 88]. While preservation and archives courses draw students' attention to these and other standards, it is important that information science schools re-examine this and other parts of the curriculum to ensure that students learn about standards supporting the continuing use and protection of information and records systems. Long before the events of September 11th, information technologists had been questioning issues of the longevity of information in digital form [89].

The tragic events of September 11th also serve to sharpen the focus on questions concerning the importance of conservation and preservation efforts, coming as they did only a few months after the publication of Nicholson Baker's book Double Fold. From the standpoint of library and information science education, where educators have long been preoccupied with questions concerning the core knowledge of the field and the transmittal of such knowledge through the core curriculum of MLIS programs, recent events and broader trends (in the management of research collections and the interest in digitizing research materials) suggest that it may now be reasonable, if not necessary, for these educators to consider placing preservation as a major element within the framework of their core curricula.

Organization and access (or cataloging and reference, for readers less fond of the fashionably oblique terminology that characterizes much of contemporary library and information science education) have long been viewed as the most fundamental concerns of the field, and that view has tended to form the larger part of the professional curricula. In recent times, there has been a tendency to revise that orientation in core curricula by way of expansion, as the audience to which library and information science education addresses itself fragments, and as external factors, including competition in the information marketplace, begin to re-shape what is regarded as essential knowledge. The first response has been to emphasize information technology and management, but it may well be that a second round of responses will be focused more sharply on those areas of professional knowledge and skill that are genuinely distinguishing. Given that archivists and librarians stand almost alone in the assumption of responsibility for maintaining the integrity and continuity of the historical and literary record, and in view of the increasingly popular perception that this is a responsibility of the first order, it seems reasonable to imagine that preservation will move to the center of the MLIS curriculum. It is, moreover, not merely a response to tragedy and loss. As the digital realm evolves, questions are being raised about the functional roles that archivists and librarians will play in the future, and while exacting answers are yet to appear, it may be safe to presume that the primary roles may be defined by the functional areas in which their collective expertise is most distinctive and least duplicated; namely, in the areas of information organization and preservation.

Perhaps these events will pull together the information science faculty who possess greatly varying expertise, ranging from software and hardware issues to those who consider more the cultural, social, and humanistic aspects of the uses of information and information technologies. Over the past twenty years, especially, these schools and related professional associations have wrestled with, debated, and even split over such different perspectives. Electronic records management, digital libraries and digital preservation, and other concerns have brought forth an immense body of literature (too extensive even to try to summarize here), much of it calling for greater cooperation and different approaches. The destruction of the World Trade Center and damage to the Pentagon, along with the loss of records, libraries, and artifacts might stimulate a renewed interest in cooperative efforts. Information science schools seem to be a logical focal point for such efforts, since they already have many different types of expertise on their faculties, a research infrastructure, and a need to provide relevant teaching of future information professionals.

 

Conclusion: Final Practical Thoughts

Throughout this essay we have considered how the transformation of the world on September 11th impacts on the curriculum and programs of information science schools. Much of this discussion has stressed both needs to re-think these schoolsÌ curriculum and opportunities for service to the communities and constituencies they serve. As difficult as it may be to consider, the events of September 11th are providing some new attention on the kinds of academic and continuing education programs information science schools offers and this may translate to new avenues for recruiting, grant funding, and other activities, counterbalancing other potential negative impacts (such as the loss of international students with limits on student visas and foreign students going home because of fears about their safety) [ 90].

For this and other reasons, information science schools' faculty need to consider the ramifications of the terrorist attacks on September 11th and events yet to come. The varied expertise and experience of these faculties can be harnessed to deal with such matters, ranging from reconsideration of its academic programs to research and publication. Information science faculty we must do more than just write about these concerns. We envision that we will undertake reviews of the curricula to determine how best to address these issues; we will explore opportunities for research and development projects to answer some of the questions raised; and we will work with the wider community on service projects to effect some of the changes needed.

The most immediate matters may concern just how information science schools teach, the kinds of positions they prepare their students for, and how, as a result, they determine their mission. All of the attention about the destruction of records and other information systems led to an upsurge of interest in the management of personal and individual documents [ 91]. How do we integrate personal recordkeeping into our normal focus on organizational systems? [ 92].

There are many ways we can sum up the far-reaching consequences of the tragic events of September 11th for information science schools. Will we see new kinds of jobs for our graduates? Will these positions require new kinds of courses and delivery of these courses to new kinds of students? Will we see new kinds of students coming into these schools?

We need to re-imagine the kinds of jobs we are educating our students for, anticipating that the market for these graduates may change in fundamental ways. For example, our own school has supported the development of one of the leading North American programs in archives and records management. While this program has evolved to support students focusing on records and recordkeeping systems, the majority of students attracted to this program have come here to prepare themselves for positions in very traditional archival programs (historical societies, museums, colleges and universities, and government agencies) in very traditional positions (archivists, records managers, and manuscripts librarians).

As a result, the curriculum for this archives and records management program supports such career objectives as well as it can. However, it is likely that a new kind of archivist or records manager may be called upon in the future, one more oriented to issues of accountability and current use of records than in the maintenance of long-term records for future historical research. Minimally, the archives and records management courses must be reconfigured to support positions where professionals are concentrated on disaster-preparedness, recovery, and other similar functions. This means that the courses must try to become more interdisciplinary but not in a manner usually considered by the archives and records management communities, where they draw on history, legal, and other disciplines long-connected to archival studies. We need to attract non-archivists, individuals who look at such issues from technical and policy perspectives rather than cultural or historical viewpoints, into the classrooms with future archivists in order to prepare these future professionals for the complex and perhaps different roles they may be encountering. This may require a renewed consideration of the use of distance education for the delivery of courses, a teaching approach that has not been widely embraced in this discipline in North America.

Thinking about new curricular programs or revisions in present ones might mean pressing information science schools to be more innovative in how they support teaching. In the past, even in the most comprehensive of these schools, faculties have tended to cluster around a particular degree program, like the Masters in Library Science or the Masters in Information Science, without much need or incentive to cross over disciplinary boundaries. Now we need a new kind of interdisciplinarity, similar to what some have been predicting or calling for in higher education for years, where faculty move in and out of courses, team-teaching, guest lecturing, crossing departmental and disciplinary boundaries to work with each other and to serve on doctoral and other commitments, and so forth [ 93]. We might have expected that this sort of thing would have been occurring with the debate about the future of the printed book and the rise of digital libraries and e-books, but while the scholarship on the book has grown and become more diversified, this issue has not galvanized such schools. Some more recent commentators have noted that the debate about the future of the book is really a false debate since we need to be concerned with "all modes of knowledge, for in the end they are complementary, not antithetical" [ 94]. At the least, however, we still need to bring the debate into the classroom because it energizes critical thinking about the roles of information professionals [ 95]. It is the magnitude of the destruction of the World Trade Center and the Pentagon and the ensuing war on terrorism that might provide the necessary impetus for radical new thinking and programmatic responses.

There may be other ways of dealing with such matters, such as in developing innovative lecture series where outside experts, representing a variety of perspectives not normally present in such schools, could be brought in for public lectures and planned interaction with both faculty and students. The physical presence of such experts would be welcome, but these schools should also explore the greater use of distance education and Web-based technologies to bring these individuals into the classrooms in ways that could enhance focusing on the kinds of complex issues generated by the new war against international terrorism. Government experts, civil liberties critics, and experts on topics as wide-ranging as the Islamic faith and Middle Eastern and Western attitudes towards information technologies could make these schoolsÌ programs much more meaningful in a world that is simultaneously becoming more complex as well as reliant on information networks, the media, and other related technologies.

Library schools, the ancestors of information science schools, have often not been seen as innovative, but as traditional enclaves for traditional thinking faculty and professions. A decade ago, these schools were under pressure from university administrators to justify their existence in higher education, and a number were closed, apparently because they did not connect to the universityÌs mission and because they often had not built relationships with other schools and academic units [ 96]. Now these schools have the opportunity to lead in reacting to and studying many of the aspects of the new Information Age war. In a provocative book about information technology and higher education, James O'Donnell, a classicist, wondered about what the future roles of specialized faculty will be. "Can we imagine a time in our universities when librarians are the well-paid principals and teachers their mere acolytes? I do not think we can or should rule out that possibility." He pushed the point even more: "The real roles of the professor in an information-rich world will be not to provide information but to advise, guide, and encourage students wading through the deep waters of the information flood. Professors in this environment will thrive as mentors, tutors, backseat drivers, and coaches" [ 97]. The events of 11 September 2001 may move information science schools into a much more critical position within universities and society than they have ever before held. Or, if these schools ignore the implications and try to consider business as usual, they may become marginalized than ever before.

The world, including that in which information science schools reside, has changed dramatically in a very brief period of time.

About the Authors

The essay is a collaborative effort of the faculty teaching across the departments and programs of the University of Pittsburgh School of Information Sciences. The lead author is Richard J. Cox, Professor of Archival Studies, at the School and a frequent contributor to First Monday. Biographical information about the other faculty can be found at the School's Web site at http://www2.sis.pitt.edu.

Notes

1. Other faculty contributing ideas include Roger Flynn, Karen Gracy, and Liz Shaw. Tom Dubis passed many useful references and citations to the chief author of this paper.

2. "The Day the World Changed," Economist (15-21 September 2001), p. 13.

3. Stanley Hoffman, "On the War," New York Review of Books (1 November 2001), at http://www.nybooks.com/articles/14660, accessed 9 October 2001.

4. Lewis H. Lapham, "Drums Along the Potomac: New War, Old Music," Harper's Magazine, volume 303 (November 2001): pp. 35-41 (quotation p. 39).

5. Jeffrey L. Pasley, "And Now for Something Completely Similar," Common-Place, volume 2 (October 2001), at http://www.common-place.org/publicj/200110.shtml, accessed 1 October 2001.

6. See, for example, James A. Dewar, "The Information Age and the Printing Press: Looking Backward to See Ahead," Ubiquity, volume 25 (15-21 August 2000), at http://www.acm.org/ubiquity/views/j_dewar_1.html. Using Elizabeth Eisenstein's history of the printing press, Dewar, a senior mathematician at RAND, suggests that there are "compelling" parallels between the printing press era and the contemporary Information Age. He concludes that there will be "changes in the information age ... as dramatic as those in the Middle Ages in Europe," the "future of the information age will be dominated by unintended consequences," "it will be decades before we see the full effects of the information age," and "the above factors combine to argue for: a) keeping the Internet unregulated, and b) taking a much more experimental approach to information policy." Read Richard Cox's response, "The Information Age and History: Looking Backward to See Us," Ubiquity, (26 September-October 4, 2000), at http://www.acm.org/ubiquity/.

7. See Paul N. Edwards, The Closed World: Computers and the Politics of Discourse in Cold War America (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1996) and Martin Campbell-Kelly and William Aspray, Computer: A History of the Information Machine (New York: Basic Books, 1996).

8. Todd Lappin, "Preserving the Voices of the Twin Towers," New York Times (11 October 2001), at http://www.nytimes.com/2001/10/11/technology/circuits/11AUDI.html?ex=1003818852&ei=1&en=2fe8ef7f2a036885, accessed 12 October 2001.

9. For example, the U.S. Customs Service lost a specialized library used by its agents to classify imports in the destruction of the World Trade Center.

10. "The Day the World Changed," p. 14.

11. David Ronfeldt and John Arquilla, "Networks, Netwars, and the Fight for the Future," First Monday, volume 6, number 6 (October 2001), at http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue6_10/ronfeldt/, accessed 5 October 2001.

12. Seymour M. Hersh, "Annals of National Security: What Went Wrong; The C.I.A. and the Failure of American Intelligence," New Yorker (10 October 2001), at http://newyorker.com/FACT/. The connection of information professionals like librarians to the CIA and Cold War intelligence approaches has recently been put into the limelight as part of a conspiracy and loss of public trust by Nicholson Baker, Double Fold: Libraries and the Assault on Paper (New York: Random House, 2001). The chief author of this essay, Richard J. Cox, has written a response to Baker's book, Him and Me: A Response to Nicholson Baker's Assault on Libraries (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, forthcoming).

13. Ronfeldt and John Arquilla, "Networks, Netwars, and the Fight for the Future."

14. For some perceptive discussion of such matters, see Daniel C. Hallin, The 'Uncensored War': The Media and Vietnam (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989); Susan D. Moeller, Shooting War: Photography and the American Experience of Combat (New York: Basic Books, 1989); and Barbie Zelizer, Remembering to Forget: Holocaust Memory Through the Camera's Eye (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998).

15. "Picture Perfect?" Economist (20 October 2001), p. 75.

16. Ana Marie Cox, "The Changed Classroom, Post-September 11," Chronicle of Higher Education (26 October 2001), pp. A16-A18.

17. Katherine S. Mangan, "Terrorist Attacks Prompt Professional Schools to Add New Training," Chronicle of Higher Education (26 October 2001), p. A18. Professional schools mentioned included public health, medicine, nursing, law, business and economics, engineering, and security studies.

18. See, for example, Paul Hoyningen-Huene, Constructing Scientific Revolutions: Thomas S. Kuhn's Philosophy of Science (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993).

19. Dan Carnevale, "Congress is Urged to Spend More on Research into Ways to Counter Cyberterrorism," Chronicle of Higher Education (11 October 2001), at http://chronicle.com/free/2001/10/2001101101t.htm, accessed 12 October 2001.

20. There has been considerable discussion for more than thirty years about the emergence, viability, and desirability of the "paperless" office. For a recent discussion, refer to Abigail J. Sellen and Richard H. R. Harper, The Myth of the Paperless Office (Cambridge: MIT Press, 2002). For a convenient summary of recent research, see Ann Balough, "How Paper Facilitates the Way People Work," Records and Information Management Report, volume 17 (September 2001): pp. 1-16.

21. For the sometimes uneasy balance of professional schools within universities, see Derek Bok, Higher Learning (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1986).

22. See Richard J. Cox, "Drawing Sea Serpents: The Publishing Wars on Personal Computing and the Information Age," First Monday, volume 3, number 5 (May 1998), at http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue3_5/cox/.

23. See Richard J. Cox, "Accountability, Public Scholarship, and Library, Information, and Archival Science Educators," Journal of Education for Library and Information Science, volume 41 (Spring 2000): pp. 94-105.

24. Stephen Jay Gould, The Lying Stones of Marrakech: Penultimate Reflections in Natural History (New York: Harmony Books, 2000), p. 223.

25. Jane Fritsch and David Rohde, "Trade Center's past in a sad paper trail," New York Times (14 September 2001), at http://www.nytimes.com/2001/09/14/nyregion/14PAPE.html, accessed 15 September 2001.

26. Roberta Witty and Donna Scott, "Commentary: Firms need recovery plans," CNET News (13 September 2001), at http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1003-201-7149701-0.html?tag=lh, accessed 15 September 2001.

27. See, for example, L. Murphy Smith, "Planning for Disaster," CPA Journal Online (June 1994), at http://www.nysscpa.org/cpajournal/old/16097614.htm, accessed 13 September 2001.

28. Jeff Bailey, "Iron Mountain is at the peak of records-storage industry," Wall Street Journal (18 September 2001), at http://interactive.wsj.com/archive/retrieve.cgi?id=SB1000778212678095520.djm &template=pasted-2001-09-18.tmpl, accessed 24 September 2001.

29. Joseph Menn, "Paper Documents Destroyed but Electronic Records Survive," Los Angeles Times (12 September 2001), at http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-091201info.story, accessed 12 September 2001.

30. Jonathan D. Glater, "Corporate Paper Trails Lie Buried in Soot," New York Times (13 September, 2001), at http://www.nytimes.com/2001/09/13/business/13LAWY.html, accessed 13 September 2001.

31. For example, James R. Chiles, Inviting Disaster: Lessons from the Edge of Technology (New York: HarperBusiness, 2001) considers fatal "system fractures" resulting from human error and mechanical problems and Edward Tenner, Why Things Bite Back: Technology and the Revenge of Unintended Consequences (New York: Knopf, 1996) examines how technological solutions often create more problems than those trying to be solved, ranging from medicine to other supposed technological innovations.

32. The statement was posted on the Archives and Archivists Listserv, 14 September 2001 14:29:19 ‚0400.

33. Richard J. Cox has made a preliminary effort to reflect on this in his "Records Programs, Disaster Preparedness and Recovery: A New Urgency," Records and Information Management Report, forthcoming.

34. Greg Cresci and Arindam Nag, "Key data lost in terror attack but seen regained," Reuters (12 September 2001), http://biz.yahoo.com/rf/010912/n12279148_2.html, accessed 15 September 2001.

35. Shannon McCaffrey, "Legal Industry Suffers Major Blow," Associated Press, Saturday, 15 September, 5:33 PM ET, http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/ap/20010915/us/attacks_lawyers_4.html, accessed 18 September 2001.

36. John Seely Brown and Paul Duguid, The Social Life of Information (Boston: Harvard Business School Press, 2000). For an earlier article incorporated into this book by John Seely Brown and Paul Duguid, "The Social Life of Documents," First Monday, volume 1, number 1 (May 1996), at http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue1/documents/. For a related article, see David M. Levy, "The Universe is Expanding: Reflections on the Social (and Cosmic) Significance of Documents in a Digital Age," ASIS Bulletin, volume 25 (May/June 1999), http://www.asis.org/Bulletin/Apr-99/the_universe_is_expanding___.html.

37. Discussions about knowledge management are legion, but a continuing useful orientation to it is Thomas H. Davenport, Information Ecology: Mastering the Information and Knowledge Environment (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997).

38. Quoted in Lisa Singhania, "Financial Firms Put It Together," USA Today (12 September 2001), at http://www.usatoday.com/money/finance/2001-09-12-rebuilding.htm, accessed 13 September 2001.

39. Quoted in Joan D. LaGuardia, "Investors fear a paperwork nightmare," News-Press (13 September 2001), at http://www.news-press.com/biz/today/010913records.html, accessed 15 September 2001.

40. Steve Vogel, "Tear-Stained Spreadsheets: Army Office That Lost Half Its Staff Reconstructs a Year's Work," Washington Post (10 October 2001), p. B1, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A33788-2001Oct9.html, accessed 11 October 2001.

41. For an assessment of these programs, refer to Richard J. Cox, Elizabeth Yakel, David Wallace, Jeannette Bastian, and Jennifer Marshall, "Archival Education in North American Library and Information Science Schools," Library Quarterly, volume 71 (April 2001): pp. 141-194 and "Educating Archivists in Library and Information Science Schools," Journal of Education for Library and Information Science, volume 42 (Summer 2001): pp. 228-240.

42. Jesus Sanchez, "Destruction Leaves Firms Searching for Quarters," Los Angeles Times (12 September 2001), at http://www.latimes.com/la-091201real.story?coll=la-home-utilities, accessed 13 September 2001.

43. Terence Riley, "What to Build: Two Architects, An Urban Planner, a Structural Engineer and a Landscape Designer Consider the Future of Ground Zero," New York Times Magazine (11 November 2001), pp. 92-94, 96.

44. Peter Behr, "Wall Street Firms Struggle to Cope With Staff Losses," Washington Post (13 September 2001), p. E01, at http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A21153-2001Sep12.html, accessed 18 September 2001.

45. Eli M. Noam, "Terror Tests the Fabric of the Communication Network," New York Times (17 September 2001), at http://www.nytimes.com/2001/09/17/technology/17NECO.html?ex=1001744134&ei=1&en=a8a10a60f2d66415, accessed 18 September 2001.

46. For example, William J. Mitchell, City of Bits: Space, Place, and the Infobahn (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1995) and E-topia: "Urban Life, Jim - But Not As We Know It" (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1999). In the earlier book Mitchell examines how computer networks are redesigning the city, just as earlier railroads, automobiles, telephones, and new commercial networks transformed urban life. The more recent book examines whether cyberspace has killed the city, concluding cyberspace's influence may be no greater than earlier developments such as postal systems, electrification, and the automobile.

47. A prime example remains Sherry Turkle, Life on the Screen: Identity in the Age of the Internet (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1995), but other disciplines have chimed, such as C. A. Bowers, Let Them Eat Data: How Computers Affect Education, Cultural Diversity, and the Prospects of Ecological Sustainability (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2000) and Barry Sanders, A Is for Ox: Violence, Electronic Media, and the Silencing of the Written Word (New York: Pantheon, 1994).

48. Simon Romero, "Attacks Expose Telephone's Soft Underbelly," New York Times (15 October 2001), at http://www.nytimes.com/2001/10/15/technology/15PHON.html?ex=1004149942&ei=1&en=9209ae6c8e9fc523, accessed 16 October 2001.

49. New York Times (21 September 2001), p. B13.

50. New York Times (13 September 2001), p. A2; (26 September 2001), p. A20; (3 October 2001), p. A19.

51. See "Teaching Students About Terrorism and Related Resources," at http://askeric.org/Virtual/Qa/archives/Subjects/Social_Studies/Current_Events/tragedy.html.

52. Bill Carter and Felicity Barringer, "At U.S. Request, Networks Agree to Edit Future bin Laden Tapes," New York Times (11 October 2001).

53. Check Daniel Dayan and Elihu Katz, Media Events: The Live Broadcasting of History (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1992) or Johanna Neuman, Lights, Camera, War: Is Media Technology Driving International Politics? (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1996) among the hundreds of media studies. How are these being used in information science schools?

54. For a wide array of writings on these topics, see Philip E. Agre and Marc Rotenberg (editors), Technology and Privacy: The New Landscape (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1997); David Brin, The Transparent Society: Will Technology Force Us to Choose Between Privacy and Freedom? (Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley, 1998); Amitai Etzioni, The Limits of Privacy (New York: Basic Books, 1999); Angus MacKenzie, Secrets: The CIA's War at Home (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997); David M. Rabban, Free Speech in its Forgotten Years (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997); Natalie Robins, Alien Ink: The FBI's War on Freedom of Expression (New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1992); Jeffrey Rosen, The Unwanted Gaze: The Destruction of Privacy in America (New York: Random House, 2000); H. Jeff Smith, Managing Privacy: Information Technology and Corporate America (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1994); and, Janna Malamud Smith, Private Matters: In Defense of the Personal Life (Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley, 1997).

55. Murray Sayle, "Hijacking Television," Prospect (October 2001), at http://www.prospect-magazine.co.uk/highlights/hijacking_oct01/index.html, accessed 29 September 2001.

56. Sayle, "Hijacking Television."

57. Stanley Kurtz, "Free Speech and an Orthodoxy of Dissent," Chronicle of Higher Education (26 October 2001), p. B24.

58. Patrick Thibodeau, "Information security will be key with lawmakers," 17 September 2001 Posted: 8:52 a.m. EDT, at http://www.cnn.com/2001/TECH/industry/09/17/information.security.idg/index.html, accessed September 20, 2001.

59. Philip Shenon, "Ashcroft Wants Quick Action on Broader Wiretapping Plan," New York Times (18 September 2001), at http://www.nytimes.com/2001/09/18/national/18CONG.html?todaysheadlines, accessed 18 September 2001.

60. Carl S. Kaplan, "Concern Over Proposed Changes in Internet Surveillance," New York Times (21 September 2001).

61. Kevin Poulsen, "Hackers face life imprisonment under anti-terrorism act," Business Week (25 September 2001), at http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/sep2001/tc20010925_5807.htm, accessed 29 September 2001.

62. William Glaberson, "Technology's Role to Grow in a New World of Security," New York Times (18 September 2001), at http://www.nytimes.com/2001/09/18/national/18RULE.html?todaysheadlines, accessed 18 September 2001.

63. Alan Travis, "Identity cards: Un-British or Vital? The ID Debate," Guardian(25 September 2001), at http://politics.guardian.co.uk/attacks/story/0,1320,557630,00.html, accessed 29 September 2001.

64. Bruce Craig, National Coordinating Committee for the Promotion of History (NCCPH) Washington Update, volume 7, number 39 (27 September 2001).

65. Bruce Craig, National Coordinating Committee for the Promotion of History (NCCPH) Washington Update, volume 7, number 43 (18 October 2001).

66. See "The Post-September 11 Environment: Access to Government Information," at http://www.ombwatch.org/info/2001/access.html.

67. Ron Southwick, "Colleges Largely Complying With Requests for Information on Foreign Students, Survey Finds," Chronicle of Higher Education (4 October 2001), at http://chronicle.com/free/2001/10/2001100403n.htm, accessed 5 October 2001.

68. Jim Puzzanghera, "FBI Pursuing Clues to Terrorists on Internet and In E-Mail: Forensic teams searching computer files in Florida public libraries where suspects may have left tracks," Mercury News (19 September 2001), at http://www0.mercurycenter.com/local/center/internet0920.htm, accessed 24 September 2001.

69. Katie Hafner, "In the Next Chapter, Is Technology an Ally?" New York Times (27 September 2001), http://www.nytimes.com/2001/09/27/technology/circuits/27TECH.html?ex=1002598492&ei=1&en=bcaa7b1d0aeea9ac, accessed 29 September 2001.

70. See this issue of his newsletter at http://www.counterpane.com/crypto-gram-0109a.html.

71. "Tech Sector, Already Weak, Disrupted by Attacks," New York Times (20 September 2001), at http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/technology/tech-attack-technology.html?ex=1002093116&ei=1&en=9040d8a7247e05cf, accessed 24 September 2001.

72. See, for example, Carl Shapiro and Hal Varian, Information Rules: A Strategic Guide to the Information Economy (Boston: Harvard Business School Press, 1998).

73. See, for example, Thomas K. Landauer, The Trouble with Computers: Usefulness, Usability, and Productivity (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1995).

74. Stewart Brand, The Clock of the Long Now: Time and Responsibility (New York: Basic Books, 1999), p. 88.

75. Whether such a site of tragedy should be memorialized is an issue that Americans, and others, have wrestled with before; see Kenneth E. Foote, Shadowed Ground: America's Landscapes of Violence and Tragedy (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1997).

76. Raymond LaFever to the Archives and Archivists Listserv, 13 Sep 2001 11:59:49 ‚0400. Within days a group of archives - including the New York State Archives and the National Archives-Northeast Region (serving as co-coordinators); the Archivists Roundtable of Metropolitan New York; New York University's Program in Archival Management and Historical Editing; Columbia University, New-York Historical Society; the New York City Department of Records and Information Services; the American Records Management Association-New York City; and the METRO Library Agency - had joined together to work on disaster assessment and recovery and to document the World Trade Center destruction. Additional information about these efforts can be found at Web site established by the State Archives at http://www.nyshrab.org/WTC/wtc.html.

77. "Documentary records first of NYC air attacks," 17 September 2001 Posted: 3:23 PM EDT (1923 GMT), at http://www.cnn.com/2001/SHOWBIZ/News/09/17/attack.film.reut/index.html, accessed 19 September 2001.

78. Neal Gabler, "This Time, The Scene Was Real," New York Times (16 September 2001), at http://www.nytimes.com/2001/09/16/weekinreview/16GABL.html?rd=hcmcp?p=03wKM03wS243sgO012000mQRnYQRgk, accessed 19 September 2001; Elvis Mitchell, "Good at Action Films. Maybe Too Good," New York Times (18 September 2001), at http://www.nytimes.com/2001/09/18/movies/18NOTE.html?rd=hcmcp?p=03wKK03wS243sgO012000mQRnYQRgk, accessed 19 September 2001.

79. Angus Kress Gillespie. Twin Towers: The Life of New York City's World Trade Center (New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 1999).

80. Richard W. Wiggins, "The Effects of September 11 on the Leading Search Engine," First Monday, volume 6, number 10 (October 2001), at http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue6_10/wiggins/. See also the Pew Internet Report on Internet use after Sept 11th at http://www.pewinternet.org/reports/toc.asp?Report=46. Among other things the report concluded, "Perhaps the most significant development online after the attack has been the outpouring of grief, prayerful communication, information dissemination through e-mail, and political commentary. Nearly three-quarters of Internet users (72%) have used e-mail in some way related to the events to display their patriotism, contact family and friends to discuss events, reconnect with long-lost friends, discuss the fate of the victims, and share news."

81. Eugene S. Schweig, Joan Gomberg, Paul Bodin, Gary Patterson, and Scott Davis, "The Internet: Shaking Up Scientific Communication; How a Regional Mailing List Facilitated Response to an International Event," Nature (26 July 2001), at http://www.nature.com/nature/webmatters/equake/index.html.

82. Stephen Schwartz, "The 'Ladenese Epistle': What you can learn from reading Osama's oeuvre," Weekly Standard, volume 7, number 7 (29 October 2001), at http://www.weeklystandard.com/FreePDF/FreePDFPopup.asp.

83. Brewster Kahle to: archivists@yahoogroups.com, Archives and Archivists Listserv, 16 September 2001 07:48:59 ‚0700.

84. Andrea Foster, "2 Scholars Archive Web Sites on Terrorist Attacks," Chronicle of Higher Education (18 September 2001), at http://chronicle.com/free/2001/09/2001091801t.htm, accessed 19 September 2001.

85. Leslie Walker, "Web-Page Collection Preserves The Online Response to Horror," Washington Post (27 September 2001), p. E01.

86. Bruce Craig, "Cultural Institutions Impacted by World Trade Tower Disaster," National Coordinating Committee for the Promotion of History (NCCPH) Washington Update, volume 7, number 38 (20 September 2001).

87. Information about the library at the Pentagon can be found at http://www.hqda.army.mil/library/.

88. BFanning to the Archives and Archivists Listserv, 1 October 2001 14:59:22 ‚0400.

89. For a popular account, see Stewart Brand, The Clock of the Long Now: Time and Responsibility (New York: Basic Books, 1999).

90. As we were working on this document, several students from the Middle East have withdrawn and gone back home. With 173 international students out of our total 865 students, restrictions or individuals merely declining to come here because of concerns about safety can have a serious impact on the School (and, indeed, the entire University). We have also received inquiries about transferring to our program from other schools in the New York and D.C. areas, so it is possible that there may also be some new students coming to the school.

91. See, for example, Jeff Opdyke, "Your Money Matters: Do You Know Where Your Vital Records Are?" Wall Street Journal (10 October 2001), at http://www.nj.com/newsflash/index.ssf?/cgi-free/getstory_ssf.cgi?f0118_BC_WSJ--YourMoneyMatters&&news&newsflash-financial, accessed 11 October 2001.

92. Similar questions have been asked before, such as by Francis Miksa, "The Cultural Legacy of the 'Modern Library' for the Future," Journal of Education for Library and Information Science, voume 37 (Spring 1996), pp. 100-119.

93. See Julie Thompson Klein, Interdisciplinarity: History, Theory, and Practice (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1990).

94. Eric Ormsby, "The Battle of the Book: The Research Library Today," New Criterion (October 2001), pp. 4-16 (quotation, p. 7).

95. Richard J. Cox, "Debating the Future of the Book," American Libraries, volume 28 (February 1997), pp. 52-55.

96. The classic study on this is Marion Paris, Library School Closings: Four Case Studies (Metuchen, N.J.: Scarecrow Press, 1988).

97. James J. O'Donnell, Avatars of the Word: From Papyrus to Cyberspace (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1998), pp. 90, 156.

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Editorial history

Paper received 13 November 2001; revision received 20 November 2001; accepted 29 November 2001.

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Copyright ©2001, First Monday

The Day the World Changed: Implications for Archival, Library, and Information Sciences by Richard J. Cox with Mary K. Biagini, Toni Carbo, Tony Debons, Ellen Detlefsen, Jose Marie Griffiths, Don King, David Robins, Richard Thompson, Chris Tomer, and Martin Weiss
First Monday, volume 6, number 12 (December 2001),
URL: http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue6_12/cox/index.html