[ba-unrev-talk] Day 1 report from Doug's visit to Singapore for the World Library Summit
Cast of characters: (01)
Doug – Dr. Douglas C. Engelbart
Bill – Bill Zoellick. www.fastwater.com Working with Doug on Singapore
initiatives as case studies for Bootstrap Alliance
Mei Lin – Mei Lin Fung www.isoe.com Chair of the Core Planning Committee,
Bootstrap Alliance (02)
World Library Summit “Global Knowledge Renaissance” www.wls.gov.sg
Day 1 Monday April 22, 2002 (03)
It’s the beginning of the first full day in Singapore for Doug, Bill and Mei
Lin. A delegation of 4, with limo, backup luggage cab and more, met us at
the airport in the wee small hours of 4/21, then accompanied us to the hotel
to “ make sure we check in ok”. Eastern hospitality is easy to get used to!
Doug has a palatial suite with fresh flowers in every room, fruit bowl and
even a finger bowl with an orchid floating in it! Breakfast on Monday is
with Julie Sabaratnam, Director of Strategic Initiatives at the Singapore
National Library – assigned as Doug’s personal liaison for the enter
duration of our stay, we have instructions to call her anytime of the day or
night if we need help. Over breakfast we meet Prof. Bob Usherwood, Prof. Of
Librarianship at the Dept of Info. Studies at the U. of Sheffkeld, UK, and
former president of the UK Library Association. His latest book? The Public
Library as Public Knowledge, 1999. (04)
We also meet the most prolific Map collector in the world, 80,000 maps!!!!
And Ann Okerson, from Yale University – organizer at Yale of the North East
Research Libraries consortium, 21 large research libraries that negotiate
licenses for electronic information, she’s also a founding spirit of the
Internatinoal Coalition of Library Consortia. She’s talking about Licensing
and Copyright and how the thoughtful application of priciples of copyright
can be applied to licensing practices and bring libraries and readers the
best of both regimes. I can’t wait to hear what she has to say about this
tricky area! She does say, its not going to be easy. (05)
The rest of the day, we work on Doug’s keynote talks. Now we’ve got some
sense of the local color and conference flavor, its easier to adjust it to
connect to the people who are coming. All 850 registrants! (06)
About Singapore, libraries (07)
The conference program notes that a recent Wall Street Journal article
described Singapore libraries as “trendsetting”. Two out of every 3
Singaporeans are members of the public library. The country has spent half a
billion US $’s in the past 5 years on upgrading their libraries which now
are being built at a size of 100,000 square feet. Library loans are up five
fold since 1995. (08)
See below for the welcome messages. Some interesting themes going on in this
conference. (09)
Dr. Tan Chin Nam, Chairman of the National Library Board of Singapore and
chief civil servant in the Ministray of Information, Technology and the
Arts: (010)
The World Library Summit is a pacesetting effort in addresswing the key
issues aaffecting the evolution of knowledge societies in globalised world.
The post 9-11 world calls for greater connectivity, convergence and
collaboration among nations and across different cultures. Creating, sharing
an ddeploying knowledge to benefit societies and humanity hae become more
pressing. ….. How to remain relevant in a rapidly transforming knowledge
infrastructure rests in the skills of today’s librarians…… (011)
The Summit is founded on three main ideas: Knowledge Augmentation, Cultural
Entrepreneurship and Knowledge Governance….The exposure to 60 world thinkers
and architects of knowledge communities will stimulate sharing, diffusion
and exchange, giving birth to new ideas, a new hope for tomorrow and a
better world for all. (012)
(650) 328 3816
Palo Alto (013)