May 1998 No. 59

ISSN 1071-5223

About INFOBITS

Infobits is an electronic service of the Institute for Academic Technology's Information Resources Group. Each month we monitor and select from a number of information technology and instruction technology sources that come to our attention and provide brief notes for electronic dissemination to educators.

ACRL/CNI Internet Education Project
Free Internet Newsletter
Statistics on Distance Learning Programs
The Open Journal Project
New Cyberpsychology Journal
Information "Sweetspots"
Vroma -- Virtual Community for Classics Study
IAT Librarian's Links

ACRL/CNI INTERNET EDUCATION PROJECT

The Emerging Technologies in Instruction Committee of the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) Instruction Section, in conjunction with the Coalition for Networked Information (CNI), is sponsoring a Web site which identifies exemplary user education and training materials supporting the use of the Internet and other networked information resources. The primary goal of the project is to provide a place for librarians and others involved in the instruction and delivery of networked information to display and share model instructional materials. Materials selected for inclusion on the site should be specifically designed for instruction in the selection and evaluation of information in a networked environment. Of particular interest to the committee are materials which demonstrate innovative and creative use of technology in instruction and those which successfully integrate the selection and evaluation of both print and electronic resources.

For examples of projects currently included on the site, link to: http://www.cwru.edu/affil/cni/base/acrlcni.html

To submit materials to be considered for the Internet Education Project Site, contact Internet Education Project, c/o Martha Fleming, Kelvin Smith Library, Case Western Reserve University, 10900 Euclid Avenue, Cleveland, OH 44106-7151 USA; email: user-ed-submit@po.cwru.edu

FREE INTERNET NEWSLETTER

Free Pint is a free email newsletter from the United Kingdom written by professionals who share how they find quality and reliable information on the Internet. Recent issues covered information resources in the food industry, business and accounting, market research, engineering, science policy, popular science, and the medical field. The publishers allow subscribers to freely copy and/or distribute the newsletter in its entirety.

Free Pint [ISSN 1460-7239] is published every two weeks by Willco, Freepost SEA3901, Staines, Middlesex, TW18 3BR, UK; tel: +44 (0)1784 455 435; fax: +44 (0)1784 455 436; email: enquiries@willco.co.uk; Web: http://www.willco.demon.co.uk/
For details about subscribing, link to http://www.freepint.co.uk/

STATISTICS ON DISTANCE LEARNING PROGRAMS

The Survey of Distance Learning Programs in Higher Education by James Moses (New York: Primary Research Group, 1997, ISBN: 1-57440-008-8, $85.00) provides some interesting comparisons of costs and delivery methods in distance education. The percentage of higher education distance learning programs that employ email as a primary communications vehicle is 17.61%, while 14.31% use videocassette, 9.76% use tape cablecast, 3.9% use audiocassette, 24% use interactive video, and 27% use the Internet in their programs. Junior colleges surveyed spent a mean of $128.00 to train a distance education instructor, while four-year colleges and universities spent a mean of $551.00. Despite the finding that 40% of distance learning programs currently lose money, 95.3% of programs plan to expand their programs.

Primary Research Group is a publisher of monographs on information industries and higher education. For more information on this book and other publications, contact Primary Research Group, 68 West 38th Street, Suite 202, New York, NY 10018 USA; tel: 212-764-1579; fax: 212-397-5056.

THE OPEN JOURNAL PROJECT

The aim of the Open Journal project, funded by the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) of the Higher Education Funding Councils, as part of its Electronic Libraries (eLib) Programme, is to provide a framework for publishing journals in a networked environment (primarily the World Wide Web) that ensures maximum access to the publications. The Open Journal project is working with publishers in the fields of biology, cognitive science, and computer science to explore how articles can be enriched by using links between related works and by taking users directly to non-journal resources, such as online databases. Currently, selections from the following journals are included in the project: Journal of Development, Journal of Cell Science, Journal of Molecular Biology, Psycoloquy, and Behavioral & Brain Sciences.

For more information, contact Open Journal Project, Department of Electronics & Computer Science, University of Southampton, Highfield, Southampton, SO17 1BJ, UK; tel: (01703) 594479; fax: (01703) 592865; Web: http://journals.ecs.soton.ac.uk/

NEW CYBERPSYCHOLOGY JOURNAL

Cyberpsychology & Behavior is a new, peer-reviewed journal for the mental health community devoted to the "impact of the Internet, multimedia and virtual reality on behavior and society." Articles in its inaugural issue include "The Gender Gap in Internet Use," "Internet Addiction on Campus," "The Relationship Between Depression and Internet Addiction," and "A Review of Virtual Reality as a Psychotherapeutic Tool."

Cyberpsychology & Behavior [ISSN: 1094-9313] is published quarterly by Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., 2 Madison Avenue, Larchmont, NY 10538; tel: 914-834-3100; fax: 914-834-3582; email: info@liebertpub.com; Web: http://www.liebertpub.com/

To subscribe contact the above mailing address or tel: 800-M-LIEBERT or 914-834-3100; fax: 914-834-1388.
Annual subscriptions are $59 (personal/U.S.); $89 (personal/airmail outside U.S.); $100 (institutions/U.S.); $140 (institutions/airmail outside U.S.)

For information on the journal's editorial board and manuscript submission, link to http://www.liebertpub.com/new/pubs/10949313.htm

INFORMATION "SWEETSPOTS"

StartSpot Mediaworks, Inc., headquartered in the Northwestern University/Evanston Research Park in Evanston, IL, has created two "sweetspots" -- free information Web sites designed to make finding the best topical information on the Internet a quick, easy, and enjoyable experience.

LibrarySpot, a virtual library resource center for educators and students, librarians and their patrons, families, and businesses, "was designed to break through the information overload of the Web to bring the best library and reference sites together with insightful editorial in one convenient, user-friendly spot." The site includes links to general reference tools; lists of journals, magazines, and newspapers online; and online library catalogs. Resource guides are provided to help parents in raising a reader, library tips for students writing term papers, links to lesson plans for teachers, and tips to help businesses research their competition. LibrarySpot's Web address is http://www.libraryspot.com/

BookSpot features book-related resources on the Web. The site includes links to book reviews, lists of books for children, electronic books, and bestseller lists. BookSpot also has information on joining or starting online reading groups and book clubs. BookSpot's Web address is http://www.bookspot.com/

For more information, contact Stephanie Meismer, StartSpot Mediaworks, Inc., 1840 Oak Avenue, Evanston, IL 60201 USA; tel: 847-866-1830; fax: 847-866-1880; email: feedback@libraryspot.com; Web: http://www.startspot.com/

VROMA -- VIRTUAL COMMUNITY FOR CLASSICS STUDY

The VRoma Project: A Virtual Community for Teaching and Learning Classics is an online "place," modeled upon the ancient city of Rome, where students and instructors can interact live, hold courses and lectures, and share resources for the study of the ancient world. The two-year project, funded by a $190,000 grant from the Teaching with Technology Program of the National Endowment for the Humanities, seeks to address two related issues: "to improve and expand the teaching of classical languages and cultures through technology-assisted collaboration between and among undergraduate and secondary school Classics programs; and to enhance students' learning of these topics through the excitement, immediacy, and 'virtual re-creation of lost contexts' that modern technology can expedite."

Project resources include texts, commentaries, images, maps, and teaching materials. Participants can explore a virtual city set in 150 A.D. through Vroma's MOO (an object oriented MUD, a type of multi-player interactive game environment). The project also supports two intensive two-week summer workshop involving college and high school Classics faculty. The second workshop will be held July 14-25, 1998, at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio.

For more information, link to Vroma at http://vroma.rhodes.edu/

LIBRARIAN'S LINKS

The IAT will be closing its doors on June 30, 1998. We are in the process of finding a permanent home for back issues of IAT Infobits and the library's Information Resource Guides series. We will keep you informed of any URL changes that may be necessary during the transition period.

The June 1998 issue of Infobits will be the last one sponsored by the Institute for Academic Technology. We are hopeful that the publication will continue under the sponsorship of another University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill department or similar organization. Stay tuned for further developments. . .