The Buddhist Hour Radio Broadcast Archives

Our Organisation's long life strategy is based on five trusts and five notions.

In 1973, Herman H. Fussler wrote a Report for the Sloan Foundation entitled "Research Libraries and Technology".

He opened his report with a statement that: "An analysis of our library operations in relationship to technology is not made particularly easy by the voluminous literature that now exists on the subject".

He assumed that basically technology should be used where it can improve the cost/benefit or cost/effectiveness ratios of existing processes or services, or where it can extend or provide essentially new or improved services that society is willing to support.

The principal reasons for nonexploitation are primarily, but not entirely, related to economic, conceptual, bibliographical, and organisational, rather than technological, problems.

From 1963 onward, the Library of Congress in the USA made a priori decision to "automate". The query then asked, "Which of the new technologies can best be applied toward the accomplishment of the 'automation' goal?"

At the Planning Conference in 1965 the development of a model library was recommended, having such capabilities as automatic textual access, fact retrieval, and access to "the on-line intellectual community" via a network of libraries joined by time-shared computer systems.

In 1967 and 1969, the System Development Cooperation undertook two important studies dealing with technology and libraries. With these investigations the focus of major studies shifted somewhat away from automation or data-processing within individual libraries towards the establishment of national systems, or networks for information storage and dissemination.

They worked on the assumption that it was the responsibility of the Federal Government to ensure "that there exists within the United States at least one accessible copy of each significant publication of the World-wide scientific and technical literature".

Other reports followed which pointed out that there are a variety of essentially non-technological measures for changes that could equal or even exceed the immediate values of technology in the improvement of such access.

How should one explore the library of the future?

The prospects for short-term, large reductions in library costs to be accompanied by large-scale increases in capability did not seem likely in 1973.

In our view, we have demonstrated to ourselves that present technology has greatly increased the ability of persons to browse over some of our library holdings at an affordable cost.

The net commercial cost of our library systems and our Internet site, which enables our catalogue to be browsed, is about $100,000. We have entered over 2000 book titles onto our Internet site from our library indexing system.

If we allot say, $50,000 as the value of the other Buddha Dhamma material apart from our library catalogue on the site, then the all up cost of the library catalogue is $50,000. If we divide this $50,000 by 2000 (the number of books entered to date) the cost per book is $50,000 divided by 2000 equals $25 per book.

When we reach the catalogue of 5000 books the cost will be $10 per book and so on.

What is the difference between a bibliography and a catalogue?

According to E.J. Hunter and K.G.B. Bakewell in their book, "Cataloguing" (1979), "A bibliography is a list of books and/or other materials. Since it would clearly be impossible to list all materials from all countries and all periods on all subjects, such a list normally has a self-imposed limitation. Examples of this limitation are geographical...; language...; subject...and physical form...

A catalogue is also a list of books and/or other materials but with a different kind of limitation: it is restricted to the stock of a library or, in the case of a union catalogue, a group of libraries. In other respects it is less restrictive than a bibliography, since it may record all material held by the library or group of libraries regardless of geographical origin, language, subject or physical form".

We have a backlog of indexing....not only of books but of journals, newsletters, audio tape recordings, Buddhist artefacts and ritual objects, calligraphy, commentaries by Buddhist Teachers and video recordings of Buddhist Monks and Nuns.

Our librarian, Connie Rhodes, and Member, Frank Carter, are working on a plan to allow trainee student librarians from Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology to have supervised work sessions to help us set up a system of cataloguing and computer database procedure of international standard for materials of the John D. Hughes Collection which do not have a cataloguing system provided.

They will follow international best practice such as the Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules (AACR) to catalogue such materials as Photos, Buddhist Images, Ch'an ink blocks, brushes, chops and Thankas.

In the General Introduction to the Second Edition 1988 Revision, prepared under the direction of the Joint Steering Committee For Revision of AACR, they note:

"These rules are designed for use in the construction of catalogues and other lists in general libraries of all sizes. They are not specifically intended for specialist and archival libraries, but such libraries are recommended to use the rules as the basis of their cataloguing and to augment their provisions as necessary. The rules cover the description of, and the provision of access points for, all library materials commonly collected at the present time. The integrated structure of the text makes the general rules usable as a basis for cataloguing uncommonly collected materials of all kinds and library materials yet unknown".

The book is in two parts: Part I Description and Part II Headings, Uniform Titles, and References. Each Part is then made up of several chapters, for example, in Part I chapters include: General Rules for Description; Books, Pamphlets, and Printed Sheets; Sound Recordings; Computer Files; and Three-Dimensional Artefacts and Realia.

In Part II, there are chapters on Headings for Persons, Geographic Names and Uniform Titles.

We have developed policies on restricting rare books to in-library use. These books are not for loan.

We have considered the question of relative value, to the user, of taking the book home for two weeks versus studying it for a shorter time in the library.

Rather than entering into arguments regarding the subjective value of having a book at home for days, we can estimate the mean length of time the user has the book, open, in front of him or her.

Using some figures from research at M.I.T. Science Library a few years back, it was found, on the average, a person stayed about 100 minutes. Since, during that time, they performed an average of three tasks, including withdrawing some books, reading some books as well as periodicals in the library, and consulting the card catalogue or borrowing books, we can estimate that the mean time taken for any one task is about 30 minutes.

Results of a questionnaire study indicated a mean time of one hour spent on a book, about 40 minutes on a bound journal volume, and about 15 minutes on an abstract journal volume.

There are no surveys of time spent at home on a book borrowed from the science library, but measures of writers' habits plus questioning of colleagues indicate that 10 hours, on the average, is not a gross error in estimate.

Certainly 30 hours for an average value would be too great and three hours, on a technical book that has been borrowed for two weeks, would probably be too small.

We thus estimate, with various degrees of uncertainty, that, on the average, for every time a book is borrowed, it is used by the borrower for about ten hours, but also it is used in the library by two other readers for about an hour each some time during the year.

When the library has a duplicate it can be seen that 23 out of a potential 28 in-library users would be able to use one copy of the book.

We are not going to go into the mathematics of calculation of ability to provide access to a book at any given time, but those of you who are mathematically inclined can see why our guardianship policy is to lend one copy of a text or commentary only when we have five copies in the collection.

If a book is consulted in the library ten or more times for every time it is borrowed, then in-library use is evidently efficient and, anyway, cutting off circulation will not frustrate many users.

This type of situation applies to expensive monolingual dictionaries and bilingual dictionaries.

If a person is earnest in their studies, he or she could reasonably be expected to purchase his or her own dictionary. We are not about to encourage persons to believe they can be supplied with valuable texts to the detriment of other users.

What we must do, in analysing our library operations, is to reduce the daily occurrences to a set of probabilities; from these one can predict average behaviour, average deviation from average behaviour and other useful criteria, which will be accurate enough on which to base decisions involving hundreds of users over a time span of a year or more.

This is why we favour a systems approach to library effectiveness as suggested in 1968 by Philip M. Morse in Library Effectiveness: A Systems Approach (published by The M.I.T. Press).

It may be useful to consider how past trends and technologies have been greeted by the library profession.

In a 1982 Report of the Library Association in the United Kingdom, it was held that the library profession failed to meet the needs of professional research workers. These workers broke away from the main body, formed their own organisation, called themselves information scientists and developed their own techniques for handling different forms of material.

At another level, the development of Citizens Advice Bureaux, Legal Advice Centres and Customer Advice Centres highlighted a failure of libraries to respond to certain information needs.

At another level, the development of electronic media rental shops specialising in video tapes for information and entertainment again highlighted a failure of libraries to respond to certain information needs.

We provide specialised information via radio broadcasts such as this one.

It is doubtful that the type of information we have and are providing to you over this year could be obtained from any public library in Victoria.

In saying this we do not intend to disparage the policy or intellect of librarians because they cannot afford the costs of providing specialised information.

Because libraries in Victoria are being provided with Internet reading facilities they will be able to access specialised information like what we have on our Website at www.bdcu.org.au.

So if we recalculate the $25 cost per book in providing our library catalogue and divide this figure across the hundred or more hits we have per day at our site, our cost of providing the information becomes 25 cents per person.

When we arrive at 1,000 persons a day viewing our site, which we will soon reach, our service cost becomes 0.25 cents per person.

We are leading Buddhist Organisations in our concept that we can deliver to others access to our catalogue at a rate less expensive to our Organisation than providing printed library catalogues World-wide.

The rapidity of growth of Internet in Australia puts Australia, at per capita access, second or third in the World.

So our library of the future has already begun to deliver valuable information services to a very wide audience.

We encourage you to access our information base at www.bdcu.org.au and invite you to participate in our Centre's activities by donating books and journals or cash to our library projects.

Please make your cheques payable to the Buddhist Discussion Centre Upwey Limited.

Donations are not tax deductible.

Under the direction of resident Teacher John D. Hughes, the Centre has developed a library resource to become a satisfactory 20th Century Centre.

Our current development goal for the library to date is to become a third rate library by World standards. (A first rate library should be able to answer 98% of queries within one hour. A second rate library should be able to answer 98% of queries within ten hours. A third rate library should be able to answer 98% of queries within 100 hours. A fourth rate library should be able to answer 98% of queries within 1000 hours. Thus, first rate libraries do not exist in the World.)

At present, the library has some examples of the World's best Buddha Dhamma reference materials and artefacts.

These materials deal with training of the mind, otherwise known as mental culture. This is the first step towards taming mental unrest.

The Buddha has explained:
"From craving springs grief,
From craving springs fear,
For him or her who is wholly free from craving,
There is no grief, much less fear".

So the causes of providing and preserving and making available the instruction sets of how you can do something good for someone results in a good rebirth for all those involved in our library care processes.

You can not have two opposing sets of thought in your mind at one and the same time. One set of thoughts will always drive the other out. If, for instance, your mind is completely occupied with an unselfish desire to help someone else, you can not be harbouring fear at the same time.

All good things come from the preservation of knowledge in our library.

Fear and worry in moderation are instincts of self-preservation, but constant irrational fear and prolonged worry are restless enemies to the human body. They derange the normal body functions.

Mind influences the body.

When mind is concentrated on right thoughts, and supported by right effort and right understanding, the effect it produces is immense.

A mind with pure and wholesome thoughts leads to healthy relaxed living.

Calmness is not weakness. A calm attitude at all times shows a person of culture.

It is worthwhile to create the causes for being calm when things are not too favourable.

One of our Member's sister died last week. Our Member consoled the family at the funeral and encouraged them to send loving-kindness to the freshly departed person.

Because of the merit gathered over many years at our Centre, he was able to achieve the state of being calm at a time when things were not too favourable.

You may be a very busy person, but if you spend a few minutes a day in meditation or in reading some of our valuable books, you will find you become relieved of your worries and develop your mind.

It is up to you to attend to your physical and mental health.

If you come to visit our library and wish to join there is an annual library fee of $30 a year.

You can join the library without joining our Centre. This means you can use the library and borrow books without becoming a Member.
If you only join the library you have no voting rights in the election of Committee Members.

For those who want to become Members of the Centre with voting rights, there is a joining fee of $30 and an annual subscription of $30.

Naturally, we want persons to help us with our library. Contact our librarian, Constance Rhodes, on 9754 3334 on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Fridays from 10.00am to 3.00pm.

We have over 200 books and journals dealing with all aspects of libraries so you can get a good understanding of the role of libraries by helping us.

By cause and effect, you will have a good opportunity of meeting with written information both paper-based and electronic in your next rebirth. That is, if you put the causes in to help others by working in our library this life then the effects are you will come across good information in your next life.

Our library space is rare and you will find that working in our library is an enjoyable and refreshing experience.

May you be well and happy.

This script was written and edited by John D. Hughes and Leanne Eames.

Disclaimer:

As we, the Chan Academy Australia, Chan Academy being a registered business name of the Buddhist Discussion Centre (Upwey) Ltd., do not control the actions of our service providers from time to time, make no warranty as to the continuous operation of our website(s). Also, we make no assertion as to the veracity of any of the information included in any of the links with our websites, or another source accessed through our website(s).

Accordingly, we accept no liability to any user or subsequent third party, either expressed or implied, whether or not caused by error or omission on either our part, or a member, employee or other person associated with the Chan Academy Australia (Buddhist Discussion Centre (Upwey) Ltd.)

This Radio Script is for Free Distribution. It contains Buddha Dhamma material and is provided for the purpose of research and study.

Permission is given to make printouts of this publication for FREE DISTRIBUTION ONLY. Please keep it in a clean place.

"The gift of Dhamma excels all other gifts".

For more information, contact the Centre or better still, come and visit us.

© 2002. Copyright. The Buddhist Discussion Centre (Upwey) Ltd.