Geoscience after IT: Part L. Adjusting the emerging information system to new technology

Coherent development depends on following widely used standards that respect our vast legacy of existing entries in the geoscience record. Middleware ensures that we see a coherent view from our desktops of diverse sources of information. Developments specific to managing the written word, map content, and structured data come together in shared metadata linking topics and information types

The Diffusion of IT in Higher Education: Publishing Productivity of Academic Life Scientists

This study investigates widening access to the Internet and other advancements in IT across institutions of higher education and how these advances have affected the publishing productivity of academic life scientists. What distinguishes this study is that institutional IT access is measured across a wide range of institutions and multiple IT indicators are considered: 1) the adoption of BITNET; 2) the registration of domain names (DNS); 3) the availability of the electronic journal database, JSTOR; and 4) the availability of electronic library resources. Data on life scientists are drawn from the 1983, 1995, 2001, and 2003 Survey of Doctorate Recipients. Universities and colleges are classified into several tiers, depending upon research intensity. Three hypotheses are tested: 1) IT enhances the careers of faculty, independent of tier; 2) IT improves the careers of faculty at lower-tiered relative to higher-tiered institutions; and 3) within tier, the IT revolution increases women’s publication rates relative to their male counterparts. The study finds that the diffusion of IT in higher education follows the standard S-curve, with highertiere