LYNCH concluded by offering an issue for database creators to consider, as well as several comments about what might constitute good trial multimedia experiments. In a networked information world the database builder or service builder (publisher) does not exercise the same extensive control over the integrity of the presentation; strange programs "munge" with one's data before the user sees it. Serious thought must be given to what guarantees integrity of presentation. Part of that is related to where one draws the boundaries around a networked information service. This question of presentation integrity in client-server computing has not been stressed enough in the academic world, LYNCH argued, though commercial service providers deal with it regularly.
Concerning multimedia, LYNCH observed that good multimedia at the moment is hideously expensive to produce. He recommended producing multimedia with either very high sale value, or multimedia with a very long life span, or multimedia that will have a very broad usage base and whose costs therefore can be amortized among large numbers of users. In this connection, historical and humanistically oriented material may be a good place to start, because it tends to have a longer life span than much of the scientific material, as well as a wider user base. LYNCH noted, for example, that American Memory fits many of the criteria outlined. He remarked the extensive discussion about bringing the Internet or the National Research and Education Network (NREN) into the K-12 environment as a way of helping the American educational system.
LYNCH closed by noting that the kinds of applications demonstrated struck him as excellent justifications of broad-scale networking for K-12, but that at this time no "killer" application exists to mobilize the K-12 community to obtain connectivity.
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+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ DISCUSSION * Dearth of genuinely interesting applications on the network a slow-changing situation * The issue of the integrity of presentation in a networked environment * Several reasons why CD-ROM software does not network * +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
During the discussion period that followed LYNCH's presentation, several additional points were made.
LYNCH reiterated even more strongly his contention that, historically, once one goes outside high-end science and the group of those who need access to supercomputers, there is a great dearth of genuinely interesting applications on the network. He saw this situation changing slowly, with some of the scientific databases and scholarly discussion groups and electronic journals coming on as well as with the availability of Wide Area Information Servers (WAIS) and some of the databases that are being mounted there. However, many of those things do not seem to have piqued great popular interest. For instance, most high school students of LYNCH's acquaintance would not qualify as devotees of serious molecular biology.
Concerning the issue of the integrity of presentation, LYNCH believed that a couple of information providers have laid down the law at least on certain things. For example, his recollection was that the National Library of Medicine feels strongly that one needs to employ the identifier field if he or she is to mount a database commercially. The problem with a real networked environment is that one does not know who is reformatting and reprocessing one's data when one enters a client server mode. It becomes anybody's guess, for example, if the network uses a Z39.50 server, or what clients are doing with one's data. A data provider can say that his contract will only permit clients to have access to his data after he vets them and their presentation and makes certain it suits him. But LYNCH held out little expectation that the network marketplace would evolve in that way, because it required too much prior negotiation.
CD-ROM software does not network for a variety of reasons, LYNCH said. He speculated that CD-ROM publishers are not eager to have their products really hook into wide area networks, because they fear it will make their data suppliers nervous. Moreover, until relatively recently, one had to be rather adroit to run a full TCP/IP stack plus applications on a PC-size machine, whereas nowadays it is becoming easier as PCs grow bigger and faster. LYNCH also speculated that software providers had not heard from their customers until the last year or so, or had not heard from enough of their customers.
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