Digital Copies of Bibliographic Publications in the Structure of Information Resources of Federal National Libraries

Abstract

Modern libraries have considerable information resources. Digital copies of publications, including bibliographic ones, are an integral part of information resources. The author studies the activity of the Russian libraries of Federal level on creation of digital copies of bibliographic editions, basing on the own library holdings. There are three national libraries — the Russian State Library, the National Library of Russia and the Presidential Library named after B. Yeltsin. The purpose of the study is to analyse the array of digitized bibliographic publications and to identify the place of digital copies of bibliographic publications in the information resources of the national libraries. The author considers the content of the electronic catalogues of these libraries by entering the same type of request. The article presents the results of study of the volume and content of electronic catalogues, obtained by the method of bibliographic keyword search. The author analysed the array of digital copies of bibliographic publications on various parameters — chronological coverage of digitized documents; language features; terms of access to electronic documents. The author notes that the priority is now given to the digitization of publications in the national language. The article presents the types of access to digital copies of bibliographic publications from the user’s point of view. The author considers the statistical data on the availability of digital copies of bibliographic publications in the collections of electronic documents and the presence of special electronic collections. The emphasis is made on the study of open access to digitized documents. The study revealed that the volume of digital copies of bibliographic publications in the national libraries is very small for the implementation of their inherent scientific and educational function; the access to bibliographic information resources is mostly limited. The author concludes that the level of availability does not meet expectations of the user; and Russian libraries should develop their activities to expand open access to bibliographic information resources.