GPO micropublishing: An historical review and critical analysis

Abstract

Government documents constitute a substantial segment of the receipts of most depository libraries. The volume of documents and their varying formats are therefore a concern to library administrators, technical and public service librarians, as well as documents librarians. The Government Printing Office's recent microfiche distribution program results in part from an attempt to implement the Depository Library Act of 1962 and in part from GPO's interest in containing its costs. The authors discuss the ambiguities in the law, a present cause of confusion and self-contradiction. An extended historical discussion provides a perspective for the reader. Following that, there is a review of the specific events leading up to the present microfiche program, and an examination of the ramifications GPO's pre- and post-microfiche activities have had and will have on library acquisition and servicing procedures. The authors maintain that the law itself needs rewriting, but primarily focus on specific concerns for implementation of the present program because the larger matter of legislation cannot properly be addressed here.