NFAIS Announces 2005 Annual Conference Dates and Theme
 

MARK YOUR CALENDAR NOW!

Philadelphia, PA, August 3, 2004 – NFAIS, the premier membership association for organizations that aggregate, organize and facilitate access to information, announced today the theme for its 2005 Annual Conference: Whose Mind is it Anyway? Identifying and Meeting Diverse User Needs in the Ongoing Battle for Mindshare. The conference will be held at the Ritz Carlton Hotel in Philadelphia, PA from February 27 - March 1, 2005.

 Building upon the theme of the highly successful 2004 NFAIS conference, it will focus on the differences and commonalities in the search and retrieval behavior of information professionals/librarians and desktop searchers, and the resultant implications for information providers and librarians who must provide products and services that will meet the needs and expectations of these diverse constituencies.

“The Battle for Mindshare has begun,” said NFAIS President-Elect, Lucian Parziale, “but we must have a more in-depth knowledge of the needs of information seekers in order to win that battle. We know that information professionals and librarians are experienced with traditional information products and services, and that they are knowledgeable and sophisticated in their content, search, and retrieval requirements. We also know that there is a new breed of information seekers, trained on the Web by Google and other search engines, who regularly perform their own searches and who have a non-traditional, but no-less demanding set of expectations. But we do not know how the differences and commonalities between these diverse user groups vary across market sectors and subject disciplines, nor how they impact the information purchasing decisions of organizations that must meet the search and retrieval needs of both groups.”

Parziale expressed concern that the visibility and awareness of traditional information products and services among desktop searchers may be severely diminished as the search and retrieval process becomes less-mediated and there is an increased reliance on Web-based content. He said that the objective of the conference is to gain a better understanding of the search and retrieval needs of both user groups within market sectors and across subject disciplines so that information providers can develop products that seamlessly mesh within the workflow requirements of each, eventually becoming integral and necessary to their daily search process.

“This will be one of the key conferences to attend in 2005 for information providers seeking to expand mindshare within a given user group or across user groups, and for information professionals seeking to more effectively meet the needs of their clientele,” said David Brown, a member of the conference planning committee. “It will offer valuable insights to all segments of the Information Community, including the results of a survey to determine whether or not the two user groups have similar search and retrieval needs. Factors that will be evaluated by the survey include content quality, the use of abstracts/indexes, full text, etc., and the feature/functionality wish list with regard to search and retrieval technology. These same factors will be analyzed by market sector - corporate, academic, government, and public - in order to provide a comprehensive overview.” Brown mentioned that other sessions will highlight the workflow requirements of various professions, and how such requirements are being met through the development of innovative new products and services, through collaborative efforts between information providers and their customers, and through practical applications of technology. Trends in information purchasing patterns across market segments will also be discussed.

Register now! For more information or to be added to the mailing list for updates on the 2005 NFAIS Annual conference, contact Jill O’Neill, Director of Communications and Planning (jilloneill@nfais.org or (215)-893-1561) or visit the NFAIS web site (http://www.nfais.org).

This program is being developed by the 2005 NFAIS Annual Conference Planning Committee.

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