News Item 8 (March 20, 1999)

Penny Bonnett Takes Charge of Billetting

Penny Bonnett, associate editor of Health libraries review has agreed to take on the job of setting up arrangements for ICML visitors to stay in the homes of librarians from the London area. Until taking early retirement, Penny was deputy librarian at the British Medical Association and is ideal for this role since she probably has as wide a circle of friends among UK health librarians as it is possible to have.

Penny’s first task will be to mobilise the help of the various London area professional groups to find people interested in providing traditional bed and breakfast arrangements for our visitors. If you are a librarian (working or retired) and would like to volunteer to take in a visitor, please email her at penny.bonnett@bma.org.uk

News Item 7 (March 13, l999)

Proceedings to be Launched at Congress Opening

Because of the constraints in the production process, printed sets of conference proceedings usually appear many months after the event has taken place. ICML’s decision to publish our proceedings only in electronic form has given us the opportunity to launch congress and proceedings simultaneously.

With a mixture of reasonable trepidation and raw bravado, we have decided that the "publication" of the proceedings will take place at the opening ceremony on July 2^nd. They will be opened for public browsing on the web by our guest of honour – whose identity will be announced shortly.

In order to give Robert Kiley (editor) and his team a fighting chance of meeting this improbable deadline, contributors are being asked to deliver the written version of their paper by April 1^st, 2000 if they wish to be sure that it will be included in the proceedings.

News Item 6 (March 6, 1999)

Flexible Accommodation

No – not hotels with rubber walls for those likely to be driven mad by the stress of presenting a paper to a large audience, but the philosophy that the ICML administration will be adopting towards finding accommodation for delegates.

1. General

London does not have the huge, integrated conference hotels common in North America, and 8ICML will not, therefore, have a single designated conference hotel, as happened at the 7^th congress in Washington and the 6^th in New Delhi.

London is never a cheap place to stay, and this will be even more true at the height of the millennium summer. The library Association, which is providing the financial and administrative support for ICML, will be concentrating its efforts on securing low-cost accommodation of various kinds.

2. Hotel Accommodation

Experience at recent IFLA conference and other international events has shown that foreign visitors to the great European cities will find the best value in hotel accommodation by booking combined flight/hotel packages. Our assumption is that substantial numbers of overseas visitors will rake advantage of the savings offered by these packages, and that many more will arrange to stay at a hotel familiar from previous visits – or will stay privately with family or friends.

Accordingly, the registration package will not include any options for us to book hotel rooms on your behalf. Instead, we will be including information about where to find the best value in London hotel accommodation, including web addresses wherever possible.

3. Student Residences

Central London is reasonably well provided with residential accommodation for university students, which is available at a variety of levels of comfort and price. We have already reserved a bloc of rooms within easy reach of the congress centre; these are safe and clean but definitely fall within the "no frills" category and are priced as such at around £20 per night. Negotiations are in hand for mid-priced accommodation, with en suite bath or shower and communal kitchen area.

Bed and breakfast" accommodation – being a "paying guest" with a family in their home – is something of a British tradition, and one which we are planning to continue at ICML. A number of librarians who live in the London area have indicated their willingness to take ICML delegates into their homes, either at low cost or in some cases without charge.

This is clearly something that needs a careful definition or responsibilities and their careful elucidation to both host and guest, and we will be setting up a small group of volunteers to be in charge of these arrangements.

News Item 5 (March 5, 1999)

Contract Signed for River Cruise

The main social event of the congress will be a river cruise through the centre of London on the evening of Tuesday, July 4^th. Agreement has been reached for the congress to hire three of the best and most luxurious boats currently operating on the Thames. On behalf of the Library Association, Janet Liebster has signed contracts for Silver Sturgeon and Silver Barracuda (operated by Woods Boats) , and an option has also been signed for Symphony (flagship of the Bateaux London fleet).  Click here to view full-sized photos.

The evening will begin at Westminster and Savoy piers, which are within easy walking distance of the congress centre. The boats will cruise between Chelsea in the west and the spectacular Millennium Dome in the east – taking in (among many other sites) Big Ben, London’s historic City district, and Tower, and two the Wren masterpieces of St Paul’s cathedral and Greenwich Palace.

As this historic panorama flows past the windows, food and drink will flow across the tables, before delegates are returned to their departure point in time for a nightcap.

The small print:

The cost of this evening is included in the conference registration fee. The delegate pack will include a ticket valid for one particular boat. These will be allocated on a first-come, first-served basis. If the number of delegates exceeds the places available on the boats then we will make every effort to reserve additional boats of similar standard. However, we can make no absolute guarantee that everyone will get afloat on July 4^th; if this does prove impossible to achieve then an alternative event of equivalent standard will be arranged for late registrants. Vegetarian and other special dietary requirements will be accommodated and should be specified at the time of booking.

News Items 4 (February 26, 1999)

Proceedings Editor Named

Robert Kiley will edit the 8ICML Proceedings, which will be published only in electronic format and on the web. Robert is head of the Information Service at the Wellcome Trust and has an illustrious record in information and IT at the Wellcome and before that with the National Health Service. He is an experienced webmaster, and feels that every ounce of his computing expertise will be needed to consolidate contributions from all over the world and produce a coherent publication which will be worthy of the congress. Robert has joined the main ICML committee and will be working closely with Arne Jakobsson and the programme team.

News Item 3 (February 19, 1999)

Accompanying Persons Programme

A programme for the partners of those attending 8ICML is being planned by our social committee. The programme will include a ticket for the main social event of the congress - dinner and music on a flotilla of luxurious boats as they sail through the heart of London from Chelsea down to the Millennium Dome in Greenwich.

There will also be other optional activities while the congress is in session. It is expected that an accompanying person’s registration will be priced at around £100.

Feedback Please: If you or your partner are interested in participating in the accompanying person’s programme then why not take this opportunity to tell us your views and preferences? If you would like to see particular sites, if there are particular types of activity you would like to see included in the programme please tell Linda Lisgarten, chair of the ICML social committee at lindal@ulsop.ac.uk

News Item 2 (February 12, 1999)

Independent Group to Administer Scholarships

ICML has a scholarship fund to provide financial support for professional colleagues unable to find sufficient funding to attend the congress. Because the funds available will fall far short of the needs which they address, it is important that this fund is administered objectively and distributed according to criteria which everyone understands. To this end, we have set up an independent Scholarship Committee which will make its decisions in complete independence from the programme and organising committees.

It will be chaired by Dr Lenny Rhine of the University of Florida, who has a deep knowledge and understanding of the international aspects of health librarianship. To serve with him on the committee Lenny is drawing together a group of equally independent-minded people from all parts of the world.

A set of criteria on which decisions on individual scholarships will be based is being drafted and will be published on the ICML web site, and elsewhere.

Applications for ICML scholarships will be welcome from anywhere, and a standard form is being prepared which will appear on this site and make the process as straightforward as possible.

News Item 1 (February 5, 1999)

Proceedings Settled

For the first time, the proceedings of the 8^th ICML will not be published on paper. With the theme of the congress so firmly based on the impact of the internet on scholarly publishing, it was time to seize the opportunity to move whole-heartedly into web publishing.

All the papers will be published in full within the ICML web site. With none of the cost constraints of a paper publication, the proceedings will be able to include the full version of all papers presented in London, including any graphs, tables and illustrations supplied by the author.

The proceedings will be free of charge and available on an unrestricted basis.