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THREE new appointments are announced to the Polytechnic of North London School of Librarianship. T J Beck, who was a student at the school in 1969/70 and is currently a branch librarian at Tower Hamlets, moves to the school as a temporary lecturer. Dr Edward Kaplan joins the school to teach subject bibliography and the history of libraries; and Alexandra Presanis is leaving UCL, where she has been working with B C Brookes evaluating the COMPENDEX service, to take up a post at the school in September.

With the thirteenth issue affected by the recent postal strike, now seems an opportune moment to take a look at the performance of LISA in its first two years. This bi‐monthly abstracts service succeeded the former Library Science Abstracts in 1969 as a joint venture between the Library Association and Aslib. An account of its birth and a brief report on early progress both appeared in 1969.

In 1966, the Government's Office for Scientific and Technical Information offered to increase its support for Aslib specifically to encourage it to build up a viable research department, to undertake systematic programmes of research into scientific and technical information systems, and to provide consultancy services in this field. In response to an appeal from Lord Kings Norton, then President of Aslib, some twenty member organizations agreed to share with OSTI the cost of this new development during its first three years. The three‐year development period ended in December 1969, and an account of the progress made during this period was published in Aslib Proceedings for May 1970.

Aslib has had a Research and Development Department since 1959. It has received powerful financial support from the Office for Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI) and from industry, because it is recognized that a continuing department, accumulating experience, and working in close contact with operational services, is the most favourable environment for the advance of information science. Aslib's subscription income now contributes substantially to the support of the department. With the right pressure and the right encouragement from the Aslib membership, the department will continue to justify the support it receives.