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Acquisition is an essential element in Universal Availability of Publications. An extensive literature review and a questionnaire survey revealed that few countries have a national acquisition policy but that there are numerous examples of informal arrangements involving substantial numbers of libraries. Factors influencing the existence and nature of a national acquisition system include the level of national commitment to libraries, attitudes of libraries to co‐operation, and administrative responsibility for libraries. National plans must be geared to national needs and circumstances; systems may be centralized or decentralized (by subject or other features), and may be centrally planned or based on voluntary co‐operation. The National Library may have a critical role to play. Five possible models are: a centralized unit of first resort; a decentralized region‐based system; centralized national subject libraries; decentralized responsibilities; and a central collection of journals only. Each country can decide on the appropriate model for its situation and requirements.

The problems of One‐Man‐Bands (OMBs) began to be taken seriously in the early 1980s when the Aslib OMB group was formed. The group received considerable attention in the professional press, and became the object of a study by Judith Collins and Janet Shuter who identified them as “information professionals working in isolation”. Many of the problems identified in the Collins/Shuter study remain — not least of these being the further education and training needs of OMBs. These needs are studied in this report. The author has firstly done an extensive survey of the literature to find what has been written about this branch of the profession. Then by means of a questionnaire sent to the Aslib OMB group and the National Council for Voluntary Organisations (INVOG), training and education needs have been pinpointed. Some of these needs have then been explored in greater detail by means of case studies. The author found that the most common deterrents to continuing education and training were time, cost, location, finding suitable courses to cover the large variety of skills needed and lastly, lack of encouragement from employers. The author has concluded by recommending areas where further research is needed, and suggesting some solutions to the problems discussed.

In assessing the results of Judith Collins's questionnaire it should perhaps be noted that less than 50 per cent of respondents claimed to spend all or most of their time ‘dealing with economic or business or commercial information’. One can only speculate whether a higher proportion of full‐time business librarians would have revealed a greater degree of satisfaction due to a deeper knowledge of sources, or of dissatisfaction through a higher level of expectation.

On the 19th January twenty‐eight Aslib members arrived at Belgrave Square to participate in an evening meeting called Communication Games: A Workshop, which was led by the authors. The presentation of the meeting in a workshop format was a new departure for Aslib, and initially gave rise to some hesitancy in the group. As the evening progressed and as the games were played, this hesitancy evaporated and the group came together in the sharing and learning which was the point of the meeting.

After a discussion of what we mean by ‘person‐dependence’ and how we have come to recognize it, we present some examples of this phenomenon, based on observations we have made during the course of our work as consultants and thus taken from real life, but let us assure our past and present clients that the names have been changed to protect the guilty! The case histories are presented in a fairly light‐hearted way, but when we encounter a case of person‐dependence in a client organization we certainly do not treat it lightly. After the examples we draw some tentative conclusions about the factors within organizations which can lead to person‐dependence.

The author presents the results of a dipstick questionnaire survey of the Aslib UK members which was designed to establish in which areas of business information provision, users perceived difficulties. Consideration is then given to the differentiation between difficulties on the part of the information seeker and difficulties inherent in the information being sought. It is suggested that the information seeker can be prone to three problems, (1) isolation, (2) the need to respond quickly and (3) lack of training.

Information is the fourth factor of production. Information enables us to manipulate labour, land and capital to achieve the goals of the enterprise. As industry becomes increasingly information‐intensive so the need for the effective and efficient management of information becomes of growing importance. The manager's job thus increasingly becomes an information‐handling and information‐processing job; like the management of time and money, the management of information is essential to success.

Provides a comparison of the press coverage of the introduction of IVF in different contexts, giving a vantage point for examining the variability and the context‐dependence of the issue. Sheds some light on the cultural‐political‐social problems that the new technology entails. Contrasts the differences between Canada and Israel, showing that both countries endorse modern technology in the field of medidine: in both countries, IVF was imported about the same time and both used the US and Britain as a frame of reference and model rather than local developments. Shows the cultural differences of how each culture embraced the new technology.

Whether they can legitimately be described as virtuosi or one man (sic) bands, information professionals working in isolation have become something of a cause célèbre recently. This study looks first at their contribution to the collection, analysis, synthesis and dissemination of information in a single field — that of employment studies. Then, using the test of relative job satisfaction as a function of effectiveness, the characteristics, problems and satisfactions of the workers themselves are examined. The present work is based on two reports of a survey undertaken on behalf of the British Library Research and Development Department in 1983.