Notes

Abstract

M. PAUL OTLET, who is director of the International Institute of Bibliography at Brussels, has published a long and interesting memoir in the May–June number of the Bulletin de la Société d'Encouragement pour l'Industrie Nationale on the question of the establishment, in Paris, of a Central Information and Records Office for Industry. There are already in existence a certain number of enterprises of the kind, such as the Mois Scientifique et Indostiiel in France, the Engineering Index in England, and the Repertorium der technischen Wissenschaften in Germany, but their scope is limited. According to M. Otlet, the scheme should assume an international character, and its functions should be the collection, classification, and dissemination of all information available, both French and foreign, which will tend to facilitate and develop industry. A mere catalogue of works on particular subjects is not alone sufficient; a bibliography should be included in the scheme, so as to afford more detailed information on any desired subject. Books of all kinds, pamphlets, catalogues, descriptions of processes, journals, standard reference books of all countries, plans of machinery and plant, where available, a complete set of patent specifications, prospectuses of educational establishments, etcall would be collected and classified in accordance with a plan definitely laid down beforehand. Extensive card oi similar indexes would be compiled for reference, and a complete catalogue on the decimal system, together with a bibliography, would be published at definite intervals. All these works would be available for free consultation by interested parties. Authors and publishers would be invited to co-operate in order to ensure the success of the enterprise. Existing publications, e.g. the International Catalogue pf Scientific Literature, would be used as the nucleus of the work. It is to what the authbr calls the science of documentation that the Germans owe to a great extent the place they have attained in the industrial and military world, although they have often employed unscrupulous means to reach their end. He suggests that every industrial concern should have its own information and records department, which should be planned on the same lines as the national establish. ment, with which it should keep in touch. In connection with the question of patents, it was suggested at the Conference of Allies held at Paris last year that an international patent office be formed after the war, to save the time and expense now required for taking out patents in various countries. An undertaking of this nature would greatly increase the necessity for a more elaboratepractically an internationalRecord and Information Office to enable all questions of priority and infringement to be dealt with efficiently. Every phase of an important subject is reviewed in this memoir of thirty pages.