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ScholarPermalink Reply by Siddhartha Shankar Ray on March 13, 2014 at 19:24

Dear  Shaji John,

As I personally feel, when one is taking a particular project, he/she is intrigued with the issue.

As a result, the person concerned, views the issue (in idea plain) from various points of views and certain questions naturally strikes him/her.

In your case, I am absolutely confident, that the issue you have proposed must have put forward several questions in your mind.

First ask yourself, what you are going to study and what questions  you do have in your mind regarding the issue. Say for instance, what do you mean about digital repositories and what one library includes (or should include) in their digital repositories. And never-the-lesss, how relevant the materials will be for people at large. For example, in our institute, we have digitized all our working papers which are what one calls gray materials They are not copyrighted and we often receive requests for such materials from researchers from Calcutta, West Bengal, India and the world. Several of them are in mimeographed form and the papers have become brittle and the colour of the papers have become quite dull & yellowish . Most importantly, stock of the Working papers have already exhausted and we have the copies in the Library only.  We then digitized them and launched them through IDS, UK. What I meant to say, is the feasibility of digitizing the materials. The materials I am discussing are not formal publications & thus are not available through formal Channels like published books, journals etc. but since they are in demand, we  digitized the and launched in the web.

In Scientific Research Institutes, such working papers are virtually nonexistent but in many Research Institutes especially those engaged in Medical Research, many modules, booklets etc. are prepared to impart trainings and for public awareness for Epidemiological Research. those materials are well in demand and can be included in digital repositories.

I hope I could explain the issue from the "utility" perspective as a curtain raiser!!   Now It all depends upon you, how you view the issue and what do you expect. Because they only matter, how will you devise your questionnaire.

Wish you good luck in your venture.

Siddhartha S. Ray, Calcutta

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