(no subject)

[sebastienne]

Ok, promise this is the last spam for today.. I'm all over lj at the moment it seems. This post wouldn't even be here if it weren't for insomnia, which I never ever ever suffer from. Ever.

... so what am I doing here?

Good question.

See, it turns out that the two degrees I'm trying to choose between - Information Systems and Library and Information Studies - are identical but for two pairs of modules. And it turns out that those two pairs of modules are roughly 50% identical.

Here are the only sections of the module specifications to differ at all:

LIS, Libraries past, present, and future: National and government libraries; Education libraries (academic, schools); Public libraries, library in society, community information; Special libraries, Future prospects for libraries and librarians; digital transition; library as place.

vs

IS Information Science foundation: Domain analysis; Bibliometrics; laws; analysis of literatures; Information analysis; competitive intelligence; Special libraries and information units; Information Science as a discipline and profession.

of this pair, I prefer LIS.

LIS Digital Libraries: Digital Library definitions, characteristics, features, issues; Digital Library design; collection management, digitisation, preservation; access and interfaces, inter-operability; services, trends, and developments.

IS Information Retrieval: Implementation of information retriecal systems. Distributed information retrieval. Models of information retrieval interacion. Non-text information retrieval. Current developments in information retrieval research.

of this pair, I prefer IS.

The degrees are practically identical so it really doesn't matter (matter matter matter matter) but I still can't decide. of course.

Oh, I'm just so contrary, me. Well, at least I have LJ and pitta bread. That's almost as good as sleep.

Comments

[shimgray.livejournal.com]

I'd advise taking whichever one means the end degree is called LIS!

I think you probably have the right selection of the modules, but hey. It boils down to whichever way you go, you take one suboptimal one...

[slasheuse.livejournal.com]

LIS. First off, LIS in the first lot is way way more interesting, and in the second lot, Digitial Libraries sounds v useful.

[liminereid.livejournal.com]

'''LIS

[neoanjou.livejournal.com]

This may be just me, but the IS stuff sounds more theoretical, whereas the LIS stuff sounds a little more practical, although I must admit that with a lot of what is written it could go either way. So I suppose in part it depends upon what you want to do with your degree later - i.e. whether you want to specialise in the front-of-house (more LIS I would guess) or back-end (more IS I'd assume) aspects of a library. However as with most of these things I doubt it will restrict you too much no matter which you choose.

[(Anonymous)]

Toss a coin. Declare the decision is made.

If a couple of hours later you don't find you're actually calm and decided, switch.

Works for me. Sometimes.

[deepbluemermaid.livejournal.com]

I'd go for LIS, simply to have 'library' in the degree title :)

[jacinthsong.livejournal.com]

I quite obviously do not know enough to have an informed opinion, but both the LIS modules sound the more interesting to me - digital libraries sound like a very Good Thing to study, unless that material's covered elsewhere in the course I suppose.