Casting the Net: Towards a Model for Collaboration and Communication on the Electronic Network; A Symposium to be held in Washington, DC.

在人文和科学领域，电子网络越来越多地用于访问、传播和处理研究数据，以及与研究相关的同事进行交流。迫在眉睫的国家研究和教育网络（NREN）的发展极大地加速了这一进程，但也带来了发展沟通、协作和关键控制结构的需求，这在很大程度上是前所未有的。需要解决的基本问题是什么是可行的，什么是可取的。如何处理网络管理问题，以确保学术自主权的维护，我们也缺乏共识。有鉴于此，正在召集网络发展、数据库设计、电子信息管理和网络用户研究方面的25名专家，审议如何最大限度地利用发展网络作为研究和教育媒介所隐含的机会。需要快速实验原型，在本次研讨会/研讨会上，电子研究和学习环境的实质性概念将作为一个假设提出，供参与者系统地进行批评，以便对使这种原型在智力上健全、在技术上和财政上可行所需的条件建立具体的理解。​本次研讨会的结果将报告给国家人文基金会和国家科学基金会的决策者。

In the humanities and sciences alike, electronic networks are increasingly used to access, disseminate, and work with research data and to communicate with colleagues in connection with this research. The imminent development of the National Research and Education Network (NREN) is greatly accelerating this process, but also brings with it the need to develop structures of communication, collaboration, and critical control which are largely unprecedented. Basic questions about what is feasible and what is desirable need to be addressed. We also have little shared understanding of how to handle the problem of network management so as to insure the preservation of academic autonomy. In view of this, twenty-five experts in network development, database design, electronic information management, and network user research are being convened to consider how to turn to maximum advantage the opportunities implicit in the development of NREN as a medium for research and education. Rapid experimental prototyping is needed, and at this symposium/workshop, a substantive conception of an electronic research and learning environment will be presented as a hypothesis to be critiqued systematically by the participants in the interest of establishing a concrete understanding of what is required to make such a prototype intellectually sound and technologically and fiscally feasible. The results of this symposium will be reported to decision makers in the National Endowment for the Humanities and the National Science Foundation.