ABSTRACT
The perspective is that of the commercial publishing and information field—the so-called real world, although some of the things that happen in the commercial world seem pretty unreal at times. Attention focused on machinery and technology has shifted to a new focus on people, the users of information and the professional intermediaries—gatekeepers, middlemen, and the like—who are charged with getting information to users. Descriptions of the skills and abilities a gatekeeper or information professional should have bring to mind that in the commercial world all of these skills are to be found in two types of existing professionals—editors and librarians. The discipline of information management will be corporate wide and range from top to bottom in the organization, with new kinds of "information managers" who have yet to be identified taking their places along with—and often over—existing information departments. People in the commercial information industry are very much concerned with the developments, and they are working on appropriate responses.
