THE UNIVERSE OF INFORMATION.pdf - ideals

correspondence. The decisions of the London Conference in
1929 about translations were still in force, but for the first
time, it seemed to Alingh Prins that the question of significant
profit from the sale of translations looked as if it might
now arise. He proposed, therefore, that «50°/o of future profits
should be transmitted to the IID which would put them at the
disposition of the International Office of Bibliography in view
of the debts of this institution with respect to its old founders.
It is my opinion that the formal debts of the Office should be
considered as debts of honour for the IID». 85 Otlet and La Fontaine
would have none of this. «It is not, it has never been»,.
they said, «a question of compensation for MM. Otlet and La
Fontaine». It was a question of what they had created and
worked for.
What they have worked for and are working for can be defined a?
follows: Documentation constituted by a Universal Network formed by"
a World Center and of auxiliary national, local and special centers-
To link and symbolise the whole, a Universal Bibliographic Repertory
registers and classes all the product of human thought ... Any
mutilation of this work cannot win their approval for it would be a
contradiction of the very principles of its foundation.
Proceeding from this point of view, Otlet and La Fontaine then
asserted:
After the separation precipitated at Frankfurt last August between the-
Office and the Institute, it is, with all the collections, the International
Office of Bibliography to whom belongs the rights of publication and
it is with it that agreement will have to be made A) for the development,
and B) for the publication of the tables of the Decimal
Classification. 86
Immediately Alingh Prins received Otlet's letter claimingcopyright
for the OIB in the Decimal Classification, he protested
that:
The «Universal Decimal Classification* is published by the International
Institute of Bibliography whose Executive Committee
functions as a Publications Committee by virtue of a decision taken
at the Tenth Conference of our Institute. Being convinced of the
necessity for a German and an English translation of the Code, I have
the duty and the right to submit this request to the Executive
Committee ... I regret that I do not see either the duty or even the
right of addressing myself to the International Office of Bibliography.
Once more he explained that no separation had been provoked
at Frankfurt, and carefully reviewed the events that had led
to this misapprehension. Moreover, at Frankfurt Otlet and La
Fontaine had agreed to the budget prepared for the IID of
which the Committee for the Decimal Classification was part.
They therefore «recognised the right of control of the IID's
Council in the management of the CD. ...» In his opinion,
Alingh Prins said, nothing had really changed because of
the disagreement at Frankfurt. «In reality it is only a question
of an administrative matter, which needs to be understood
335.