Introduction

Different issues of sustainability and the various factors related to the economic, social and environmental sustainability of information systems and services have been identified and discussed in this book. Sustainability issues relating to various recent developments in ICT, such as green IT and green information services, and several policy issues – such as the sustainable development policies of the United Nations, the open access policies of various research funding bodies, and legal and policy issues of some government- and institution-sponsored studies – have been addressed in the context of sustainability of information. Various models and frameworks for the study of sustainability of scholarly communications, information systems and services have also been considered.

However, appropriate research and manpower development activities are essential to develop and manage sustainable information systems and services – from the creation of recorded information to its distribution, management, access and use or re-use. This book has demonstrated that in order to achieve sustainability of information a variety of research and professional expertise and skills are required at different stages of the lifecycle of information systems and services. Some of these research directions have already been identified. This chapter looks at how these new trends in research can contribute to the sustainability of information, and at some new areas of research and development activities required to attain sustainability of information.

Open access and a paradigm shift in information management, education and research

Chapters 7 and 8 explored how implementation of open access policies can create virtually a global distributed digital library of scholarly research data and output of academic and research institutions. While continuous funding support and other resources like growing demands for ICT infrastructure currently stand in the way of the progress of open access research content and data (for details see Connell, 2011; Cryer and Collins, 2011; Cullen and Chawner, 2011; MacDonald, 2011; St Jean et al., 2011), the recently introduced open access policies of various funding agencies and institutions will bring a paradigm shift in information management, access and use, especially in the context of scholarly communication processes. The promises of cloud computing and green information systems, and further research in these areas, may provide solutions to some of the sustainability problems by reducing ICT infrastructure and energy consumption costs and thereby improving the economic and environmental sustainability of digital information systems and services (Chowdhury, 2012a, 2012b).