Remember the human: the first rule of netiquette, librarians and the Internet

In one of the written versions of netiquette, the first rule is “remember the human”. This is intended to encourage more tolerant and considerate behaviour amongst Internet users. It could also be taken as a reminder to librarians that they should not let the attractions of new technology cause them to forget the human dimension. A major aspect of the relationship between the librarian and the user is the confidentiality of transactions and the librarian’s commitment to preserving the user’s privacy. Results from Loughborough University’s Privacy in the Digital Library project suggest that users have very strong trust that their privacy is safe with librarians. However, the results also suggest that librarians are not well organised to protect user privacy against possible intrusions from commerce, government or other sources. Other evidence suggests computer system managers do not fully share the librarian’s concern for human values, and tend to place technical considerations first, so there is a need for libraries to develop policy that emphasises human values in the technological context. The principles behind sets of guidelines on policy development drafted for the Council of Europe, the Loughborough project, and Library Association Publishing, are outlined.