Searching the web for federal government information is exciting and easy. However, there are some major unresolved issues to keep in mind as agencies switch many of their traditional print publications to an electronic format. Some issues to consider are:

• There is a major archival question now that publications are no longer being published in print, but are available only electronically. Who will archive electronic materials? If an agency issues a policy statement on its web page today, and changes policy and rewrites the statement tomorrow, where is the first statement?
• Viewing documents on the Web often requires downloading specialized software, such as PDF (portable document format) or TIFF files. Who will be available to help the user understand what these terms mean and what is required?
• Much information found on the Web is inaccurate or undocumented. How will the searcher be able to distinguish the difference in information coming from an original source, such as a federal agency, with information put up by anyone with a little html knowledge?
• The shift of government information from a paper to a more electronic environment impacts virtually every aspect of a Federal Depository Library including:
• Public service - how do you provide public service in an electronic environment?
• Collection development - how do you keep track of publications coming from agencies solely in electronic format?
• Space planning - how are the current physical spaces that are used for documents going to be used in the future if everything is electronic? What will a reference collection look like if everything is electronic?
• Bibliographic access - how are libraries going to provide access to electronic information? Are libraries going to create records for their OPACs? If so, what standards are going to be used? Are libraries going to create WWW pages instead for access?