VALUE OF INFORMATION SERVICES:

At the outset, it must be emphasised that there is no consensus of opinion among information scientists and professionals regarding the "concept of value of information". Neither is there any agreement on the extent to which information has a quantitative value. Also, it is necessary that we distinguish carefully between value and cost. It may be possible to determine the cost incurred in operating an information service, that is to say, its purchase price, staff time, hardware and software costs, etc., but this does not reflect the true value to the users. A great deal of effort has been made in on attempt to produce some realistic way of assessing the value of information services. The fact remains that information cannot, in general, be evaluated in the same way as other resources. Therefore, the value of information, unlike that of more tangible resources, is simply not quantifiable. It must be mentioned that information has no intrinsic value. Its value depends upon its context and its use by particular users on particular occasion, and the,value of information to its users is not possible to determine in advance. We should remember in particular that it is usually only meaningful to speak of a piece of information having value to a specific user in a specific context. Estimates of value differ according to the time, place, and personality of the person (or culture of the group) making the estimate as well as the intrinsic properties of the phenomenon being judged. It must be stated that all judgements of value must be based on the subjective deliberations of a person or group., The degree to which judgements may be, considered objective is bound with measurement and units of measurement.