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The Library of Congress and OCLC have signed a cooperative agreement to develop a prototype for a new reference service based on the Collaborative Digital Reference Service (CDRS) pilot, begun in early 2000 by the Library of Congress and 16 participating libraries. Now in its third phase, the pilot project has expanded to include more than 60 libraries and other institutions internationally.
The goal of MRS is to provide professional reference service to researchers any time anywhere, through an international, digital network of libraries and related institutions. The 24/7 service will deliver the direct benefits of quality reference service to a broad spectrum of users: a reliable and authoritative knowledge navigation service, a large searchable archive of authoritative answers, and increased visibility and support for libraries everywhere. The service will use new technologies to provide the best answers in the best context by using Internet resources, as well as other resources that are held...