Alastair Gibson Smith (1948 – 20 November 2019) was a New Zealand academic in the field of

library and information science Library and information science(s) or studies (LIS) is an interdisciplinary field of study that deals generally with organization, access, collection, and protection/regulation of information, whether in physical (e.g. art, legal proceedings, e ...

. He retired in 2014 after spending most of his career at

Victoria University of Wellington Victoria University of Wellington ( mi, Te Herenga Waka) is a university in Wellington, New Zealand. It was established in 1897 by Act of Parliament, and was a constituent college of the University of New Zealand. The university is well know ...

Biography

Smith obtained a BSc in physics from the

University of Auckland , mottoeng = By natural ability and hard work , established = 1883; years ago , endowment = NZD $293 million (31 December 2021) , budget = NZD $1.281 billion (31 December 2021) , chancellor = Cecilia Tarrant , vice_chancellor = Dawn F ...

, a

Diploma in Teaching The Diploma of Education, often abbreviated to DipEd or GradDipEd, is a postgraduate qualification offered in many Commonwealth countries including Australia, Sri Lanka, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom. Overview The diploma can build on the g ...

from

Christchurch Teachers' College The University of Canterbury ( mi, Te Whare Wānanga o Waitaha; postnominal abbreviation ''Cantuar.'' or ''Cant.'' for ''Cantuariensis'', the Latin name for Canterbury) is a public research university based in Christchurch, New Zealand. It was f ...

, a diploma from the New Zealand Library School and an MA from

. He worked at the

National Library of New Zealand The National Library of New Zealand ( mi, Te Puna Mātauranga o Aotearoa) is New Zealand's legal deposit library charged with the obligation to "enrich the cultural and economic life of New Zealand and its interchanges with other nations" (''Nat ...

, BRANZ and

, where he rose to Senior Lecturer. He was appointed the inaugural general secretary of the Bicycle Association of New Zealand in 1979. He was diagnosed with

multiple myeloma Multiple myeloma (MM), also known as plasma cell myeloma and simply myeloma, is a cancer of plasma cells, a type of white blood cell that normally produces antibodies. Often, no symptoms are noticed initially. As it progresses, bone pain, an ...

, a type of cancer, in 2001. Smith died in

Wellington Hospital Wellington Hospital might refer to: * Wellington Hospital, New Zealand, a hospital in Wellington, New Zealand * Wellington Hospital, London The Wellington Hospital in St John's Wood, London is the largest private hospital in the United Kingdom, an ...

on 20 November 2019.

Publications

Academic

Smith served on the editorial boards of Cybermetrics, the Journal of Web Librarianship, and Information Science Research and authored the following significant publications (greater than 100 citations according to

Google Scholar Google Scholar is a freely accessible web search engine that indexes the full text or metadata of scholarly literature across an array of publishing formats and disciplines. Released in beta in November 2004, the Google Scholar index includes p ...

): * Smith, Alastair G. (1997) Testing the Surf: Criteria for Evaluating Internet Information Resources.

The Public-Access Computer Systems Review ''The Public-Access Computer Systems Review'' (''PACS Review'') was an open access journal about end-user computer systems in libraries. Established in 1989, the journal ceased operation in 2000. During its nine years of publication, ''PACS Revi ...

8, no. 3 http://info.lib.uh.edu/pr/v8/n3/smit8n3.html * Smith, Alastair G. (1999) A tale of two web spaces: comparing sites using web impact factors.

Journal of Documentation The ''Journal of Documentation'' is a double-blind peer-reviewed academic journal covering theories, concepts, models, frameworks, and philosophies in information science. The journal publishes scholarly articles, research reports, and critical rev ...

55 (5):577-592 * Smith, Alastair G. (2001). Applying evaluation criteria to New Zealand government websites. International Journal of Information Management 21(2): 137–149. * Smith, Alastair; Thelwall, Mike (2002) Web Impact Factors for Australasian Universities.

Scientometrics Scientometrics is the field of study which concerns itself with measuring and analysing scholarly literature. Scientometrics is a sub-field of informetrics. Major research issues include the measurement of the impact of research papers and academi ...

54(1/2): 363–380. * Elgort, I., Smith, A. G., & Toland, J. (2008). Is wiki an effective platform for group course work?

Australasian Journal of Educational Technology The ''Australasian Journal of Educational Technology'' is a peer-reviewed academic journal covering research in educational technology, instructional design, online and e-learning, educational design, multimedia, computer assisted learning, and r ...

, 24(2), 195–210. https://web.archive.org/web/20140416051146/http://www.ascilite.org.au/ajet/ajet24/ajet24.html

Non-academic

* ''Everyday Cycling in New Zealand''

Awa Press Penguin Group is a British trade book publisher and part of Penguin Random House, which is owned by the German media conglomerate Bertelsmann. The new company was created by a merger that was finalised on 1 July 2013, with Bertelsmann initiall ...

2012.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Smith, Alastair 1948 births 2019 deaths University of Auckland alumni University of Canterbury alumni Victoria University of Wellington alumni Academic staff of Victoria University of Wellington Information scientists Deaths from multiple myeloma Deaths from cancer in New Zealand