Tietolinja News - The Electronic Newsletter of the Library Network Services, Helsinki University Library - wishes all new readers welcome to its pages. The mission of Tietolinja News is to serve as an information channel to the research library world in Finland.

The Library Network Services (LNS) is the part of Helsinki University Library, the National Library of Finland. LNS is responsible for the national co-ordination of the academic library network, the maintenance of the legal deposit services, the production of the national bibliographies, compiling the union catalogues and carrying out development activity in the fields of library information technology and new electronic services. LNS seeks to provide up-to-date information annually to its international colleagues concerning these activities and services.

Libraries in Finland are an integral part of the information society. Gateways to global information is a phrase which successfully characterises the libraries in Finland, where half of the population are active library users and borrow one book every week around the year. Ms Mirja Ryynänen, a Finnish member of the European Parliament, has taken the initiative of a common library policy paper in European Union. Her ideas are presented in an article elsewhere in this issue.

The Finnish National Library is responding to the challenges of the information society with a range of broad national and international development projects. Some of these activities, such as the selection of a new library information system for all the academic libraries and the purchase of electronic journals and databases for use of the academic community by country licenses, are also discussed in this issue. The amendment of the Act of Legal Deposit is a timely topic. A working group headed by the Ministry of Education has completed the preparation work for the new law, and the results are discussed in three different articles.

The trend of development activities is very similar in many countries all over the world. Our case is not unique. For this reason it is very important for members of the library community to share experiences with each other.

Tilke, the home page of Finnish research libraries is a recently developed service, which extends the services of Tietolinja and invites you all to an excursion in the world of Finnish research libraries. Welcome.

Inkeri Salonharju
Director, Library Network Services, Helsinki University Library