World libraries: Professional social network for libraries of Australia

“Libraries Australia” is a resource sharing service hosted by the National Library of Australia for Australian libraries and their users. It is used for reference, collection development, cataloguing and interlibrary lending. The heart of “Libraries Australia” is the Australian National Bibliographic Database (ANBD), which records the location details of over 42 million items held in most Australian academic, research, national, state, public and special libraries.

The “Libraries Australia” service replaces earlier systems and the Australian Bibliographic Network (ABN) – which was created in 1981 to foster resource sharing by Australian libraries.

The “Libraries Australia” has mounted its own Social network on the Ning platform. The authors hope that the project will attract interest in the public, first and foremost, among the librarians, who will be able to consolidate the library community, ask questions, make a comment about “Libraries Australia” or simply connect with colleagues facing current issues. While “Libraries Australia” will view the content in order to respond to questions, they will not moderate the discussion unless the guidelines for use are breached. "