MIBE (Association of the Hungarian Information Specialists)

Our Association was founded in 2001. Our aim is to introduce and develop the profession of information specialists and to create a Hungarian network of the profession. To achieve this goal our association is also involved in scientific activities and serves as an information point. We support the education of information brokers and provide a forum for qualified information brokers. Beside this we also organise programmes und represent the interests of information specialists.

The profession…

The roots of the activity of information brokers go back to the US of the 1960’s. It was at that time that a few private persons together with libraries realised that the mass spreading of computers and copying machines could be the begin of the information revolution. Through easier retrieval, copying and transport of documents the basis of a new activity, the profession of information specialists was created.

Due to this the profession is relatively new but not without any antecedents. It is hard to mark the exact borders of this profession. There are a number of related professions, like librarian, or adviser. Those are, however, not called information specialists.

Information brokers represent the wide society, there are librarians, intellectuals, lawyers, physicians, economists, engineers among them. This makes it possible for them to specialize. Most of them have a university degree, speak foreign languages, and have very good computer, Internet, marketing and data base knowledge.

The position of the profession…

Information brokers are “knowledge workers” just like teachers, advisers, journalists, priests, librarians or industrial spies. The difference between them and information specialists is, however, that information specialists draw up a customized information or knowledge package for their consigner. They use legal instruments for this and they charge a fee for their work.

Activities of the information specialists

Because of the large number of sources and types of information information brokers specialize in company information, knowledge management, observation of competitors, data search, searching in databases, infometrics, webmetrics, trend observation, document services, etc. or a combination of these activities. Specialisation from a technical point of view is also possible. Some are good at data acquisition on the phone, others at searching in databases, or at sales – providing ample possibilities for cooperation.