Growth Rate Is 35% : Data Bases: A Wealth of Information

A caller to the Chicago radio program “Sex Talk” was curious about the safe use of a sexual stimulant known as Spanish fly. Dr. Malcolm Schwartz, the show’s resident physician, who knew nothing of the faddish “wonder drug,” turned immediately to his personal computer and a telephone.

Seconds later, information from a distant medical data base was on his computer screen and he was able to warn radio listeners in 38 states that the substance can cause hemorrhaging of the heart and other vital organs. It “clearly is life-threatening,” he told his audience.

Data bases, the computer-age descendants of information banks, can “absolutely save lives,” said Schwartz, of Park Ridge, Ill., who describes them as vital tools for improving the quality and speed of medical research by doctors.

Information Consumers

But they also have been discovered by increasing numbers of information consumers in government, law, business and private life--often with unusual results. For example:

- In a small, windowless office in Buenos Aires, a computer operator is compiling information about the desaparecidos-- the estimated 30,000 Argentines who disappeared during the repressive regimes of recent military juntas. The data base will be used to help trace the missing and to aid prosecution of those responsible.

- In Pittsburgh, where officials of H.J. Heinz Co. are making plans to grow crops in China, corporate librarian Nancy Wright constantly scans data bases for media and scientific reports on new agricultural developments in China.

- In Lexington, Ky., the city established a shelter for the homeless, but not before officials had consulted a national data base to see how other cities were dealing with the problems of their homeless.

- And in Stockton, a consumer-oriented data base offers advice on a variety of psychological problems, from how to stop smoking to how to deal with “computer addiction.” A trained psychologist also provides personal counseling--via computer, instead of the couch--for an extra $50 an hour.

‘Information Age’

Data bases--containing everything from lumber marketing analyses to the genealogy of thoroughbred horses, from instant stock quotes to movie reviews, from help-wanted ads in St. Louis to dating services in Virginia--are proliferating in the United States and around the world as demand for information soars.

“We’re in the Information Age,” Matthew Lesko, publisher of the Data Base Informer newsletter in Maryland, said. “Information is a valuable commodity. It’s the most important thing in our lives.”

In Britain, the government has designated a minister for information technology to promote information as a commodity of trade. A government study there estimated that Europe alone is a potential $800-million annual market for information. In the United States, an estimated $1.3 billion is spent annually on tapping computer data bases, according to the New York marketing and consulting firm of Cox, Lloyd Associates Ltd.

And computerized information banks are growing at the rate of about 35% a year--with most of the boom in the United States, where about 70% of all data bases are published.

600% Growth in Five Years

Cuadra Associates, a Santa Monica-based publisher of data-base directories, last fall reported a 600% growth in commercial data bases over the last five years. Today there are an estimated 2,500 commercial data bases available to almost anyone with a telephone and a relatively inexpensive computer.

With such equipment, a data-base subscriber can be connected, for example, to stock exchanges, news services and resource libraries. In seconds, it’s possible to get up-to-date comparisons of constantly changing air fares, check the daily flight schedules of all airlines and even find out about weather conditions along the route.

“Consumers are just discovering that this technology is at their fingertips,” said Randy Stratt, director of market development for Source Telecomputing Corp. of McLean, Va., a consumer-oriented data-base producer. “There is great demand for timely and dynamic information.”

While a number of data bases have been created for average users of home computers--including one, for example, that reviews New York restaurants--the bulk of computerized information banks are designed for businesses and professionals who are willing to spend an average of about $65 an hour for information.

Costs for access to computer data bases generally range from $7 to $300 an hour, plus a subscription fee. Of course, computer speed can keep the time required for a search relatively brief.

“Businesses are willing to spend whatever it takes to get the right information fast,” Kenneth R. Duzy, a data-base specialist for Cuadra Associates, said.

“The flow of business relies on information,” said Libby Trudell, marketing manager for Dialog Information Services in Palo Alto, a leading data-base producer. “It’s a staple of the marketplace. Some people depend on us like they depend on a utility.”

Duzy said the rapid growth in data bases results from the continuing drop in computer costs, rising computer literacy and the increasing numbers of individuals who use desk-top computers to find information directly rather than pass requests through librarians or consultants or spend long hours themselves in a library.

Schwartz credits the speed and scope of one medical data base for saving the life of a patient suffering from barium poisoning. Schwartz said a panel of doctors had studied the case and concluded that the patient was likely to die because there was no known treatment.

However, a data-base search discovered medical references to five similar cases in Finland that had been treated successfully with antibiotics.

“A library search that might take 10 days to two weeks can be done by computer in 6 to 12 minutes,” said Schwartz, who also consults a drug data base before dispensing prescription drugs to check on possible side effects for patients using more than one drug.

One notable area of increasing data-base use is in monitoring the stock markets. A number of data bases provide instant access to the New York securities exchanges, allowing investors to keep track of changes in stock prices and to buy and sell stock over their phone-connected personal computers from homes or offices.

Additionally, the growing use of personal computers has led to increasing numbers of smaller, informal data bases, sometimes called electronic bulletin boards--many of which are free.

“It’s like a sophisticated form of the CB radio craze,” Lesko, the newsletter publisher, said. “A guy having a roof problem in Pennsylvania can post an electronic request for help, and some guy in Georgia might have the solution. Why should a guy in Pennsylvania have to reinvent the wheel when he can find out how someone else already did it?

“That’s what’s so valuable about this technology,” he added. “It allows us to share information and experiences.”

Lesko noted that a group of veterinarians, for example, operates a free bulletin-board data base that allows them to exchange treatment and diagnostic information. Electronic bulletin boards also include such features as comedy-by-wire, humorous anecdotes about computers; feature articles by previously unpublished writers, and a sort of electronic soapbox for subscribers to share opinions on current events.

Also growing are the numbers of data bases compiled for special projects--such as the human-rights activities in Argentina--that so far are not directly available over a telephone connection between computers.

In Kenya, for example, a University of Chicago biologist has used a portable Osborne computer to record field observations of baboon behavior. The information, stored on small computer disks, is periodically mailed to the United States for storage and analysis. And in the isolated Sierra Juarez mountains of Mexico, a group of researchers is using a portable Kaypro computer to compile a data base of medicinal plants and herbs used by the local Zapotec and Mixtec people.

Marriage of Processes

The data-base business grew out of the marriage of computers and the traditional publishing industry when book and directory publishers found that enormous volumes of information already prepared for publication could be easily and cheaply stored in computers. More recent development of personal computers and telephone hookups made instant access to those computer libraries possible for individuals all over the globe.

At first, information available on commercial data bases was largely technical--engineering and financial analyses, bibliographic indexes and scientific abstracts, for example. Now computer users can plug into everything from reports on the latest legislation pending in Washington to religious counseling from “Computers for Christ.”

Universities are becoming publishers of data bases as well. In Indiana, a Purdue University computer provides information on agricultural commodities and research. And earlier this month the Scottish Development Agency announced in Glasgow that St. Andrews University--founded 573 years ago in medieval Scotland--will establish a high-technology data base featuring such subjects as engineering, electronics, biotechnology and medicine.

Wine-Guide Data Base

“There’s definitely a proliferation of electronic information,” said Tom Lehman, product manager for Control Data Corp., producer of a data base on urban and rural issues for local governments. “There’s a movement in the world at large toward more extensive use of these technologies.”

Clearly, not every data base has a market, however. Source Telecomputing, for example, dropped its wine-guide data base that had included recommendations for which wine to serve with what main dish.

“It didn’t work because it wasn’t dynamic--the information didn’t change,” explained Nancy Beckman, manager of public relations for the data-base publishing company. “White wine will always be good with fish. That won’t change over the centuries. But stock quotes and airline fares change every minute, and that’s what makes the information valuable for consumers.”

Because economic demand is essential to a successful data base, it is unlikely that some subjects will soon become grist for data bases.

“There are a lot of untapped areas for more data bases, but--like art history--they may not be economical,” Cuadra Associates’ Duzy said. “How many people would be willing to spend money for art history information? It’s like anything else. If there’s a market with people willing to spend money for information, then someone will have the information for them.”

Data-base growth, Duzy added, is proof that information is worth money.

Some companies are staking future profits on that assumption. Late last year, for example, Dun & Bradstreet announced that it will spend $35 million to set up a business information data base in London for commercial customers in Great Britain, Ireland, Belgium and the Netherlands.

However, despite rapid developments in the information field, data bases “will never replace libraries,” predicted Trudell of Dialog Information Services.

“People like to browse,” she said. “They don’t always want a machine to do that for them. We’re all social beasts.”