The Enterprise and Economic Development Glossary
a resource of the .network library |
information broker:
... an intermediary in a sale or transaction who receives
a fee for providing information; a data broker, a
gatherer of information which is passed on to a buyer without consultation.
According the Answers.com information
Brokers ... provide, for a
fee, information retrieval from publicly accessible data sources, most
often
online databases (source).
An organization
that maintains
information, the cost of which is included in a membership fee, is
classified as a information or data broker by the definitions
here. This is especially true of membership organizations that sell access
to their archives to non-member outsiders.
Data and Information brokers provide a worthwhile
services
for
those
who prefer
to pay to have someone handle the gathering process. The use of information
gatherers can be cost effective in
specialized areas, such as enterprise
and economic development, where they have
networks in
place. Data
and information brokers may serve
as guides for getting in touch with contacts ... but
stop short of being consultants. Information brokers offering
data gathering and regionalizing services
generally cost less than those of consultants.
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