Mary,
An interesting aspect of LibraryThing are the ammount of user
contributed metadata. The LibraryThing community has FRBRized the
collection by grouping various editions of the same work. They have also
contributed tags to the metadata mix.
Another source of metadata comes from the links made by usage. Folks who
had this book often also have these books. That is machine generated, a
type of information our catalogs could make better use of.
Patron privacy is an important principle of our profession. But maybe
our patrons should be the ones to decide what they keep private. Lots of
folks are displaying their reading lists, a simple script copied from
LibraryThing, on their sites. I know I am.
http://catalogablog.blogpsot.com
Another thing LibraryThing can demonstrate is how to combine MARC with
other metadata formats. I'm guessing the LOC metadata they are getting
is MARC. But they also use Amazon and both exist in the same catalog.
Sincerely,
David Bigwood
bigwood_at_lpi.usra.edu
Lunar & Planetary Institute
http://www.lpi.usra.edu/library/whats_new.shtml
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 19 Jun 2006 11:02:30 -0700
From: Mary Grenci <mgrenci_at_UOREGON.EDU>
Subject: Re: More new thoughts
On Mon, 19 Jun 2006, K.G. Schneider wrote:
> Make the system friendlier, spend less money on hand-hewn metadata
> and more on books and services, etc. I have to wonder if a tool such
as
> LibraryThing wouldn't support such a library's needs better than any
> traditional ILS.
You do realize that LibraryThing is chock-full of "hand-hewn metadata?"
You think Library of Congress has stopped cataloging? What about the
other
large libraries with records that people use to generate their own
"library?" Yes, Amazon is a major source also, I realize that. I use a
lot of their data in my own LibraryThing library. The metadata in Amazon
doesn't just magically appear either, though, except in the case of data
about digital objects that is input by the creator at the time of object
creation. Anything in a physical form must have "hand-hewn" metadata
input
by a human, whether that human be employed by Amazon or some other
company.
FWIW, I certainly would agree that cataloging as it exists now is much
more complicated, labor-intensive and expensive that it needs to be. So
greatly simplify it yes, but don't pretend that there's no human source
behind the metadata in services like LibraryThing.
Mary
Received on Tue Jun 20 2006 - 10:29:49 EDT