I recommend that we form some sort of large-scale committee. This group
would be composed of librarians and information workers across the
United States, perhaps extending to Canada and other English speaking
countries or even world-wide.
We could then appoint knowledgeable individuals to discuss problems that
arise with the classification and description of materials. This
smaller group -- answering to the larger body -- would propose solutions
and rulings and then recommend them to all member libraries. It would
be up to the member libraries to enforce compliance.
It would be best to codify these rulings into guidebooks, offering these
to librarians for regular reference. It would also be taught in library
schools, thereby ensuring compliance into the future. Of course, as
time progresses and more interpretations change, additional editions of
this guide will need to be published.
...Oh wait. We've already been doing this for the past 40 years or so.
AACR, DRM? ALA, CLA, IFLA? Does this sound familiar to anyone?
On 9/29/2006 10:06 AM, Elise Zappas wrote:
> You are so absolutely right about this. Human products are the results
> of human activity, which is, by nature, inconsistent. What to do?
>
> Elise
>
<snip>
Received on Tue Oct 03 2006 - 08:58:28 EDT