Re: coyle/hillman article from dlib [mods]

Karen wrote in a recent post:
"...What is problematic about the library cataloguing viewpoint is that
it is based on some principles that do not seem to be derived from any
study of user behaviour -- there's absolutely no feedback loop from the
user to the library cataloguing rules. So we have this gap between the
"very good" metadata that libraries have and the fact that users are
flocking to non-library systems. There isn't much glory in being right
if no one comes to use our systems."
Amen. I recently asked two friends doing research at the highest level
in two entirely different fields in two entirely different UK
universities if I could pick their brains unofficially about how they
use the library. Both responses could be summarised as "the library
manages our access to e-journals, but otherwise it's irrelevant. It will
be dead in a few years if it doesn't change". One advised a career
change (advice I intend to ignore).
It seems to me that at the highest level, libraries have the potential
to help users in two ways
* Finding specific leaves in a burgeoning information forest
* Sorting the wheat from the chaff (dodgy information from solid stuff)
Libraries are almost the only entities capable of doing this in neutral
way, uncomplicated by shareholders or voters.
AACR2, MARC and the rest are only useful to the extent that we can
employ them to achieve goals at this kind of level in an efficient and
effective way.
John Hardy
Senior Analyst, Talis Information Ltd

-----Original Message-----
From: Next generation catalogs for libraries
[mailto:NGC4LIB_at_listserv.nd.edu] On Behalf Of Karen Coyle
Sent: 18 January 2007 01:41
To: NGC4LIB_at_listserv.nd.edu
Subject: Re: [NGC4LIB] coyle/hillman article from dlib [mods]

Alexander Johannesen wrote:
> If we are to deal with the
> world we need to talk to the rest of the world. Is Amazon's metadata
> less worth to us because it's not in MARC nor created with our special
> bibliographic rules? If you answer 'yes', well then that's our problem
> right there, and may well be the end of the library world as we know
> it.
>
Actually, catalogers (and I know I'm stereotyping here) don't really
care about the data format, so it's not the MARC-ness or non-MARC-ness
that matters to them. Catalogers care about how decisions are made when
creating metadata, and that the decisions be consistent across items and
between systems. This is not a bad thing, in itself. Unfortunately, they
also think that the library cataloging rules are the only suitable ones
for creating metadata. I'm sure that we can all find fault with Amazon
or Google in their metadata creation, and in that sense the catalogers
are right, some of their metadata is really sloppy. What is problematic
about the library cataloging viewpoint is that it is based on some
principles that do not seem to be derived from any study of user
behavior -- there's absolutely no feedback loop from the user to the
library cataloging rules. So we have this gap between the "very good"
metadata that libraries have and the fact that users are flocking to
non-library systems. There isn't much glory in being right if no one
comes to use our systems.

kc

--
-----------------------------------
Karen Coyle / Digital Library Consultant
kcoyle@kcoyle.net http://www.kcoyle.net
ph.: 510-540-7596
fx.: 510-848-3913
mo.: 510-435-8234
------------------------------------

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