> Ted Gemberling writes:
>
> "copy cataloging is often harder than original cataloging. Especially if
> the original cataloger did a "minimal-level"
> record."
>
> I agree. But once you update that minimal level record, I and 654 other
> copy catalogers should not have to do so in our own systems as well
> (assuming by way of example that 656 libraries with their own ILS
> acquire the book). That's my point. There is the space for changing the
> paradigms we operate under without discarding the intellectual effort
> that catalogers produce.
>
> Allen Mullen
Not only that, but leveraging the intellectual output of the cataloging
community as a "hive mind" is not even a new concept; it's a lost practice.
The only reason we had local cards in the olden days is because we needed
the physical items on hand. The concept was about centralization. It wasn't
perfect and it had a lot of hiccups, but it was on the right track.
Unfortunately, there was no way to flip a switch and have us all go online
at once in a grand national online catalog, so in the transition from cards
to online systems, we lost that collective-ness, and we began to justify
local practice as if it were based on sound theory and not the accident of
how we moved from paper to online systems.
How we do things not only makes no sense, but it makes it that much harder
to have a kind of centralized intelligence for cataloging.
The hard part is letting go... which is also about turf, egos, and force of
habit.
K.G. Schneider
kgs_at_bluehighways.com
http://freerangelibrarian.com
Received on Wed May 16 2007 - 15:28:57 EDT