I'm always flummoxed when it comes to the decision : is the information I'm
putting in just detail vs is it actually providing access.
It comes out when something "interesting" is wanting to be done with the
data and it turns out that details were skipped because they weren't seen as
important access points.
Anyone who tries to repurpose metadata sees the inconsistencies and can get
very frustrated when trying to pull out or pull together data differently
than, say, the established index of an ILS.
Case: Whining recently about old old MARC records that had very sketch
titles and often didn't include authors in 100 fields because the rules
didn't make you do it. It was good enough then. Now it isn't
Case: Georgraphic grouping of data but it turns out the fixed field for ctry
was skipped because the ILS at the time didn't do anything with it anyway.
Wasn't an access point - why look up those pesky three letters?
Case: Grouping publishers together with dates to approach for copy right
permissions; whoops, abbreviated publishers get us nowhere. The Association
in 260 $b ugh! Well, it isn't an "access point" why bother.
Case: Grouping personal names together - without relator codes - is the
person in the 700 an author of the work or some other "role"? A detail that
was not used because access was for the name not the role
Anyway, you all get my point. The problem I have is when is a detail
actually turn into an access point and when is "good enough" now turn out to
be useless down the road?
I think what I took away from the meeting at LC was that I need to give up
on the touch the record once and walk away. Instead, the record might be
touched and retouched over and over as more data becomes available. But
that sounds very expensive.
Yet still, I go back to my cubical and I do.... what? Go fast and hope that
what I've decided was good enough is actually okay and that later I won't be
cursing myself because I can't provide subset of my data by something that
seems so obvious to that future me?
Received on Wed Jul 11 2007 - 19:59:30 EDT