> Also interesting that this happens at the same time that OCLC announces
> tagging in WorldCat...but you can apparently only use tags within your
> own profile, so as not to "interfere"...
This is because we are too damn schizophrenic.
On one hand, we want tags added by novices to make everything findable
a la Flickr or whatever. On the other, we don't trust even
professional catalogers at other institutions not to screw up
metadata, so we insist that everything has to be futzed with locally.
This process isn't efficient enough to keep up with the flow, so we
solve the problem by batch loading massive amounts of metadata for
electronic records, purchased sets, govt docs, etc generated using a
variety of methods and relying heavily on trained monkeys to hunt down
individual records in WorldCat. We want everything on and off at the
same time.
There's a part of me that wants to believe that having systems and
methods in constant tension with themselves is somehow advantageous,
but I suspect I am kidding myself.
Thank God we don't design rockets. Too bad we're we're not genetic
engineers -- I'll bet we could come up with a pushmepullyou design
that would blow Dr. Dolittle's mind.
kyle
Received on Mon Sep 29 2008 - 11:22:09 EDT