Rinne, Nathan (ESC) wrote:
> Am I wrong to guess that the *one thing* Google can't replicate is the
> mass of MARC records devoted to all those old books?...
>
Are you assuming this would be a _bad_ thing if Google "replicated" it
-- or simply used our collective records instead of trying to replicate
it? I still don't understand why this is a bad thing. The more the
merrier.
> Karen, I don't like the OCLC secrecy, hardball, and downright
> "we're-not-a-business-but-we-act-like-one" stuff either, but maybe, in
> regards to the cessation of OCLC's existence (if Google gets its hands
> on all the MARC records) some people just consider it obvious that this
> would happen?
>
I'm confused. Obvious that WHAT would happen? That OCLC would cease to
exist if Google got it's hands on their records?
But, um, it looks to me that OCLC has _already_ shared their records
with Google, just under a secret agreement of some sort, instead of
freely. But it's certainly not obvious to me that OCLC will cease to
exist no matter who gets their hands on OCLC records.
Dont' get me wrong, OCLC's existence is hardly assured in any event.
OCLC very well might cease to exist _either way_, these are critical
times of changing environments, OCLC has to figure out how to adapt. It
is FAR from obvious to me that the safest thing OCLC can do is
monopolize it's data.
Jonathan
>
Received on Tue Jul 14 2009 - 12:49:08 EDT