On FRBR and user tasks, I have some practical experience, from
explaining LibraryThing's FRBR-ish concept at library talks for about
two years now. (This month I did West Virginia and two in New
Zealand!) This is the story that works for people:
Reality: Patron goes into a library catalog. Wants Twilight. Types
"Twilight" into the OPAC. On the fourth page of a accession-date
ordered list, finds the book. All the copies are checked out. Leaves
in frustration.
With LibraryThing for Libraries: Book page shows all the editions in
the library, so when the user sees all the copies of this edition are
checked out, they get links to the ebook, audiobook, another paper
edition and a translation in Spanish. They click to one of these, and
leave happy.
Things worth noting:
1. The "use case" depends in part upon problems with the current OPAC.
If OPAC search worked well, same-name editions of a book would cluster
in results. If OPACs have usable author pages, that would also help.
2. The LibraryThing model is flat, and user-created. The data is
therefore extremely rich—millions of edition groups.
3. The LibraryThing solution exists. The data is free and available right now.
4. The LibraryThing model could change tomorrow, easily, and that would be okay.
Now, I'm not against perfect solutions. But library technologists
should recognize the directions their technology tends to err. It is
not towards quick, insufficient solutions but toward complex,
over-engineered solutions that take forever to happen. By the time
these solutions are implemented, they are just as insufficient as
quick solutions, but a decade late, too complex and with too much
institutional buy-in to ditch. Pick your library technology—MARC,
OAI-PMH, etc.—and this is the story. FRBR is already 11 years old, and
implementation is hardly imminent.
Libraries have been talking about FRBR for more than a decade now.
And, except for renegade efforts like LT and the Aquabrowser work
sets, patrons still don't know about other editions of Twilight. By
the time RDA-FRBR gets around to telling them, Twilight will be Little
House on the Prairie. It's not at all unlikely that libraries will be
forgotten too. The Kindle store has a work-clustering concept too. And
it's not FRBR.
Tim
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Check out my library at http://www.librarything.com/profile/timspalding
Received on Wed Oct 21 2009 - 08:56:03 EDT