So the MD5 for the download should become part of the catalog record?
Cindy Harper, Systems Librarian
Colgate University Libraries
charper_at_colgate.edu
315-228-7363
On Mon, Mar 15, 2010 at 4:34 AM, Weinheimer Jim <j.weinheimer_at_aur.edu>wrote:
> Harvey Hahn wrote: [
> <snip>
> The concern I wish to share is that of altering free public domain text
> without any obvious or external clues to that effect other than comparing
> the text with other sources.
>
> A blatant example I recently became aware of is a work by the famous market
> trader W.D. Gann entitled "The Magic Word". The 2008 "Revised Edition"
> published by The Richest Man In Babylon Publishing CHANGED(!) the "magic
> word", substituted a different translation for the selected Bible verses
> contained therein, and omitted significant
> amounts of original text (and probably altered other text, too). Yet the
> title and author attribution remain the same (the author died in 1955, so he
> could NOT have "revised" this work). Someone who did not know of these
> major alterations might think this is essentially the original work with a
> few updates here and there, not a whole new work! (This publisher has done
> similar "editing" and reformatting of other Gann works, to the detriment of
> the originals, which depend on the exactness of language, pagination, etc.)
> </snip>
>
> You are absolutely right. But it would be a mistake to think that this does
> not happen with printed materials. It has since day 1. Normal library
> catalogers deal with these issues much less often than rare book catalogers,
> and especially, catalogers who work for antiquarian book dealers.
>
> The very concept of "edition" is very different for each group. Actually, I
> think the discussion on Wikipedia describes it as well as anything I have
> seen
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edition_%28book%29#Collectors.27_definition.
> I also suggest the excellent page at
> http://www.bookthink.com/0003/03beid.htm for a much more indepth
> terminology of "edition" in antiquarian terms.
>
> The determination of "who really wrote what" was some of the work the
> scholars did at the Library of Alexandria, because often, they would have a
> text that would purport to be by, e.g. Aristotle and they would determine
> that it was not Aristotle, make up a persona and call it "Pseudo-Aristotle."
> Then they had to detail the textual variants and so on, which was all
> absolutely necessary to determine what Aristotle *really* wrote in a
> manuscript world.
>
> But of course, it all continued into the world of printing. Early printed
> books show lots of lots of major variants, but even modern ones do as well.
> I'll bet that if you would look at the items in a library's collection that
> claim to be "copies" many can look quite different. The layout on the t.p.
> can be different; the array of dates on the t.p. verso can be quite
> different, so it would be logical to assume that at least some of the text
> is different too, but for us, so long as it fits into LCRI 1.0 that it has
> the same: 245 abc, 250, 260 abc, 300 a, 4xx, it is by definition a copy,
> even though the text itself may be quite different because we do not compare
> the text. Rare book dealers' bread and butter goes much deeper than this,
> though. Take a look at the points for a Harry Potter book at:
> http://www.fedpo.com/BookDetail.php/Harry-Potter-Phil-Stone to discover
> how they look for a true 1st edition. And while I may not care, a lot of
> others do and the difference can be ama!
> zing. Here is an example of how much money you can get if you find that
> real 1st edition!
> http://www.abebooks.com/servlet/BookDetailsPL?bi=1284941522. Wow! Maybe I
> would care after all! Signed editions go for much, much more.
>
> Regular catalogers do not and cannot go into such detail, but we will have
> to find solutions to the problem you mention in this networked world. Still,
> there is this basic tension between, in FRBR terms, the work/expression
> (abstract) and the manifestation/item (physical). Normal catalogers assume
> that what they see in the 245, 250, 260, 300, 4xx describes the text (i.e.
> work/expression), and rare book catalogers do not. For example, I may
> catalog a book that says it is the text of "The Old Man and the Sea" but it
> starts out with "Call me Ishmael." As a cataloger, I would not bet very much
> money at all that the text from one "item" of a book is 100% the same as
> another "item," but yet they are considered to be the same "manifestation."
> Still, I would bet the house that the 245, 250, 260, etc. information is the
> same.
>
> In the digital world, we have different possibilities available to describe
> the text by using automatic word counts, file compares, and other tools
> which could allow for a much higher degree of exactitude than ever before.
> Perhaps people will be able to get lists of differences between one text and
> another, a kind of automatic manuscript collation. Or maybe we'll say that a
> difference under 5% means it's a copy. Maybe we'll even bring back the idea
> of the autograph and archetypal copy.
>
> It's really an interesting time!
>
> James L. Weinheimer j.weinheimer_at_aur.edu
> Director of Library and Information Services
> The American University of Rome
> Rome, Italy
>
Received on Mon Mar 15 2010 - 10:41:53 EDT