On Wed, Jun 30, 2010 at 12:02 PM, David Pattern <d.c.pattern_at_hud.ac.uk> wrote:
> We've had recommendations ("people who borrowed this...") based on circ data in our OPAC since 2005 and it's had a huge (positive) impact on how stock circulates and on how many items students borrower per year, e.g.
> http://library.hud.ac.uk/catlink/bib/415607/cls/
> Much as I love bX, I do wonder what's stopping libraries from collaborating and doing recommendations themselves?
>
In the U.S., it's become fairly customary to expunge borrowing history
as way to avoid getting entangled in the USA PATRIOT act.
It would certainly be possible to anonymize the data before expunging
it, but, realistically, this is something the vendors should be
building into their systems rather than replicating (and supporting)
at every node.
Same goes with bX -- I think most libraries view their link resolver
as a black box (and, indeed, some probably are) so getting the initial
uptake would be tough. The sad fact of trying to do anything
pan-institutionally in libraries is that if it's not backed by a
vendor, libraries aren't interested.
-Ross.
Received on Thu Jul 01 2010 - 09:28:13 EDT