16.12.2010 21:31, Jim Weinheimer:
>
> This is to announce that I just added the latest “Cataloging Matters”
> (no. 7) podcast to my blog at
> http://catalogingmatters.blogspot.com/2010/12/cataloging-matters-podcast-no-7-search.html.
>
> This one discusses "search".
>
Thanks for this new instalment which obviously roams much further
than previous ones.
First, a hint:
The subject of "Search" has been treated by John Battelle in a 2005
book (a real, hardcover one):
The Search: How Google and Its Rivals Rewrote the Rules of Business
and Transformed Our Culture
ISBN 978-1591840886
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1591840880
This book concentrates on the business aspects of Search as a product,
although he probably was the first to realize that Search is the most
important ingredient in the new economy of all activities that require
access to information.
Search is of course, as you clearly point out, much more than a product.
It is a pervasive phenomenon, some of its aspects make it indispensable
for our everyday life, some are dangerous for us as individuals, some
are just (perceived as) annoying, some reshape the ways business and
research and education are being done, in subtle or brutal or
imperceptible ways. Minus Search, however, the Internet at its current
size and shape would be barren ground.
One of the dangers is not the Search activity in itself but the
tracing and profiling that, unnoticed by the user, is going on along
with it. This can have innumerable ramifications in that it creates new
Search opportunities for those who command the resources, and these may
affect us, as individuals, in very new ways, and not just business-
related ones. Doing anything on this planet is not what it used to be.
On this vast background, catalog search is a very narrow field.
RDA's vision amounts to little more than making it an electrified and
enhanced version of 19th century cataloging ambitions. Other players,
like Amazon, LibraryThing, GoogleBooksearch, have already added many
more features to their Search products while partly re-inventing our
age-old ideas but only as much as required for their business model.
This raises the vexing question again: What is our business model? Only
after we answer this can we set out to define what our
Search model ought to be. And then, what our code of cataloging
rules should focus on and include. A much bigger project, I'm afraid,
than what can be taken on by our "powers that be" in the ways they
go about their business.
We might, however, also become very radical and say: Search is no
longer part of our business. We provide access to public materials, and
no matter where people search and find references, they can link into
our locating service which will provide them a means of access or a
place to obtain it. For the new situation is such that there is a
plethora or cornucopia of search services where publications may be
found, when there used to be not much outside libraries a mere 20
years ago. This entire setup has changed drastically.
B.Eversberg
Received on Fri Dec 17 2010 - 05:16:36 EST