Cataloging Futures

Join RDA community on ALA Connect

Hey catalogers and metadata librarians, this new RDA forum looks like a great way to keep up on the up-and-coming cataloging code, RDA.

ALA Connect is a new platform ALA is using for committee work as well as less formal information sharing and networking. We have created a community for RDA, open to nonmembers of ALA, which is available at: http://connect.ala.org/RDAforum

Please join the community. Below are functions of the ALA Connect platform.

• Posts (which are like blog posts)
• Online docs (which are like collaborative, wiki-like pages or Google Docs)
• Group calendar (for listing meetings, deadlines, etc.) -Surveys (for asking multiple questions at once)
• Polls (for asking a single question)
• Chat room (text-based, including the ability to save a transcript of the discussion)
• Discussion forums (also known as “bulletin boards”)

Patrick Hogan

Director, Online Resources

American Library Association Publishing

Via RDA-L discussion list

Cataloging Wikipedia articles

Interesting post from the State Library of Kansas. They've cataloged 1,000 Wikipedia articles primarily focused in their niche.

We have cataloged about 1,000 Wikipedia articles analytically at the State Library providing links via the Kansas Library Catalog, WorldCat/OCLC and the State Library’s consortium OPAC, ATLAS. Most all of the Wikipedia articles we’ve cataloged are concerned with Kansas, Kansans or current topics with few resources initially available via standard library resources. We had one of the first records in WorldCat/OCLC linking to information on then-Supreme-Court-nominee, John G. Roberts, as well as an early record on Hurricane Katrina. We followed these entries with other cataloging records accessing more substantive resources, but yes, the initial records were for Wikipedia articles.

ATLA ICC Theological Librarians' Manual Wiki award

The American Theological Library Association's International Collaboration Committee (ICC) is awarding contributions to their wiki. Here's their mission statement:

The ICC wiki is a collaboratively-developed repository for digital materials which are useful for beginning or continuing theological librarians around the world in the various aspects of their work. All theological librarians are welcome and encouraged to participate. We ask participants to register and log in prior to making changes. Contributions must serve the above-stated mission of this site. As a Committee we are excited to offer this wiki as a place where there can be true collaboration of theological librarians from around the world contributing ideas and insights for the benefit of all.

ATLA ICC Theological Librarians' Manual Wiki award

http://wiki.atla.com/wiki/index.php/ICC

Amount: Ten awards each US $100.

Requirements: Read the mission statement at the outset of the ICC Wiki. In keeping with this, contribute to the ICC Wiki. In so doing, you are publishing your contribution actually to the Wiki. The contribution will include your name and may include your email address. Those contributions placed on the Wiki by October 31 2008, and judged among the ten best, will be granted awards of US $100 each. Participants may contribute more than once and the best of their contributions will be considered for an award. Background information on the ATLA ICC Theological Librarians' Manual Wiki can be found in the ATLA Newsletter, vol 55, no 3, May 2008, p. 10. Contributions should not constitute a copyright violation. They could be workshops or articles you have prepared especially for this purpose, or used previously. A wish list for contributions to the Wiki is found on the wiki site, but it is not exhaustive. Contact any of the International Collaboration Committee members for further information. You may request Chris Beldan, [email protected] to mount your contribution to the Wiki.

Completion date: October 31, 2008. Winner's names will be posted on the Wiki. Winners will be responsible in the month following the announcement to advise an ICC member of their address to which the award can be sent.

Chris Beldan
Associate Librarian
Philip Schaff Library
Lancaster Theological Seminary

New book on tagging

A few weeks ago I bought Gene Smith's book, Tagging: People-Powered Metadata for the Social Web. This looks like it's going to be a great read!

Library 2.0 and the cataloging community

One of the most thoughtful library bloggers, Rory Litwin recently wrote on his blog, Library Juice:

These days, when reading the library literature or a conference program it’s hard to find much that is not about the Library 2.0 idea. It seems to me that many librarians have forgotten that there is something worthwhile in what we do already, and that “Library 2.0″ is an update rather than something completely new. Lots of people would not want to hear this, but I think many librarians should have more respect for librarianship as a profession and don’t know as much about what they are doing as they should. If there were a little bit more about librarianship per-se in our professional discourse it would be harder to dismiss our own profession in favor of a mode of information (access, organization, use, and conceptualization) that others have invented. [emphasis mine]

Looking at this quote in terms of cataloging (this blog's niche). I agree with Rory, that traditional cataloging often get short shrift in our professional discourse. Our legacy cataloging standards and tools were awesome for their time. For example, I worked with a card catalog for almost nine years. It's a pretty cool pre-computer device. So, taking some time to  understand our library legacy is key. Yes, we should have a healthy self-respect for and understanding of our profession.

But to play devil's advocate, the cataloging community needs to take more seriously that the Web is the communication device of choice for our users. The first line of library communication has changed to digital mode. This shift requires us to rethink everything--the how, what, and why of cataloging. We need to have an openness and willingness to incorporate the new and unfamiliar (I write this at a time when I'm studying XPath and XQuery--didn't foresee this trajectory back in library school!). So, I don't think we're there yet. I think we're only just beginning to come to terms with Web technology and what it can do for us cataloger-types. We're not exploiting it and using it fully. So, a little bit of nudging from the Library 2.0 crowd is a good thing.

OCLC WorldCat: Redundancy and Collaboration

I wrote this post almost 2 weeks ago on the back of the LC working group report, but it got lost in the shuffle. Anyway, this theme (or meme) is in the air right now, so here goes. As I read the report, I keep thinking that a significant part of our redundancy problems lie with OCLC's model. It's not conducive to collaboration.

I work with OCLC WorldCat everyday, and there seem to be a lowering of standards with regard to the quality of the records that are dumped into the database. If OCLC is lowering its standards, then why can't we modify data in OCLC? They need to open up the editing capabilities and let us (the members) add to and enrich all the records in WorldCat.

I'm not saying there shouldn't be guidelines about what we should and shouldn't modify. But OCLC needs to start trusting the library community. Let quality control and added value be a collaborative effort. With the current model, we aren't taking full advantage the skills of the library community. Currently, we are very limited as to what we can correct or enhance. It feels like a straitjacket.

The OCLC leadership talks the talk. Vice President, Karen Calhoun, has frequently argued that we need to have a different understanding of "quality." And Roy Tennant writes:

So here's the thing: you may or may not have noticed it, but we just went from a world where we were the gatekeepers to information to one in which we are hanging on for dear life. We can either wise up or get out of the game. I prefer to wise up. For me this means forgetting about "control" and getting good about "enrichment". [emphasis mine]

So, my message to OCLC is--throw caution to the wind and let us cataloger-types get in on some of this collaborative Web 2.0 lifestyle! Let us correct data. Let us enrich data. WorldCat will be a better resource for it.

Related: Open WorldCataloging?

LC Subject Cataloging and the Open Library

I'd be remiss if I didn't point out that there's a post on subject cataloging over on the Library of Congress Blog. It refers to an interview with Aaron Swartz about the Open Library. Again here's another example of the Web 2.0 crowd's interest in quality bibliographic data (I've mentioned this before.).

I'm encouraged by Web 2.0 projects like Library Thing and the Open Library. Read the interview and the LC blog post and let me know what you think.

"Why Web 2.0 Is Leading Back to Full Cataloging"

A few selections from an interesting post by Rory Litwin from his blog, Library Juice:

"We often think of Web 2.0 sites in terms of the idea of “tagging instead of cataloging.” In fact, rich 2.0 sites, the ones that do a lot of data processing to create their services, usually have both free-form tagging by users and standards-controlled metadata about objects, and it is actually often the latter that drives the main functionality of the sites. This is the case with both Last.fm and LibraryThing."

"The real functionality of both Last.fm and LibraryThing, though, rests not on user tags but on the standards-based metadata for the objects in it - books for LibraryThing and music tracks for Last.fm. In both cases, casual users can simply rely on the data that the system loads into their profiles automatically ..."

"The functionality of LibraryThing is enhanced because of the fact that it makes use of cataloging that has already been done by professional catalogers. Data in LibraryThing that comes from Amazon is not as rich or as accurate as the data from research libraries, but in most cases it is quicker to get, and it is still based on essentially the same Z39.50 standard, which is in turn based on cataloging standards."

"So… If sites like Last.fm eventually become a part of life for the majority of people, I think there will be an emergence of support for the role of professional catalogers somewhere in the system, so that the majority of users, who “just want it to work,” will be satisfied. Free-form tagging has its place, but where consistency and accuracy counts, as it does in many Web 2.0 sites, I think reliance on users will turn out to have been a dead-end, and there will be a new appreciation for our professionalism."

At a time when catalogers are feeling a sense of uncertainty as to where their future lies (as well as the future of the AACR2/MARC metadata they are still faithfully creating), it's refreshing to read a post like this as a reality check.