One of the areas that I wondered about was whether the information embodied in records in RDA would be significantly more useful to the end users, as compared with current Marc records. If so, would end users start to make inferences from the absence of data in older records.
I can only argue by an older example / analogy (and not so far from historical accuracy). Suppose 30% of our catalogue records had NO subject headings ... So 70% of the titles about the Hugenots had a subject "Religion-France-16th century" - then there are two scenarios
A. Would users coming across a title WITHOUT this subject heading infer that the book is NOT about "16th century French religion"?
B. Would they always search the catalogue for this subject only (assuming that this WOULD retrieve all the titles to do with the Hugenots?)
In this case, there are arguments for presenting the 30% as a "separate" database / set of records .... And indeed I have implemented several systems along these lines - e.g. at Oxford and TCD - for sets of data for which the catalogue records are of significantly different quality.
Would there ever be arguments along these lines for RDA vs pre-RDA catalogue data ? If RDA lets us FRBRize catalogues significantly more effectively than from straight Marc21, for example, maybe we should make the difference visible or explicit to the end-users
Regards
Frank
-----Original Message-----
From: CIG E-Forum [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of C.J. Carty
Sent: 19 April 2011 15:40
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: National Libraries implementation
I can't give exact examples but feel we struggle with inconsistency enough when it comes to record matching or deduplication as it is, it's nothing something new to RDA. Plus, while RDA records are still being created in MARC format, then the differences are not so huge.
Glenn Patton mentioned the need to refine this at OCLC, today Frank mentioned the issue of matching edition statement (4th ed vs Fourth
edition) and Alan has mentioned the work that the BL have had to do on their merging profiles for this kind of thing. It will definitely be an area where it will be useful to share experiences (particularly with users of the same LMS) but I don't think the situation will be *incredibly* much more difficult than it already is in some of our catalogues (with records created at different times, records of different cataloguing levels, imported records in various levels of completion as well as mistakes/variations in practice or in interpretation of rules, etc).
Just a personal instinctive reaction, no hard evidence to back that up!
Celine
On Apr 19 2011, Bernadette Mary O'Reilly wrote:
>But it isn't just a matter of whether records can sit side by side in
>the catalogue. If we want to match records automatically for harvesting
>or deduplicating, the more consistent they are the more efficient the
>algorithm can be and the less manual work will be needed. Not just an
>issue for big libraries - ordinary public libraries may want to
>consolidate their catalogues and deduplicate them.
>
>Best wishes,
>Bernadette
>
>
>Please note change of address
>
>*******************
>Bernadette O'Reilly
>Catalogue Support Librarian
>
>01865 2-77134
>
>Bodleian Libraries,
>Osney One Building
>Osney Mead
>Oxford OX2 0EW.
>
>*******************
>
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: CIG E-Forum [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Hugh
>Taylor
>Sent: 19 April 2011 14:09
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Re: National Libraries implementation
>
>Nicky Ransom said - in whole or part - on 19/04/2011 13:31:
>> Would it really be workable for national libraries of different
>countries to implement RDA in different ways?
>
>I think I'd like to respond in the form of a question (or two): why is
>implementing RDA in different ways any different from (or more
>troubling
>
>than) implementing AACR2 in different ways (as happens now, and has
>done
>
>since the beginning of AACR2 - and well before that, of course...)? Is
>there something specific to RDA that means our attitude to "differences"
>
>in its application needs to be much more restrictive than it has been
>previously?
>
>And if so, should that attitude apply only to national libraries' data
>creation? Is it reasonable to expect one thing from them and another
>from the rest of us?
>
>Something to take our minds off the glorious weather outside (well,
>outside my window, at least!).
>
>Hugh
>--
>Hugh Taylor
>Head, Collection Development and Description Cambridge University
>Library West Road, Cambridge CB3 9DR, England
>
>email: [log in to unmask] fax: +44 (0)1223 333160
>phone: +44 (0)1223 333069 (with voicemail) or
>phone: +44 (0)1223 333000 (ask for pager 036)
>
--
Céline Carty
English Cataloguing
Cambridge University Library
Cambridge CB3 9DR
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