[DCRM-L] OCLC's IR webinar (May 13)

[Ted P Gemberling]

Allison,
You make some very good points, and I appreciate your work ethics. I just have one question: if you don’t think you have enough information to upgrade master records, how can you update holdings on those records? It seems that updating holdings implies a judgment that you have the same edition.

Some master records have notes saying things like “there is a variant with such and such typography on the title page.” A single note may mention several small variations. I have noticed that some catalogers will use that record for all the variants, and some will create new records if they think the difference is significant enough. I have generally been willing to use both kinds of records. If I use a “multiple variant” record, in my local note I will indicate which variant our copy is. With both notes present in our local record, users know what we have and what other variants exist, though I guess not where they exist. I suppose that could be what’s lost with the IR’s, an easy way to find variants.

Ted

From: dcrm-l-bounces at lib.byu.edu [mailto:dcrm-l-bounces at lib.byu.edu] On Behalf Of Allison Rich
Sent: Thursday, May 14, 2015 2:42 PM
To: DCRM Users' Group
Subject: Re: [DCRM-L] OCLC's IR webinar (May 13)

Hello Will and Richard and all:

I could get snarky here too. But I will try and refrain from such low behavior.
Nevertheless I have a few points to add:

1) We are a small community of people who care about item level descriptions, as creators. I know that our patrons here at the John Carter Brown Library are truly grateful for the full level descriptions. But, let's face it, most people who don't use special collections libraries simply don't care about such detail. So, in that way, Richard's comment of "However that therm is technically defined, we know that in our endeavor, this means that Excellent + Good = Good, Good + Good Enough = Good Enough, Good Enough + OK = OK, OK + Whatever = Whatever, and that the job is to persuade the customers that Whatever is the New Excellence" is particularly and very painfully true.

2) We will most likely **not** be using LDB or the new program - whose name escapes me at the moment, sorry - simply because the information will only be available for viewing by the Brown University system and by no one else. The local, full record in the ILS will be better than anything LBD can offer. Perhaps at large institutions such as Harvard who has numerous libraries this will be a useful program as the larger Harvard community will be able to see the local data issued by the various holding libraries. But that is just speculation on my part.

3) The ominous statement that OCLC issued about not having a firm date for the death of the Connexion client was most worrisome to us after the webinar. My gut feeling tells me that Connexion will be killed off after BIBFRAME becomes the new MARC. What worries me is that a program like Record Manager will be the new form of display for ILS platforms. If that is the case then we might be in for a very cruel shock. But this is just me, unless any of the rest of you had the same feeling.

4) A plethora of #5 500 fields will overcrowd the MARC record and make it look terribly clunky!!! I rarely upgrade the master record because we have always utilized IRs and besides in a world filled with variants with poor master records without citations how can one **really** upgrade a master record made by someone else if they are unsure whether that master record is that they truly have in hand???

5) I was the one that asked the questions about getting rid of lesser quality records from the database in the very last minutes of the presentation. And I meant it. If we are being encouraged to streamline ourselves, I submit
a quote to them from the gospel of Luke: "Physician, heal thyself". And clean up your own house before asking other people to streamline their own.

I have worked at institutions where I have only been encouraged to "get the books on the shelves". I have always done more. I refuse to do mediocre work. Thankfully at my library my work IS appreciated by staff and patrons. But in the wider world, sadly, I am "Allosaurus", a big, plant-eating dinosaur. I have more years worth of work ahead of me in this field (I hope) and I will roll with and learn whatever follows MARC. I know that change is inevitable. But, like Richard, I fear that "Whatever" is the new "Excellent".

Best for now,
Allison



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"Outside of a dog,

a book is probably man's best friend,

and inside of a dog,

it's too dark to read.

- Groucho Marx"



Allison Rich

Rare Materials Cataloguer

ESTC and NACO Coordinator



John Carter Brown Library

Providence, Rhode Island

Allison_Rich at brown.edu<mailto:Allison_Rich at brown.edu>



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