LC Cataloging Newsline Items of Interest

Here are a few items of interest from the volume 16, no. 4 (June 2008) issue of LC Cataloging Newsline:

LC ENDORSES RECOMMENDATIONS OF LIBRARY OF CONGRESS WORKING
GROUP ON THE FUTURE OF BIBLIOGRAPHIC CONTROL

Associate Librarian for Library Services Deanna Marcum issued the Library of Congress's response to On the Record, the Report of the Library of Congress Working Group on the Future of Bibliographic Control, on June 1. The working group offers more than 100 specific recommendations, organized under five general recommendations: (1) Increase the efficiency of bibliographic production and maintenance for all libraries through cooperation and sharing; (2) Enhance access to rare, unique, and other special hidden materials; (3) Position our technology for the future; (4) Position our community for the future; (5) Strengthen the library and information science. The Library of Congress embraces the Working Group's recommendations, which were submitted to Dr. Marcum in final form on Jan. 9, 2008, just prior to the American Library Association (ALA) 2008 Midwinter Meeting. Members of the Working Group met with Dr. Marcum and Beacher Wiggins, director for
Acquisitions and Bibliographic Access, on June 6 at the Library of Congress to discuss the Library's response. Members agreed, at Dr. Marcum's request, to continue as informal advisors to the Library as the Library follows up on the recommendations in the report. Dr. Marcum convened the working group in November 2006 to examine the future of bibliographic description in the 21st century. More information on the Working Group, including the Library's response to the report, is available at a special public Website, URL http://www.loc.gov/bibliographic-future
*******************************************************************
JOINT STATEMENT OF U.S. NATIONAL LIBRARIES ON RDA DEVELOPMENT

The Library of Congress has been very active in development of Resource Description and Access, the planned successor to the Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules, 2nd ed. Concerns raised by the LC Working Group on the Future of Bibliographic Control led to a joint meeting of managers of LC and the two other U.S. national libraries, the National Library of Medicine (NLM) and the National Agricultural Library (NAL), on March 10, 2008. The representatives of the three national libraries agreed that the development of RDA is an important international initiative that has involved the resources of libraries in many countries for the past several years. The three U.S. national libraries agreed on a joint commitment to the further development and completion of RDA, with decisions on implementation to be made jointly after review and testing of the completed code. The text of the three libraries' joint statement is available online at URL
http://www.loc.gov/bibliographicfuture/news/RDA_Letter_050108.pdf

Representatives of NAL, NLM, and LC met on June 9 to begin to define the scope and nature of the testing of RDA that will be conducted as part of this agreement.
*******************************************************************
REPORT OF THE JOINT MEETING OF BIBCO AND CONSER OPERATIONS REPRESENTATIVES HELD MAY 1-2, 2008, AT THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

Operation representatives from BIBCO and CONSER, the two bibliographic record programs of the Program for Cooperative Cataloging (PCC), held joint and separate meetings May 1-2, 2008.

This report provides highlights from the joint meetings. Summaries of the separate program meetings will be available in the near future.

Update on RDA
The operations representatives were given an update on the April 2008 meeting of the Joint Steering Committee for Development of RDA (JSC) by Barbara Tillett, LC representative to JSC. Many of meeting outcomes reported by Dr. Tillett are posted on the JSC Web site: http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/jsc/0804out.html Constituent review is expected to take place between August 2008 and October 2008 and an early 2009 release date is still on target. The final online product will include "workflows" that provide simple instructions to walk a cataloger through creating bibliographic and authority records. It will probably be possible for groups such as the PCC to specify guidelines for applying RDA and share this within the online product, but more will be known about this capability as the product nears completion.

Provider Neutral Records for Online Monographs
BIBCO members are considering a new proposal to develop guidelines for online monographs. CONSER members shared their experiences in developing guidelines for provider neutral records for online serials. The provider neutral approach calls for one record to represent the online version of a resource, even if it is delivered simultaneously in several packages. The approach reduces the number of duplicate records in the national database for
essentially the same resource and facilitates local tracking of resources. BIBCO members agreed to form a group to determine requirements, timeline, and steps for implementing a policy for provider neutral record for online monographs.

PCC Guidelines for Cataloging Integrating Resources
CONSER and BIBCO representatives discussed the 2008 revision of Integrating Resources: A Cataloging Manual http://www.loc.gov/catdir/pcc/bibco/irman.pdf
The manual is used by members of both programs to create records for integrating resources and share record maintenance. The 2008 revision reflects new coding practices for integrating resources and the current WorldCat cataloging environment of PCC libraries since RLG and OCLC merged in 2006. Representatives discussed potential guidelines including advice on the number of records needed for different language versions of an online integrating resource.

LC Response to the Report of the Library of Congress Working Group on the Future of Bibliographic Control
Beacher Wiggins provided an update on LC's response to On the Record: Report of The Library of Congress Working Group on the Future of Bibliographic Control http://www.loc.gov/bibliographicfuture/news/

(LC Cataloging Newsline)