OCLC publishes 42nd annual report to the membership

OCLC's 42nd annual report to the membership has just been issued and is available at: http://www.oclc.org/news/publications/annualreports/2009/2009.pdf?utm_source=WhatCountsEmail&utm_medium=OCLC+Abstracts&utm_campaign=OCLC+Abstracts.

"In the report, Jay Jordan, OCLC President and Chief Executive Officer, wrote that fiscal 2009 was a challenging year as libraries and the OCLC cooperative felt the impact of the worldwide economic recession. At the same time, the cooperative continued to execute its long-term strategy of building Web-scale services, setting the stage for an exciting transformation in the way libraries serve their institutions and users."

From: OCLC Abstracts, Vol. 12, no. 47 (Dec. 7, 2009).

Beacher Wiggins announces delayed implementation of the BIBCO Standard Record guidelines at LC

Beacher Wiggins made the following announcement on the BIBCO and PCC mailing lists today:
LC will not be ready to implement the BIBCO Standard Record guidelines
on January 4, 2010, when PCC participants will begin following those
guidelines.

A delayed implementation at LC is necessary so there will be time
(1) to consider the following:
a. the inclusion of additional elements in records created by
LC's cataloging staff (as proposed by Policy & Standards Division in
April);
b. the use of code "pcc" in the 042 field for "in process"
items;
c. the impact on vendor-provided records;
d. whether Validator (an internal check application) checks are
necessary;
e. whether OCLC's algorithms to preserve series access points
when merged with LC's need to be adjusted;
f. impact on non-Acquisitions & Bibliographic Access cataloging
operations at LC;

(2) to make the appropriate changes to the following:
a. Voyager templates;
b. preprocessing software for vendor-provided records, if
necessary;
c. ECIP software;
d. EPCN software;
e. any additional software maintained by ABA's
automation specialist;
f. documentation to reflect the change in practice (LCRI's have
been/are in the process of being adjusted to reflect the new PCC series
policy). There are also numerous DCMs that would need to be adjusted
(B13, B16, C1, D8, E1, E2, M7-- not an exhaustive list), and perhaps
workflow documentation as well.

CDS will issue a subscriber notice to announce that LC will begin coding
records PCC again. (These are usually 60 or 90 days ahead.)

Just announced on the RDA list!

RDA: Resource Description and Access will be published in June 2010. While we regret this delay in release of RDA, the transition from publication of AACR2 as a printed manual to release of RDA as a web based toolkit is a complex process with many interdependencies.
The updated text of RDA incorporates recommendations from constituencies and other stakeholders approved at the JSC meeting earlier this year. The revised text has been successfully loaded into the RDA database. The product is currently undergoing thorough quality review and testing in preparation for release.

We recognize that customers and prospective users of RDA need reliable and timely information for planning and budgeting. We are confident that this revised deadline is a realistic target for publication of RDA.



Pricing and purchasing information will be introduced at the time of the ALA Midwinter Meeting, 15-18 January 2010.



Mary Ghikas, Chair Committee of Principals
Alan Danskin, Chair Joint Steering Committee for Development of RDA
Don Chatham, Chair Co-publishers

ALCTS draft report on romanization -- comments due

The ALCTS non-english access working group draft report on romanization

is up on the web and available for comment. The working group was charged with examining the current use of romanized data in bibliographic and authority records, and make recommendations for best practices.

The conclusion seems to be that we are not quite ready to move away from providing romanized data in access points, but that we should rely on automatic translation whenever possible.

Comments are due by Tuesday, Dec. 8.

From Catalogablog

ISBD Area O published

Area O of the ISBD has now been published on the web. Area 0: Content Form and Media Type Area is an amendment to the International Standard Bibliographic Description (ISBD). Area O will take the place of the general material designation (GMD) in area 1. It is being issued with a set of examples and will be incorporated into the consolidated ISBD for its next revision in 2010.

From Catalogablog

Google Scholar Chief Engineer on Law Librarian podcast

Google Scholar's chief engineer, Anurag Acharya, will be the featured guest for the Dec. 4th installment of Richard Leiter's The Law Librarian podcast.

From Just in Case

Free provider neutral webinars

OCLC will be holding two Webinars on the topic of Provider Neutral E-Books to be presented by Robert Bremer, OCLC Senior Consulting Database Specialist. Robert served on the PCC task group that formulated the provider neutral policy. He will describe how a provider neutral record differs from previous cataloging practices for eBooks, and will also discuss OCLC’s plans for conversion and consolidation of existing eBook records in WorldCat.

You can access the Provider-Neutral E-Monograph MARC Record Guide at:
http://www.loc.gov/catdir/pcc/bibco/PN-Guide.pdf
The two free webinars will be held on Thursday, December 10 at 1:30 PM EST and on Tuesday, December 15 at 11:00 AM EST. Each will last no more than 1 hour.

Registration is available at the following links:

Dec. 10:
https://www3.oclc.org/app/request/bin/request.asp?specialCode=Neutral10Dec09

Dec. 15:
https://www3.oclc.org/app/request/bin/request.asp?specialCode=Neutral15Dec09

The sessions will also be recorded and available on the web after December 15.

Info from Cynthia Whitacre on the OCLC Cataloging e-list