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Another Blow for the Status Quo
July 12, 2007

A colleague pointed out that the inimitable Thomas Mann had posted yet another diatribe against change. To even be able to follow what I say below you should probably at least have it open now if not have already read (or skimmed) it.

I hardly know where to begin. As for the need for librarians, I will certainly not argue against that. But as for the need for librarians on the front end of a transaction, with Mr. Mann or someone very much like him carefully and slowly guiding the grateful supplicant through a long and convoluted reference process when in fact they probably only want a few decent sources with which to write their paper is something I will continue to try to refute.

As much as possible we need to put the smarts of a reference librarian in the back end of the process — that is, within the systems themselves. And I’m happy to report that even right now, with what we’ve been able to accomplish so far, we’re not doing as poorly as Mr. Mann seems to want to make us out as doing.

For example, using his very own example, I found several of the results that he seemed to be so proud of finding through a rather convoluted path simply by entering “athenian tribute” in WorldCat.org (produced by my employer), all within a few seconds. Amazing. And as we become better at applying FRBR principles, relevance ranking, faceting browsing options, and other indexing and display improvements this will only improve. The third item in the list was the source that he repeatedly pointed out as being an essential resource.

The basic problem with Mr. Mann’s long and seemingly erudite expositions is that he sets up straw men and then proceeds to methodically and thoroughly knock them down, all simply to defend a status quo that no longer exists. I can’t help wondering if he was able to spend so much time guiding this hapless student through the research process simply because no one else came in during the long period that it took to accomplish this research task which will forever be beyond the ability of the student to replicate.

I told you I hardly knew where to begin. Now I hardly know where to stop. Much of his treatise is apparently devoted to defending controlled vocabularies against keyword searching, which may be news to Google engineers but no one within the library profession. And the point for me is not either/or, it’s AND. Why not use all we can bring to bear on the task? Why not search the full-text when you have that and controlled vocabularies when those are available and both when they are present, then rank accordingly? But in the Thomas Mann universe, you must choose. He falls prey to the very same zero sum game of which he accuses Deanna Marcum in one of the final notes of the paper.

Having said all this, I think that there are issues he raises that are well worth considering and could probably be boiled down into a much more succinct and palatable (to this reader) exposition of principles that should be considered when building systems in support of research. But given the weight of the dross that surrounds such potential gems, as well as the obvious bias (does it escape anyone that they’ve downloaded the paper from the web site of the union representing LC employees?) I find myself at a loss of mining them. Perhaps someone with a stronger stomach will attempt it to our mutual benefit. More power to them.

In the end, if there is something he gets right from my perspective it is the awareness that the needs of researchers wanting to do comprehensive research are very different from those who only require “a few good things”. We do no one any favors by conflating those needs into one system. Rather, we must design systems that can offer appropriate services for a variety of needs, of which those are two of great importance to an academic audience.  So yes, let’s debate these issues, he and I and you and her. They’re important, and essential that we get right in this great transition. But a transition it is, despite the sturm und drang that Mr. Mann continues to bring to the discussion while trying to defend the status quo. Good luck with that.

Posted by Roy Tennant on July 12, 2007 | Comments (1)