The Library of Congress has announced that it is going to undertake a major reevaluation of bibliographic control in a move that could lead to a gradual transition away from the 40-year-old MARC 21 standard in which billions of metadata records are presently encoded.
"It's a ten," said Sally McCallum without hesitation when asked to rank the project's scope and importance on a scale of one to ten. McCallum is chief of the Network Development and MARC Standards Office at LOC.
The goal of the Bibliographic Framework Transition Initiative is to determine "what is needed to transform our digital framework" in the light of technological changes and budgetary constraints, said Deanna B. Marcum, the library's Associate Librarian for Library Services, who will lead the initiative. "It's very important that we find a way to link library resources to the whole world of information resources not focusing exclusively on bibliographic information," she said.
By rethinking MARC, which has supported resource sharing and cataloging cost savings for many years and is the predominant standard for the representation and communication of bibliographic and related information in machine-readable form, Marcum said that the LOC hopes to determine whether the standard can "evolve to do all the things we'd like it to do, or do we need to replace it" with something more compatible with the Internet world.
As the LOC concludes what to retain from current metadata encoding standards, the library community may eventually need to get comfortable with other data structures.
"We have a huge library infrastructure very much built up over the years around the MARC format, and this will cause some disruption of that and that costs something and it has to be done smartly and carefully," said McCallum. "We can go on as we are but it's not desirable," she said.
Inspired by RDA The hope is that a move toward new data structures will "enable bibliographic data to be used in very new technologies and technical configurations, such as the semantic web," McCallum said.
"I think we need to go into some of these new data structures with more alacrity than we have," McCallum said. "It would behoove the community to get comfortable with other data structures, like XML or RDF."
There is also a desire in the library community to "reap the full benefits of new and emerging content standards," as indicated by the comments that accompanied the testing of the new Resource Description and Access (RDA) standard, Marcum said.
RDA is a cataloguing code which covers all types of content and media (including digital resources) and was released about a year ago to replace the Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules, 2nd Edition Revised (AACR2). Its development was a recognition that libraries operate in a digital environment and have to deal with metadata creators who are not librarians. RDA integrates library cataloguing records with this new metadata, but the testing raised further issues that have spurred the new initiative.
"Many people made the comment that while the new code [RDA] will allow us to better link the disparate resources that are available, there are inherent difficulties in using MARC as the carrier for the records we create in this new code. It's just time to get serious," she said.
"They raised this issue. I give that group credit for raising this issue of whether it is time to reevaluate the MARC standard," Marcum said. "And I think by focusing on that question it has increased the sensitivity of all of us to the barriers that exist in our current system to making information fully accessible," Marcum said.
Change will come slowly The LOC intends any changes to be gradual.
"MARC is going to be around for another ten years. It's used too universally," McCallum said. "There are too many services and products based in MARC, and its use will simply dwindle as people convert and as they can afford to convert," she said.
"We want change with stability," McCallum said. The LOC is mindful that libraries have to contain costs even as they are being asked to provide cataloging metadata for the exploding amount of digital material.
The project will also:
Foster maximum re-use of library metadata in the broader web search environment.
Explore the use of data models such as Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records (FRBR) in navigating relationships, whether those are actively encoded by librarians or made discernible by the semantic web.
Plan for bringing existing metadata into new bibliographic systems within the broader Library of Congress technical infrastructure.
Marcum said the initiative will be "fully collaborative," and an initial discussion will take place in June at the annual conference of the American Library Association in New Orleans. A series of meetings with stakeholders are expected in 2012 and 2013.
Reader Comments (13)
Asking some of my staff, I found that comment is difficult until more is known, as far as they're concerned.
Posted by Jim Pakala on May 26, 2011 07:26:49PM
Whether or not this is a good thing is really going to depend on a lot of things not just the LOC. Right now libraries across the country are more worried about keeping their funding than making their bibliographic metadata work with the semantic web. The way I see this playing out is that larger urban library systems will be the only ones who can afford "rethinking" MARC21 and small rural libraries will not be able integrate into the new system. Far from doing what LOC hopes this is just going to be one more divider between urban and rural libraries.
Posted by Jeff Saunders on May 27, 2011 09:59:13AM
Jeepers, its only taken 10 years to get RDA out of MARBI.
I'll make a flat prediction: I turn 50 this year. It'll take
10 years to work this out (and I'll be 60) - and 5 more
after than for whatever passes for a vendor to deliver
working code (and I'll be 65). Unfortunately that still
leaves 2.5 years 'till I can retire and work as a greater at
WalMart (or it's successor).
I look forward to explaining "Mother Avrams Remarkable
Contribution" to dissolute, misguided youth for years to
come.
Posted by Mark Andrews on May 29, 2011 07:18:30PM
Open source ILS like Koha are conquering small libraries, and especially libraries in the Third World. MARC 21 is their problem now: they need too many human resources to produce good bibliograhic records.
So I hope that the new standard will avoid both the complications of MARC and revisions. The digital divide in libraries means a cultural division for everybody in the world.
Posted by Francesco P. on May 30, 2011 08:33:24AM
Dear Mark: I am a project manager in an ILS software
development company. I can assure you there will be working
code in a much smaller time frame. Competition is fierce in
the area and we are eager to implement any new standard that
could put us a couple of years ahead of the competence.
Posted by Jesús L. Domínguez Muriel on May 31, 2011 03:34:03PM
Sooner or later, this is going to be necessary. The library world of today is certainly a very different place than the world of the first versions of MARC. Most catalogers would probably agree that MARC is very complex, and takes a long time both to learn and to properly apply. The complexity would be less of a problem if library catalog software could make full use of the MARC data. How many systems, for example, can make full use of all the data in all the various kinds of 5XX fields, beyond perhaps a keyword search. I am afraid that catalogers may be spending a lot of time providing data that do not help users decide if the record being described meets their needs.
This will, however, be an expensive undertaking, especially for large libraries. I wonder how many people in upper management will view this as a priority? Switching from MARC will pose all sorts of interesting problems, and I am glad I will be able to leave them to my successors.
Posted by Michael Farmer on June 1, 2011 10:39:39AM
Jesús, I've been in this business since 1986, including 10
years with ILS vendors. I hope you are right and I am wrong. I
want to believe you - but I don't believe your boss.
Posted by Mark Andrews on June 1, 2011 03:17:19PM
I don't understand why there is talk of basically reinventing a new system when MARC works well and if such a change is really needed why not revise what is already in place to incorporate the technology rather than re-invent the wheel again. I also think that someone may not have completely considered all aspects in relation to upfront or sustaining costs for training, etc. or that there would be a consensus of a standardized format everyone can adopt to regardless of the size or type of library. Change can be good if it actually does make things better or a difference; but just to change something for the sake of change or because you have the ability or power to is something else. I think before everyone jumps on the bandwagon to keep up that much more research or opinions from a well rounded selection from across the country of those who use MARC on a regular basis should be done and not just a group at LOC. Just my opinion.
Posted by Sue Knoche on June 1, 2011 04:51:59PM
We have just started to follow MARC21. To me it is very hard. Understanding every tag's use is time consuming. When we worked with CCF in CDS/ISIS and that was very easy for us. If we can get any easier system then that will be a good arrangement for us. But thinking for next migration puzzled me. However hope for the best.
Posted by Muhammad Hossam Haider Chowdhury on June 2, 2011 04:40:42AM
"There is also a desire in the library community to "reap the full benefits of new and emerging content standards," as indicated by the comments that accompanied the testing of the new Resource Description and Access (RDA) standard, Marcum said."
Really!! The response I'd seen on all the catalogers' listservs I belong to has been more rage, frustration, and depair. Funny how that works. The admin types who create these nightmares say it's a boon, a blessing, and universally loved. While all the feedback is complaints of confusion, unnecessary work, and dubious utility.
Sounds like this will be a reprise of the RDA fiasco. Trying to stay connected to the mainstream is a laudable endeavour, within reason. But, the trend appears to be integration with Friendster, Wikipedia, TMZ and the Paris Hilton blog site to draw in " a new audience to keep libraries au courant". The real effect is alienate their current patrons by frantic attempts to woo users that will never pay them any heed. A true lose-lose strategies. But, no matter! They have MBA's. That trumps real world experience, and the need to pay attention to mountains of negative feedback on their latest brainstorms!
Posted by Cate C on June 2, 2011 12:34:33PM
What would the loss of MARC format do to the _display_ of catalog records in, say, the Voyager system? In subject searching it is crucial to have displays of both cross-reference information and browse-menus of subdivisions of headings. With these displays of _relationships_ among headings, the entire subject heading system would be eviscerated. We still need vocabulary control--we need it more than ever, in fact. How will subject vocabulary control be affected?
Posted by TJ on June 20, 2011 02:00:23PM
Can anyone tell me what some of the "inherent difficulties in using MARC as the carrier for the records we create in this new code" are?
Posted by Michael Segur on June 22, 2011 10:23:51AM
I do agree it will be a big expense for smaller libraries, the way the economy is today. WE are getting rid of Marc Why?? If there are so many services and products in Marc why get rid of it? We are replacing it with what?
Posted by Karen Thompson on June 29, 2011 08:41:01AM
