We’re having a blizzard in Chicago. I’m listening to a librarian update us on LoC cataloging stats – 77K more new person records, 3K new subject headings, and so on.
It’s a big deal because library cataloging standards are undergoing big changes. The rules changed, from one acronym to another, AACR to RDA, and that took about 10 years – from 2003-2013 – but even bigger, the format and the way cataloging is done is changing. We’re going from creating database records – into systems originally designed to print cards – to a more webified, data-in-encoded-xml documents, method.
Now that I’m sitting here, I remember sitting in basically the same meeting last year, in Philadelphia.
I go to all this stuff so I can teach it.
But most people would run screaming.
And, from the tweets, I might’ve selected the wrong meeting – this alternate sounds good:
Remember, #BIBFRAME is only the bucket for data! RDA is only one type of description standard it can hold #alamw15
— Gloria Gonzalez (@InformaticMonad) February 1, 2015
But, oh well, ALA is ever thus, too many things to go to, and sometimes the choice is impossible.
And, I blundered into FREE BEER in exhibits! One of the university presses – they always seem the freest with the alcohol.
