Monthly Archives: May 2007

WordPress help request; commenting issues

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I am of the last week having issues commenting on some of my own posts. This is the message I receive:

Forbidden

You don’t have permission to access /blog/wp-comments-post.php on this server.

One of these was from February (just now), but the other was from last week. I am not trying to put in any fancy code, one URL in the recent one (although that failed without it, also), and nothing but pure ASCII characters. I simply have no idea.

This is the post which concerns me the most as it is active, and is a serious conversation that I am trying to have. The weirdest part is that I am able to comment some. I put in a couple “test” comments, which I removed. You can see that I made a couple others, although not the full one I was trying to make.

Does anyone have any ideas? I am down to one computer at the moment since my Mac laptop is completely trashed and has to be sent off to Apple for repairs; new trackpad and hard drive.

I’m already stressed enough about the PowerBook and a million others things that I don’t need this issue. The bad part is I’m not sure I can even get into my WP instance until I get the Mac back; at least not without finding a program for the PC and tracking down passwords….

Anyway, any and all suggestions are welcome! Here’s hoping that whoever has the answer can comment, or perhaps use the contact page. I have received a couple emails from folks who were unable to comment on the LC Working Group posts last week, but I have no idea if it is the same issue. No one told me what the problem was for them. I have to wonder how many others couldn’t comment and didn’t contact me.

Update: “Talked” to Blake and it seems I’m running up against some mod_security antispam rules. I know the exact word which caused a problem on the Chief post, and while it is understandable I am not happy about it.

As for my comment on the 1st David Bade post I have sent Blake the text of the comment I was trying to make and also let him know which part took and at which point it failed. I have tried my damnedest to figure out what word there could possibly be “offensive.” The problem with spam filtering is the word does not even have to be offensive; it only has to accompany such words. Of course, offensive is overly broad here. If I was depressive and wanted to discuss medication in my comments I’d be screwed.

I really try very hard not to hate anyone, be they nationalities, religions, groups of any sort, even single individuals. Hating isn’t good.

But. I. Fucking. Hate. Spammers.

Anyone who causes it so that I cannot have a conversation on my own blog about my own discipline is to be utterly despised. The world would be a far better place if all spammers’ heads were to simultaneously explode. Anyone remember Scanners?

I appreciate Blake doing a good job to help us all. Can’t be mad at him in any way. But when I can’t use ordinary words in my own language to have a conversation then there is serious issue.

Fucking spammers are the scum of the earth!

No IM and other things

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Computer

To my few IM buddies I will not be available the next … days. I took my laptop to the shop this afternoon. The trackpad had been locking up a lot lately, and last night the whole machine just got stoopid! I’m really worried and praying that it is still under warranty. I believe it is; but my beliefs are not exactly relevant.

I’m also pissed because I was going to do a full backup before taking it in. I have a fairly current almost complete backup, but I really would have liked to be able to just dump the whole thing to the external drive first.

They won’t even be looking at it until tomorrow. <sigh>

Life ….

You know, we’re just going to leave that one alone for now.

I have “arrived”

I guess by one scale I have finally “arrived.” I made it into American Libraries Direct for my reporting on the LC Working Group on the Future of Bibliographic Control meeting. I really don’t even have a problem with their claim that “Blogger Mark R. Lindner offers extensive notes on the session, which featured a controversial presentation by University of Chicago cataloger David Bade….” Some do consider it thus, although I do not.

I just really wish they had linked to the first post. It seems to me to be more like yellow journalism to link to the one post that reports on the presentation that might be considered controversial, or that they have labeled as such. It also does not help that it is the only presentation that I questioned in any true way. As it has already become abundantly clear to me, many people fail to see the labor of love and actual respect that I have for David Bade’s views in my questioning.

I wrote what I did there, and in my follow-up, because I care deeply about his message being heard and, more importantly, being understood by those who need to hear it. I fear even more will now only see my questioning. For that I am especially sorry to David Bade.

The “system” is once again poised to shut down dialogue.

Conferences

I am now officially registered for both NASIG and NASKO. Here we come June, Louisville and Toronto. Woohoo!

David Bade’s paper, redux

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Note: I really struggled with this post and almost decided to trash it except for letting people know that they should not take my misconstrual of David Bade’s words as I had. But I spoke with someone whose opinion I value this afternoon and was reminded that I am at least trying to engage in dialogue, that it should be evident that I actually care because of his message, that even though I display a concern with the manner in which David Bade’s words are formulated I have helped to show some that there are far more to them than those of a “frustrated intellectual” who is tilting at a madly whirring windmill. That helped bolster my spirits some. So I guess I’ll ask that if you cannot recognize that, or if you are not willing to try and keep that in mind as you read, then just move along now. If you cannot respect that simple request, please do not read another word.

David Bade has responded to my critique of his paper at the LC Working Group meeting last week.

His comments add quite a bit to situate the sentences I found offensive in such a manner that I now see them in a much better light. Please read his response.

Before I proceed I’d like to repeat something I said in my 1st post on this topic:

At this point I will add some comments on David’s paper. Please do not misconstrue these thoughts. I have no doubt that if he and I were able to sit down over a few pints [or some Mongolian tea] we would agree that we are both saying the same thing. I also humbly offer this critique as the things I am about to complain about are the same issues I struggle with the most—voice, nuance, and “selling” your message to your audience. These comments are offered as a request for some of that nuance and not as a deconstruction of his points.

He has also graciously offered to provide a copy of his paper to any who ask [AUTOCAT 15 May 2007]. It is none of my business to post his email address, but it is findable if you look for it at the University of Chicago Joseph Regenstein Library.

I can accept his comments in the light he has placed them with his comment on my post. But. There are still several tiny (and not so tiny) issues overall, both with the specific thing I found offensive and with the whole paper. With my background in philosophy, history/philosophy/sociology of technology and so on (and his clarification), I can see what he appears to be up to in his paper. And I applaud him. Let me make this very clear: I really like and appreciate his paper, and I love the concepts that he is attempting to bring to the table.

But these are extremely complex ideas, and the tack he is using to bring them out will be unfamiliar to a large number of librarians. I am fully aware of the limited amount of time and conceptual space in which he had to work at the Working Group meeting. As such, perhaps his chosen tack was not the best one; or perhaps he only tried to fit too much in. These are not some sort of lordly critique on my part; I have often been in this predicament and have no doubt I will be again. Often. It is one of my biggest weaknesses; one I am working hard to overcome.
His main point is “to reorient and reestablish librarianship on a totally different basis (communication rather than engineering)” [or described as a theory of transportation in the paper]. But, David, do you realize that many of the prominent, if not the most prominent in LIS, theories and metaphors of communication are based on engineering, mathematics, and/or transportation?

I could be mistaken but I certainly do not remember Grice—nor Wittgenstein, in a serious way—ever being mentioned in 70+ hours of graduate LIS education. Shannon, yes. Lakoff, yes. Many other mathematical/engineering/transportation-based concepts/metaphors of communication? Yes. This is not to suggest that you should not try. Only that you need to be seriously and critically aware of the battle you are undertaking. [I am well aware that Shannon's is a theory of information supposedly, but if information is not what is communicated (among being other things) during an act of communication, what is?]

As I alluded to in his offer to provide his paper, David also addressed my concerns on AUTOCAT. Let me state here unequivocally, except for the 1st couple paragraphs of my post on David Bade’s paper all of the comments came from me. Let me also try and help shut down the idea I may have started: He did not mean to disparage catalogers at all in his comments that I critiqued. In fact, he finds himself in that situation. Maybe it was just me and a few others, or perhaps it truly is easy to be offended by his wording of those thoughts, but he meant no offense. I take him at his word on that!

In his AUTOCAT post he offers some more clarification and context. Again. It helps. But it is not an answer. Not because he failed, but because there really is no “answer.” There are only many and varied things we can do—as he calls for—to mitigate the situation.

If he wants to reorient librarianship towards a theory of communication then he ought to learn a lot more about communication. As much insight and intelligence as Grice and Wittgenstein bring to the topic, they are not the last word by any stretch. And as much of a wonderful tool as philosophy can be, in the end we are talking about language, people, people using language, and other social practices. There is and never will be a philosopher who can “save” us on these subjects. And that statement comes lovingly from one who considers himself a philosopher in his better moments.

Again. Let me state. I pretty much agree with most of what David Bade has said. But he is in many ways on one end of what can only be a continuum. The world he rallies for—as much as I would even love to see and live in it—probably never did, nor will it ever exist.

But can we do something to orient ourselves, our profession, and our institutions toward it? Certainly we can! And I would even be honored to help him try.

One of my biggest concerns with his presentation of his ideas is that as hard as it was for me to grasp what he’s really trying to say I can only wonder how doable it is for others; especially those who need to hear it. In a world in which the Calhoun Report exists and is taken seriously by many who control the purse strings and directions of our institutions I have serious sleep-disturbing thoughts about the language in which David’s ideas are cashed. It is far too easy for those unprepared, unable, or unwilling to engage with the actual ideas contained in his ideas to dismiss them out-of-hand and just say, “See. These “frustrated intellectuals’” ideas are inscribed in stone. We’ll just go with what Calhoun recommends and everything will be great.”

Either way is suicide for the profession. We need both (and so much more), but in the right contexts. Maybe David Bade will not like my 2nd engagement with his ideas either. But, at least, I take his ideas seriously enough to engage with them. I hope that counts for something; with him and the (few) others who suggested perhaps I was a bit hard on him. Perhaps I was/am. We hurt the ones we love, right? But for those who suggested I was, where is your engagement? “Great job, David” does not constitute engagement.

You should have no doubt that I take his ideas far more seriously than many of you. And I approve of them, in the proper contexts. I’d just love to see them presented in such a way that most of the people who they need to reach can understand them, so that when/if they dismiss them it will have to be an active dismissal. It is far too easy to dismiss an idea that you have to work to understand.

My ideas here are probably much stronger sounding they really are. So, beware. If you (anyone) wants clarification, more context, some nuance or whatever, just ask. That is what I try to do. It is how I see my role in this profession. [There are issues in philosophy, linguistics, scholarly communication, inter- and intra-indexer consistency, and so many others tied up in my statement that the world David envisions cannot exist, except in a few rare circumstances; that is, item by item.]

I, too, often have problems communicating. I struggle frequently. And until recently, I have steadfastly clung to the belief that others ought to try and understand the message despite the tone, voice, attitude, language, or whatever. But that is simply not how communication works!

I give these comments in a loving spirit of healthy dialogue and honest concern for David’s message getting through to those who need to hear it. My mission is at best barely orthogonal to his. And I for one will be tracking down as many of his writings as I can for serious reading. I would like to know better where he is coming from so that perhaps I might be of assistance in helping propagate his message.

And, David, you should be aware that in addition to those who might disparage your dress, or even someone like me with the audacity to question the actual content of your views, that you do have a fan club. I have received several emails and have spoken personally with people who admire you greatly and care deeply about your message. As do I. But I simply do not consider “Way to go, David!” as sincere engagement. In fact, it seems to me to fall squarely into the gist of your paragraph that so [initially] offended me.

A couple of the folks who have been in contact with me will be engaged as our discussions show. But do not simply read David’s papers; read them and then take action to help foster his ideas. Perhaps by coming at the issues with our own voices we will be able to facilitate a world where others are capable of hearing the value in David’s “voice.”

This needs lots of work to reach the level of communication that I would like, whether it is between two people or a lot more. There are too many other things to do, though, at the moment. A large number of assumptions, lived experiences, theories (across and amongst disciplines) are essentially hidden behind almost every one of my words; just as there are in every one of David Bade’s words or anyone else’s.

And to the gentleman who via public and private correspondence thinks I am advocating a lowest common denominator approach and that I do not think that there are varying levels of qualifications and abilities, to include the possibility that someone is “elite,” that is simply not the case. It is, in fact, the exact opposite of what I would argue. I apologize if I made it seem that way, or if I did not reply to your further email quickly enough. But as David has asked that people not attribute a slur towards catalogers via his words, I would ask that you not allude to those of us who supposedly advocate a lowest common denominator approach.

In fact, alluding is downright cowardly—even if sometimes perceived as necessary and is rampant in our profession. Just who is it that is advocating this approach? And don’t say Calhoun because you have admitted to not having read all of the report. As much as I liked Thomas Mann’s critique, it is not the only or the final word on the report. As much as I respect Thomas Mann, I would not recommend letting him interpret the report for anyone else. That is why, all along, I linked to both and said “Go read both.” I despise the Calhoun Report, but I have read it at least 5 times now. I do know what’s in it. I do know what (most) Thomas Mann got right. I have a decent idea from talking with others where Mann’s rhetoric got in the way. I know where Calhoun misused citations. But all of this takes work; engaged work as David might say. Cheerleading, questioning and, perhaps even, disparagement can serve a valuable purpose, but either alone ought to be highly suspect.

Walt, if you made it this far, please, please, please, write about “librarians’ willingness to disagree with one another!” [C&I 7 (6), June 2007, pg. 6 pdf] I’ll be a guinea pig, or subject, or whatever the term is nowadays, if need be.

I am once again completely disheartened! I do not claim to be a great communicator and, in fact, maintain the opposite. This post is far more negative than it needed to be, which is not what I intended or wanted. But I keep trying and I keep trying to learn amongst all the “failures to communicate.” For those very few who seem willing to stick with me as I try we often each learn something. That does not mean we always end up agreeing. Nope. But we usually know where and why we disagree, and that is often enough, and even if not enough it is valuable.

Stephen Bell may want more disagreement, but I cannot even get people to accept questioning.

Summer to do list

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Some of these need doing almost immediately—perhaps my time wouldst be better spent working on one of them—and some more in the future but preferably or necessarily before Fall semester begins. So, in no particular order and missing a few….

Blog posts:

  • LC Working Group notes
  • Andrew Bird album/concert review
  • Hope Olson comments/review

Pay bills (rinse & repeat)

Balance check book (see above)

Independent Study on Terminology Services

Passport, apply/acquire

PowerBook to shop for the trackpad lockup problem <grrr> Now it needs a new hard driv, too. Is being shipped of tomorrow (21 May)

Taxes

Boxes out of storage

Books to used book stores

Have a summer fling (Oops, where’d that come from?)

Read unread AUTOCAT, Subject Headings, NGC4LIB & SKOS emails

Do some triage on Firefox spell checker

Student loan deferral form (again)

Clean car

Update website

Add things read lately to Zotero

Figure out (one of) these damn graphic programs so I can do my t-shirts

WordPress:

  • Some HTML in comments
  • More than one pingback to my own blog – is perhaps working?
  • Sidebars
  • Random header
  • Reliable, routine backups – seems to be amazingly better

Arrange a practicum/independent study for Fall that will hopefully put me along the road to my CAS project in the Spring.

Decide on a CAS project for Spring (OK, this one’s pushing it, but perhaps doable)

Attend NASIG – was wonderful! Thanks for everything, Steve!

Attend NASKO/ISKO-NA – Amazing; simply amazing!

Plan for ASIST in October

Get my annotated bibliographies onto the interweb in a useful format

  • MODS out of Zotero
  • Annotations in
  • Figure out linking so can do the intertextual linking (citations)
  • Learn some XSLT to do transforms I need
  • Make stylesheets
  • Output to static OAI-PMH pages or some other easily discoverable form

A ton of things are, of course, missing. And while this looks like a weekend to do list for Jenica, perhaps she can send me some inspiration so I might make some progress.

LC Working Group – Structures and Standards, part 6 – Public Testimony and Wrap-Up

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I was quite disappointed with the amount [not the quality] of public testimony. I did not work up anything to say as I figured that there would be many people far more “qualified” than me jostling for room at the microphone. Sadly, that was not the case. The 3 hours set aside for public testimony lasted about 30 minutes with only 3 people signed up.

I will be providing written testimony to the Working Group and I highly encourage anyone and everyone to do so! All written testimony (such a fancy word, eh? Input, comments, concerns,…) must be sent to Dr. José-Marie Griffiths. Contact info on this page.

Please do so! Particularly those of you in the public, special and school libraries. As you will see (shortly), it was noted that there was little representation from, of, or by, these communities. Do not let your voices and concerns go unheard.

Public Testimony

Sara Shatford Layne -Principal Cataloger – UCLA and professor in SJSU distance program

(1) Don’t forget the needs of research faculty members. There is a danger in trying to do the best for the largest number. Who will do this if not the academic libraries. An example. One researcher creates the cure for cancer vs. 4000 undergraduate papers on Hamlet.
(2) Seem to need more, not less structure and people are asking for the structure
(3) Systems we use are a kind of structure; we need to influence system creation
(4) Authority data has been underutilized
(5) What can be automated?
(6) Cataloging as a public good, we need to lobby for this over the business model – the business model does not apply here. [An economist told her at a meeting she attended that "Cataloging is a public good."]

Kevin Randall – Northwestern University, Head of Serials Cataloging

Interested to hear about the conflict between Bade/Hillman. I saw none; one is talking about WHAT, the other HOW. There is a loss of balance, too much emphasis on improving the container at the expense of content. My concern with the container is that it not leak!

Relating to CONSER standard level record:
We are focusing too much on Access, not Identify. This is being rushed to implementation. We need a graduated level of standards; the present ones are like an opaque un-marked measuring cup. It is difficult for cataloging managers to give guidance. Here it would seem that a cooperative program is being pushed by one member at the inconvenience of all other library/cooperative members. We must ask, what is the essence of cooperation? The standard level record is touted as “a floor, not a ceiling,” but with Encoding Level marked as blank it inference is full-level cataloging.

Don’t manage mortgage the future of FRBR user tasks in catalogs, we need to build up user services, but not at the expense of bibliographic control which connects our users to resources. [Updated 15 May via feedback from Kevin Randall, and in his own words: "I would suggest a correction to the last paragraph, though: instead of "manage", I said "mortgage". The point being, with the direction currently being taken in stripping things out of catalog records, we're mortgaging our future in terms of being able to meet FRBR user tasks. Without proper bibliographic control, we won't be able to connect
users to resources."]

Michael Norman – UIUC, Head of Content Access Management

Discussed U of I digitizing efforts. In our current project we have opportunities to augment/enhance records but find that current structures do not accord places for this. We are working to convert MARC records to MARC XML with a METS wrapper. We are looking to integrate MARC with other standards. (out on the web) there are examples of books with the table of contents displayed as tag clouds, we need standards for this.

The U of I digitizing effort will double the size of our catalog, and the records will go into OCLC. We need more discussion about single vs multiple records, this is a different world. How do we build these structures?

How can we use OAI/PMH to make records better and refresh them as changes occur?

We need to be where the user is and we are working on this at the U of I: by creating widgets to assist with library searches across assorted databases and the OPAC as well as digital collections.

As to looking to automate records – they are imperfect, especially with regard to subject analysis, but there are parts that can be automated. One publisher, for example, Springer-Verlag generates metadata for e-book packages at the title and chapter level and these records are not too bad, though they may need tuning.

Clifford Lynch – Director of the Coalition for Networked Information; Working Group member

Summation

Speaking for the task force:

This is a process and I urge you to submit comments.
The next meeting will be about Organization (Systems) and Economics and I will build/ frame questions for the third meeting.

An extract from the comments today:

There have been important reminders about quality control starting with Bade’s questions about the scope of bibliographic resources we are trying to manage. Is the scope national? International? Quality control relates to this question intimately. Perfect quality is easy to talk about and advocate for – is a moral position, and few human systems can provide this. [To which Bade replied later].

Discussions of quality control operationally must consider:

  • How will we measure it? With what metrics?
  • We are constrained by economics (funding is not infinite)
  • What are the trade-offs? We must think deeply about these.
  • What do user communities have to do with quality? Is it collaborative? Should it result only from internal efforts?

Many insightful comments today about legacy vocabularies and related tools. I agree, especially with the issue of the economic models for opening these up. If these can become components of infrastructure their values will increase. Presently the economic models are impediments and need to be revisited. There has been surprisingly little discussion about rethinking the content of these vocabularies. How should something like the Name Authority File change in a networked environment? What is the role of the author ID that is being discussed in different communities? We need to think in a much broader context. Discussions about the author ID are vigorous elsewhere.

There has been much about the interplay of traditional bibliographic practices and “new bibliographic practices” such as user tagging, etc. More central questions come with the implications of fully digital objects. The argument is not between user tags and LCSH, but about text retrieval computations or representation and retrieval but little has been said about this.

As to a new term for bibliographic control: It is easy to become intoxicated by visions of the digital future. Physical artifacts won’t go away. We need to help people find them. Surrogates will become the order of the day.

What is a bibliographic record? Is it a structure to populate with the digitized text of a book and an bibliographic record? Do we want to go further? What about computational derivatives – forming a concordance of the most common words. What about fully digital items? Do we need to think about the whole spectrum or draw some line in the sand? This is no longer a theoretical question posed in order to come up with best practices.

There were also valuable comments about interactions between tools, systems and standards. We need to be mindful that the systems themselves can affect our viewpoint.

Regarding better tools for cataloging: What is our goal? What are the priorities? I want more correct records, speed for copy cataloging and deeper records.

[Yes; we should do more than just say we need better tools for cataloging. But anyone who has spent more than a day or two using our current tools can easily start down this road! Nonetheless, I agree with him. Hmmm.

What would be the best context for starting and recording this discussion? Another wiki? Perhaps the NGC4LIB list? LITA and/or ALCTS? Catalogers and metadata specialists, what do you say? How should we go about documenting what we need to do our jobs—perhaps even faster, better and with less expense?]

Let us return to the point about making it easier to contribute to or improve collective metadata. There is a group called the proof-readers collective [Distributed Proofreaders] in which individuals sign up to do as many pages of proofreading a day as possible for Project Gutenberg. Can we think of ways to do this?

Comments regarding systems and economics; i.e. questions for the 3rd meeting:

(1) We need to move from “absolute perfection” to resource allocation.
(2) We need to open up our vocabularies to achieve maximum value
(3) We need notification of changes and propagation of system improvements.
(4) The locus of responsibility for maintaining, notifying and improving standards is too diffuse now. There are many different players with many different ideas. The process is complex, to the extent that we want wide use, we need coherent explanations for outside communities.
(5) We need to think about public accessibility of standards. These products should be easily worldwide accessible like NISO standards. This is urgently necessary. “Our descriptive standards are dead in the water if not widely and readily accessible, in electronic form.”

[And I do not believe Cliff meant the current RDA product model, but more directly like NISO. If I want a copy of the Z39.19-2005 monolingual controlled vocabulary standard I just download a FREE copy. But he also means available in a "Webified" version, not just as a pdf.]

Public comments on Cliff Lynch’s Summation

Richard Stewart – Indian Trails Public Library District

Seems to be a serious lack of representation of much of the library community here today, especially with the invited speakers. Public, special and school libraries have needs that all need to be addressed; I hope they’re being considered in the overall process.

Lynch asked that these communities please provide feedback via the written testimony process.

James Nye – Asian bibliographer, UIC

What about the international and multilingual communities? The area of the world that he covers is composed of approximately 2 Billion people; think of the extensive opportunities for collaboration and learning from each other.

Scripts and character sets are still major issues.

Joan ?? Schuitema - Head of Cataloging at UIC [Sorry; I tried to find out who this might be, but UIC servers seem hosed this morning.] [Updated 15 May thanks to Kevin Randall.]

Wants to confront the “all or nothing” thinking that seems prevalent

Is also a therapist. When people are under stress, black and white thinkers (catalogers, by training) will shift even more to black and white. We need to move back to the center to address the gray areas.

Marc Gartler – Director of Library Services, Harrington College of Design

In our description fields, ‘ill.” is not sufficient. Access even to just titles [of images in resources] would be of immense value to the study of visual design. More granularity.

Deanna Marcum – Summation

Thanks to the speakers and for the commentary.

Bowen referred to gray areas in this discussion of the bibliographic future: LoC is in the middle of a large gray area. It may be helpful for you to hear the considerations that LoC is making as we discuss the future:

Are there roles and responsibilities of LoC that we want to continue or to embrace?

As part of this strategic planning process in library services I read all of the annual reports of the Librarians of Congress back to the beginning. In the early years these were philosophical documents, that contained views of what LoC could or should be.

For decades LoC has been the leader in bibliographic control:

(1)Because of volume
(2) Because it assumes professional and moral responsibility for creating records to be used by the library community. This is a valuable contribution.
(3) Because of a belief that LoC should be an innovator. My article: “Too much consensus” (2000) discusses our standards and structures. They provide quality and support but such a stance may not also allow for innovation. How much should we allocate to support and maintenance of our bibliographic structures?

We know that libraries depend on us. We will continue to innovate where we can in concert with the library community.

As to the future structure of LoC: It would be helpful to know for which community we are working. LoC serves all libraries, all citizens of the US, all citizens abroad and national libraries internationally. In policy discussions we serve all communities, but at a time when funds are declining, this decline will not reverse in the foreseeable future. We must decide where to invest.

Only 30 million of 130 million items at the LoC are under bibliographic control. The tradeoffs are this: do we digitize for direct availability or do we invest in bibliographic control?

As to work in other communities – should LoC do work ‘as good as’ theirs, or in collaboration with them. If it is a piecework approach, we all become part of the information network and this makes a lasting contribution to society.

LoC works in approximately 470 languages. These are almost all very underrepresented; should they (or who) fund script/character set development?

When I met with the ALA board 2 summers ago the first question was: How much money is allocated in support of LoC services to other libraries? The answer is zero. Congress has generously funded LoC and LoC has supported other libraries in turn, but Congress has never directly funded this work. It is our tradition. We want to do what is beneficial for the library community

[A few comments and questions followed, including Bade’s assurance that he was never talking about the perfect record, for he knows this is impossible, rather bibliographic control at the level suitable for the users at a given library].

May 9 2007 Chicago, IL ALA Headquarters
Meeting of the Library of Congress Working Group on the Future of Bibliographic Control.

Many thanks to Kathryn La Barre for providing me her copious notes in electronic format and for allowing me to use them as I saw fit. I hope someone finds this material of value.

If anyone has any corrections to anything I may have gotten wrong from the beginning or perhaps mistyped, or any of the speakers who might have an issue with my transcription, please feel free to comment or contact me via my Contact Page.

Comments from any and all others are also certainly welcome!

I may try to add another post with my overall impressions and thoughts on this meeting and the Working Group process, but I need to step back for a bit. The sun is shining, the birds are singing, flowers are blooming, it’s Mother’s Day, and I have friends graduating who I need to support and help celebrate. And since Kathryn ordered me to get offline and enjoy myself I thought I might listen for once.

BTW, Kathryn, I did read something non-LIS related yesterday; 3 poems and Paglia’s commentary on them.

LC Working Group – Structures and Standards, part 5 – Jennifer Bowen

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Jennifer Bowen – Head of Cataloging, University of Rochester, and of one the co-principal investigators on the eXtensbile Catalog (XC) project

Recently stepped down as the American Library Association representative to the Joint Steering Committee for the Revision of Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules; i.e., RDA.

[Arrived back from lunch a few minutes late and thus missed Jennifer's introduction, but as she was introducing her own self and her approaches to her topic we must not have missed much.]

Discussed the current issues of structures and standards vis a vis RDA development and the future of controlled data, and new requirements for bibliographic data.

What is needed for future standards and development?/What can RDA accomplish? [Kathryn's and my notes diverge on this one so I'm combining them.]

  • The current standards and structures must operate in a broad web environment, need more flexibility and must remain up-to-date.
  • RDA is operating under a mandate to be useful (for catalogers) make it easier to train them and to facilitate cataloging.
  • RDA will be a digital resource for library environments.
  • Facilitate cataloging of digital resources in a library environment.
  • Must be amenable to promotion external to the current AACR2 community in order to enhance international adoption and become broadly useful.

What has hampered the process of RDA development?

  • “Lots of controversy”
  • Hype and grandiose goals
  • The need for “backwards compatibility” with MARC
  • Does system neutrality constrain development? [Unsure if this is Kathryn's ? or of Jennifer said it.]
  • Tight timeline with little funding
  • Success of the standard is tied to the success of the commercial product [and this is a travesty! I am aware of the funding process, but this needs to change. This standard is dead in the water as to its effect on the wider community if it is not freely open.]
  • Consultation process needs improvement

JSC docs are public but this is not enough we need to reach those with similar missions, those with whom we already share metadata, and those who we can assist with our standards and structures.

Need to consult with other communities; but which? What do we gain? How do we make the consultation successful?

Which?

  • Those with similar missions: archives, …
  • Those with who we could share metadata: publishers, metadata communities
  • Communities that can assist us with the standards process

Gain?

  • Metadata interoperability
  • Assistance in envisioning technical/technological trends and opportunities by including system developers, software engineers and businesses in the discussions.
  • We begin to talk with other standards communities and improve the standards development process
  • We can learn from other user research communities (UX/HCI/Anthropology)

Ensuring successful consultation?

  • Must be at the appropriate level
  • May (often) need to be ongoing, not one time events
  • Need organizational structures & funding to maintain relationships
  • Allow for serendipity (needs funding too!)

Recommendations for RDA

  • Move forward with the 1st release in 2009
  • Aggressively pursue development of RDA DC Application Profile
  • Restructure JSC work to focus on consultation, not document editing (JSC= 6 volunteers)

Future of Controlled Data – What’s Needed?

  • Need identifiers! (For all entities)
  • Evaluate potential based (only) on well-designed systems; not on our current systems [Yes!]
  • Provide better tools for catalogers [Hear! Hear!]
  • Facilitate faceted browsing

New Requirements for Bibliographic Data

  • Richer interfaces
  • Web services to enrichment data
  • Metadata to better support faceted browsing
  • FRBR-informed navigation; e.g., relator info, controlled access points

Research Directions / Testing Environments

  • We need a testing environment (sandbox) to encourage or experience research on data structures/display – This must be external to OCLC or our proprietary ILS.
  • Opportunities to develop new system functionalities
  • We need to conduct user research, usability testing, provide support within this for the open source community and feed the lessons we learn through research back into the standards development process [and other processes].

Sharing Metadata

  • Sharing metadata is needed between repositories and similar research environments. We need to find ways to share locally augmented results, with other libraries and other “discovery” environments.
  • Distinguish standard metadata from local metadata, but share both
  • What are the components we need to allow sharing? (eXtensible Catalog)

What’s Needed for Future Standards Development?

What is the vision of LoC/ of the library and information science community?
Should we be constrained by fear / or view this as an opportunity?

Our vision?:

  • Provide positive user experience
  • Our structures and standards should assist in leading users to library resources wherever the user is online
  • Library solutions should be useful to the broader world, and hopefully seen that way
  • Conscious of the move from cataloging to metadata; need to encourage people

A Positive Vision for Bibliographic Control

Cataloging and metadata professionals need to have:

  • Effective tools, so that they can focus on the intellectual work [Hear! Hear!]
  • The ability to participate in designing how systems use metadata [Yes! Take back control of our systems.]
  • Contribute widely to improving shared metadata (lower the bars to contributing; e.g., NACO, SACO)
  • Confidence that systems will use their work (metadata) effectively

What’s Needed Right Now?

  • Take positive decisive action
  • Clearly redefine goals and responsibilities; especially of the LoC
  • Explain and justify trade-offs
  • Articulate a positive vision for the future of bibliographic control AND how catalogers can contribute to it

Questions

[Schottlaender] You rooted comments on new approaches to consultative process (as did Greenberg) what are your thoughts on the needed organizational structure for standards development?
[Bowen] Other communities had something to gain from working together (like Hillmann’s comments about DCMI and RDA).

[Swan Hill] What I remember from AACR2 implementations is that they were delayed by the horror of changes to cataloging practice and catalogs. With all of the time taken for RDA what can be done to assure this won’t happen? We can’t afford much more delay.
[Bowen] Early on we discussed this to prevent this excuse from hampering the process and to prevent the expense and trauma and reassured the cataloging community of this, that changes would not be extensive and that records that now exist would not need to be redone. So the feedback is that the changes won’t be enough, other feed back that the world of metadata is changing rapidly and leaving us behind, or that the proposed changes are minimal in comparison. The original fears of expense seem not to be so explicit. It is hard to know how to pitch the message.
[Schottlander] One big change between the two situations is the use of MARC in a native state (cards) to deal with the changes to NAF. In a digital environment, such changes will not be so disruptive or difficult to implement.

[Bob ?] Drawing on your experiences with the eXtensible Catalog at Rochester, is there a potential vision of library services to be useful in a broader world? Is there a potential to further deconstruct library standards so they are useful outside the library community so they can be applied on a practical level?
[Bowen] Yes – we need an AP for the eXtensible Catalog work. WE need to think of bibliographic structures in smaller units/ in bits and pieces so that we can offer them out as needed to external communities.
[Schottlaender] “granularized interoperability”
[Marcum] Concern is not on RDA per se but on library investment generally at a time of needs for interactive user services. I hope RDA moves forward – can you address or think of it in terms of the services it will offer to users instead?

[Swan Hill] Roles and responsibility require redefinition. WE often do not talk about Responsibility or ethics – what it is that libraries have responsibility for – in terms of what responsibilities can be given to or shared with others, or with the community as a whole. WE need to communicate the ethics benefits and issues of responsibility at an individual level, an institutional level, and at an association or organizational level.
[Bowen] Some want to contribute (like Rochester) to shared programs more than they are allowed to contribute, due to review processes/bars at a time when others are shedding staff and responsibilities. Willing participants are out there. We need to facilitate that.

Up next: Public testimony

LC Working Group – Structures and Standards, part 4 – Jane Greenberg

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Jane Greenberg – Associate Professor at UNC SILS; AMeGA project (automatic metadata generation); Director of UNC Metadata Research Center <MRC>

“Structures and Standards for Bibliographic Data”

Discussed current research and the current issue of CCQ, which she co-edited, “Knitting the Semantic Web”

Sees Bade and Hillmann not on different planets, but as part of a continuum. [Ah yes, a good word.]

Discussion of the landscape and challenges of Standards and Structures

Provided a conceptual map of bibliographic control:

  1. Data structures (standards) as labels, containers and semantics providing element ordering functions
  2. Data communication standards for encoding, markup, exchange (ex MARC ISBD) as grammar
  3. Data value standards (NAF/ontologies/taxonomies) as syntax
  • These are not discontinuous but are often collapsed into each other.

Structures for bibliographic control include:

FRBR/FRAR/RDF/OWL/DCMI Abstract Model/METS/SKOS

We use/encode/package bibliographic data using agreed upon statements which provide control.

Professional consensus consists of agreed upon statements of best practices representing the knowledge and experiences of practitioners, thinkers and leaders.

Likes to think of structures as standards.

Problems with our structures:

  • Complex/overwhelming/inflexible/vary in scope
  • Discussion of these is infused with politics and emotions

Yet these are helpful in order to give a sense of the scope and continuum of the bibliographic universe which has/is evolved/evolving from the world of recorded knowledge into the world of information output (info, data, knowledge):

  • Traditional – recorded knowledge: Bibliographic entities (books, images, sound recordings, archives, music, etc.)
  • Evolving – information output: Bibliographic entities AND people, places, activities/events, data, relationships

In response to the Working Group questions she produced a taxonomy of ?s:

  • Need
  • Use
  • Development
  • New applications

Need

Dependent on functions, users, information, objects (continuum) –

  • Which standards to use in which context? It will take work but we can provide guidance to others
  • Do we need an Übermodel [she kept referring to this übermodel but I never got a feel for what she meant]
  • Are the standards adequate?
    • YES because we have CVs and SKOS, and the Application Profiles (AP)s from DCMI
    • NO because CVs are still developing, nothing BETTER exists

Use

How can we make better use of current standards?

  • Make them easily accessible and shareable. Look to the W3C thesaurus links as a model. :)
  • Look to the open standards like XML, MARC-XML, SKOS, etc.
  • Registries – look to the NSDL registry sandbox and Harper and Tillett’s chapter in the current issue of CCQ

How best to take advantage of legacy data?

  • Convert to XML or another interoperable standard
  • Do not dumb down; streamline these traditional structures with care to prevent data loss.

Development

What communities need to have input?

  • All! In open forum with leadership from the library community, “society’s chief information custodian”
  • We need to close the Semantic Web/Library gap (Greenberg 2007 in CCQ)
  • See Greenberg (2005) AMeGA Final Report [pdf]/ functionalities (in response to section 4.2 of the BCBC) [See here for commentary on the AMeGA report from Jenn Riley]

What organizations and organizational structures?

  • Standards making organizations: NISO, W3C, etc.
  • Professional associations/committees
  • Organizational structures … doesn’t know … streamline the process … defer to the 3rd meeting?

New Applications for the Future

What is the relationship between traditional bib control, the Semantic Web and tagging?

  • View this as a continuum
  • We can harness everyone’s bibliographic activity and data
  • The intermediary role of librarians and catalogers is evolving to include the promotion of good bibliographic practices and the extension of standards.

What standards requirements are becoming evident due to new emphases (data integration, sharing/reuse)?

  • Make trackable preservation metadata, contextual metadata, the ability to track the life cycle of an object
  • Make trackable – data integrity, authenticity, use, reuse

Greenberg’s Questions for the Working Group

  1. What structures for which contexts? Will FRBR work for institutional repositories? Should we push for CVs in social networks? Create an übermodel?
  2. Which data creation methods should be used? How rich? Which creators? (People, methods, costs)
  3. How do we improve metadata quality? Metadata evaluation? (See JCDL; Lagoze, 2006; Mitchell, 2006; Paytner, et. al., 2005)
  4. Interoperability – what are the limits to this goal? Open access is critical.

Conclusions

  • The bibliographic universe is changing to one of information output
  • Be positive; this is an exciting time
  • Take the time to reconceptualize the right research questions. Have we identified the right problem? What research methods and questions will examine these challenges?
  • Balance in our approach

Questions

Q1: [Schottlaender] Why do we keep talking about bibliographic control? Will that phrase itself stand in the way of convergence?
[Swan Hill] We are inventing so many new terms. WE may need a new term but not yet.
[Greenberg] Organization of information = bibliographic control, what ever you call is at the introductory level for LIS. UNC is working on the “Knowledge Trust”** to create a new vocabulary for our field in order to recognize and value the characteristics of libraries and librarians.
[Jose-Marie Griffiths] This is all part of a wider discussion of values as the school doubles in size and this process of creating the “Knowledge Trust” will become part of how the school defines itself/is defined. (SILS). “Knowledge” here is an umbrella concept
[Bade] Bibliographic control is a simple notion – I just want it – help me find it.

**[For those of you waiting for my snide comments, it was at this point that I leaned over to Kathryn and said, "We need to be careful here. UNC has a "Knowledge Trust" and a Metadata Research Center, while we only have a Metadata Round Table. If we don't watch it we won't be No. 1 for much longer!" To which she "reminded" me that we are tied for No. 1. That, of course, just makes my point even quicker. ;) ]

Thanks goes to Kathryn whose notes provided much of this. I had a lot of it down—and changed/added/subtracted some pieces here and there—but being able to cut and paste from her file was much simpler than typing it all in by hand.

Next up: Jennifer Bowen on RDA

LC Working Group – Structures and Standards, part 3 – Diane Hillmann

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Diane Hillmann – Research Librarian, Cornell University, Olin Library, also LITA Standards Coordinator

“Structures and Standards for Our Bibliographic Future” [ppt]

Before I begin, let me say “thank you” to Diane Hillmann for archiving and making her presentation available. And since she has, I highly suggest people have a look. Kathryn’s and my notes are basically a transcription of the slides so I may be less thorough on this presentation than I would otherwise.

On another note, especially for a standards coordinator and a librarian, shame on Diane Hillmann for only making these available in MS PowerPoint format. I am not one to say it should not be used, but it should not be the only available format for others.

General questions of balance are part of the consideration of the future of bibliographic control:

  • Standards compliance to standards interoperability
  • Environment? “Library” standards to larger standards world
  • Libraries have a long history of building standards and sharing data, BUT we cannot let our past become a strait-jacket

Imperatives:

  • To operate in a broader web-based arena using standards developed for sharing
  • To expose legacy data and vocabularies for wider use [Hear, hear to both of these!]

A start to this is the recent RDA/DCMI meeting 4/30-5/1 about data models

Outcomes:

  • RDA element vocabulary
  • Decision to expose RDA value vocabularies
  • Decision to develop an RDA Application Profile (AP) for FRBR and FRAD

RDA Element Vocabulary

  • Separate elements, attributes, properties from instructions for application
  • Provides definitions, relationships between elements and sub-elements that can be exposed to humans and machines
  • Explicitly include FRBR entities as defined relationships

RDA Element Vocab would include:

  • Element names; e.g., title proper
  • URIs – persistent and unambiguous
  • Definitions (to support semantic understanding)
  • Relationships (blueprint for processing inferences)
  • History of term changes / versioning

Why important?

  • Formal representation breaks down the silo around library data so that it is understandable by humans and machines
  • FRBR relationships can be explicitly included (clarity of expression)
  • Extensibility becomes far easier

RDA Value Vocabs

  • RDA is loaded with controlled vocabularies (like AACR2 and MARC21); embedded and difficult to use
  • CVs need to be formally expressed to be effectively used/reused and extended (recent RDA/ONIX joint effort is a step in the right direction) : this means human readable concepts, with machine registered URIs, in a traditional thesaurus structure, perhaps encoded in SKOS [there's a couple slides on this in the presentation] [there are also other XML thesauri applications - Alexandria Digital Library, ...]

RDA Application Profile

  • Documentation of community understanding and intent, key relationships, obligations and constraints.
  • Provides guidance for semantic crosswalks and specs for tools, applications and encoding.
  • Serves as a primary document to capture context around the creation of metadata (decisions and criteria).
  • Specifies appropriate controlled vocabularies and syntax encoding schemes.

Why is an RDA AP Important?

  • Can serve as a sound basic structure for the rethinking of library metadata structures/applications.
  • Each specialized community can use a related AP and reuse as much of the RDA EV as needed.
  • Further extension can be accommodated with a common structure like an AP to facilitate seamless reuse due to use of identical formal representations in each extension.

Effects on RDA?

“Not a lot but everything.”

  • Easily test data assumptions and instructional clarity
  • Allows specialized usage to evolve within an interoperable framework
  • Does not tie RDA to any specific encoding
  • Does not constrain the historic complexity of traditional library data

What’s in it for the DCMI?

  • DC community work on Application Profiles has been frustrated by a lack of formally declared properties suitable for reuse
  • RDA will provide the Semantic Web community with a plethora of stable, well-tested and generally applicable elements, properties and vocabularies
  • More general participation in development of DC Abstract Model-compliant APs

Moving Forward with an RDA/DC AP

  • Task Force has been established; co-chairs: Gordon Dunsire and Diane Hillmann
  • Both sides looking for funding
  • Important issues still on the table – but participants continuing to work

Problems with Legacy Vocabularies

LCSH, LCC, Name Authority File (NAF), etc.

  • Other communities are “suddenly discovering our legacy” and are interested in using these structures
  • New models are required for licensing in order to welcome these communities use of our legacy data [Amen!]
  • Difficult to use outside of MARC-based applications or unavailable for use due to:
    • Lack of URIs
    • Not structured for Web applications
    • No formal representations exist for application or continued development
    • Updating is not automatic

Why Are They Still Unavailable?

[If one is unaware of this conference I suggest they look into it. It is a sad reflection of where we are today that so much said 7 years ago (and some of it much earlier) has been simply ignored. I have only made it about 2/3rds of the way through the proceedings, but it is an eye-opener considering the present context. And if anyone has a copy of the proceedings they'd like to sell me please contact me via my Contact form.]

Can They Be Repurposed?

Yes, but they need to be “Webified” – URIs, explicit structure,…

See Harper & Tillett in upcoming Cataloging & Classification Quarterly edited by Jane Greenberg, “Library of Congress controlled vocabularies and their application to the Semantic Web.”

[Last Fall in Pauline Cochrane's Classification Systems seminar I gave a presentation entitled "Free the Authorities!" My independent study is on Terminology Services. I firmly believe these issues are critical if the library community is to retain much of its relevance in an online world.]

Questions

Q1: [I thought this was Cliff Lynch, Kathryn has it as Schottlaender but questionable] There are other vocabs outside the library world, e.g. gazetteers, etc. What about the openness of this set of CVs?

A: Absolutely! [following from Kathryn's notes] Reference to Weibel, Sutton, Hillmann, Baker proposal to contact legacy vocabulary owners about registering and exposing vocabularies for web reuse to overcome the old business model of publication for development and maintenance. This got little traction, but the time has come to try again.

Q2: [unknown] Are Bade’s world and Hillmann’s worlds conflicting or compatible?

A1: [Hillmann] there is no conflict in the goals which are similar in terms of metadata needs and the need to keep the special high need users but the divergence hinges on how they are satisfied we need to find new ways of doing this kind of record access

A2: [Bade] Each technology is technologically uncertain and when put to work there are many different results and different understandings.

A3: [Schottlaender] There is no conceptual divergence here – you both agree that we need more structured metadata NOT less.You are both stating the same thing. This reminds me of an LoC meeting 10 years ago between DC proponents and catalogers – each had the wrong impressions, different vocabularies but the same goals.

Q3 [Janet Swan Hill] I see a change in the use of vocabulary to passive words, expose, allow, enable, provide. Is this a conceptual problem or a problem with the language itself? This kind of vocabulary doesn’t ensure USE or USEFULNESS.

A: [Hillmann] This is what happens when you bring two cultural experiences together. WE are talking about the insertion of library culture (which uses YOU MUST) imperatives) into a broader set of communities where it doesn’t work that way. This is not coincidental use of vocabulary. Value must be emphasized in order to enable use, to entice. This language is intentional so people can/will see that something works, and has value and then decide to use it. We can’t do this by saying YOU MUST any longer. “…we have no stick to hit them with…”

[Swan Hill] Yes, but what is missing is “why you want to”

[Hillman] It is a marketing problem and we know it. Karen Schneider is working to provide a full explanation for consumption (?DCMI/RDA articulation work?)

Next up: Jane Greenberg, UNC

Some things read this week, 6 – 12 May 2007

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Sunday, 6 May 2007

Ingwersen, Peter and Peter Willett. “An Introduction to Algorithmic and Cognitive Approaches for Information Retrieval.” Libri 45 (3/4), Sep/Dec 1995:160-177.

Cited by Radford, Gary P. and Marie L. Radford. “Structuralism, Post-Structuralism, and the Library: de Saussure and Foucault.” Journal of Documentation 61 (1) 2005: 60-78. DOI 10.1108/00220410510578014 Read back in late Jan.

Post-structuralist tendencies in LIS can also be seen in the newer paradigm of “best match” that focuses on relevance and attends to issues of context and complexity (see Ingerwersen and Willett, 1995). (76)

Although now a bit dated, provides a decent intro into both algorithmic approaches and cognitive approaches (more user-oriented) to information retrieval, and how they are complementary. Not directly applicable to relationships but had its moments, and it did provide two interesting citations to sources on relevance and retrieval outcomes.

information retrieval, algorithmic approach, cognitive approach, Boolean searching, best-match retrieval, statistical approaches, term conflation, stemming, similarity measures, weighting, information need, intermediaries, cognitive IR theory

Monday, 7 May 2007

Charnigo, Laurie and Paula Barnett-Ellis. “Checking Out Facebook.com: The Impact of a Digital Trend on Academic Libraries.” Information Technology and Libraries 26 (1), March 2007: 23-34.

Reports on a survey conducted in early 2006 to determine academic librarians’ “awareness of Facebook, practical impact of the site on library services, and perspectives of librarians toward online social networks” (27).

Hmmm…? Well, if you use Facebook already there’s not a lot you will learn here, although it provides some early data on academic librarians’ perceptions of Facebook use in their libraries. The limitations of the survey—mentioned in one paragraph—are fairly significant, though, and I must wonder how useful of a baseline it will provide for the future. Speaking of which, the article will appear extremely “quaint” in five years or less.

If you are not familiar with Facebook already you will learn something, but it won’t be much about Facebook, which, of course, is not the purpose of the article.

The only other critique I care to make involves the use of Stephen Downes’ definition of social networks as “a collection of individuals linked together by a set of relations” (24). First off, that really ought to be relationships, not relations, but many people use relation this way.

My main concern is that this definition is not in the slightest bit useful as a way to discriminate any particular group of individuals from any other, completely random, group. Thus, it simply cannot mark off any social network from another, nor from any collection of individuals that do not form a social network. It is something about those relationships between the individuals that actually constitute the social network. The definition, at least as cited by the authors, completely fails to define just what it is about the relationships that does so.

Here is the Downes citation in case anyone else besides me would like to see if there is any further discrimination in Downes’ article: Stephen Downes. “Semantic Networks and Social Networks.” The Learning Organization 12, (5), 2005: 411.

Facebook.com, academic libraries, academic librarian’s perceptions, surveys

Downes, Stephen. “Semantic Networks and Social Networks.” The Learning Organization 12, (5), 2005: 411.

C’mon, be honest. You thought I was joking about tracking this down. But I had it read less than 2 hours after writing the previous. The definition comes from the very first sentence of the article and is never elaborated.

Entities in a network are called “nodes” and the connections between them are called “ties” (Cook, 2001). Ties between nodes may be represented as matrices, and the properties of these networks therefore studied as a subset of graph theory (Garton et. al. 1997). (411)

Why, yes, this is true. But these are still not mathematical relations, nor necessarily kin. Describing something using mathematics does not make the thing described mathematical; and while it is possible that people in your social network are your kin it is more likely that they are not.

People are certainly free to use relation in this manner, but I choose to follow Bean & Green’s usage:

(Because “relation” has a technical meaning, we will reserve its use for mathematical and data modeling contexts and for such phrases as “public relations” and “phase relations.” Note that all relations are relationships, but not vice versa. We will instead use the term “relationships” exclusively for the notion of semantic association, although the terms “relation” and “relationship” are often used interchangeably outside formal settings.) (B&G, 2001, vii-viii).

Now I am fully aware that data modeling is exactly what these people are doing when they study social networks and that, as such, relation is fully appropriate. But the statement, “A social network is a collection of individuals linked together by a set of relations,” (Downes, 411) is not about the abstract mathematical model or, at least, should not be. In the second paragraph Downes discusses “six degrees” and how a farmer in India and the President of the US may be closely connected, that is, nodes can be widely dispersed. So, we are talking about extant human beings and the relationships between them.

I guess I’ll consider this nit picked.

Citation:

Bean, Carol A. and Rebecca Green, eds. (2001). Relationships in the Organization of Knowledge. Information Science and Knowledge Management, Vol. 2. Dordrecht : Kluwer Academic Press.

semantic networks, social networks

Jouis, Christophe. “Logic of Relationships.” In Green, Bean and Myaeng, eds. The Semantics of Relationships: An Interdisciplinary Perspective. Information Science and Knowledge Management series, v. 3. Dordrecht: Kluwer, 2002: 127-140.

“Proposes associating logical properties with relationships by introducing the relationships into a typed and functional system of specifications. … [A] specific relation may be characterized as to its: (1) functional type (the semantic type of arguments of the relation); (2) algebraic properties (reflexivity, symmetry, transitivity, etc.); and (3) combinatorial relations with other entities in the same context (for instance, the part of the text where a concept is defined)” (abstract, 127).

relationships, logic, functional type, algebraic properties, combinatorial relations, concepts

Wednesday, 9 May

Bade, David. “Structures, standards, and the people who make them meaningful.” Presented to the 2nd meeting of the Library of Congress’ Working Group on the Future of Bibliographic Control on “Structures and Standards for Bibliographic Control.”

See “LC Working Group – Structures and Standards, part 2 – David Bade” for comments.

bibliographic structures, bibliographic standards, cataloging, Working Group on the Future of Bibliographic Control, LC

Thursday, 10 May

Turkle, Sherry. “Can You Hear Me Now?” Forbes 7 May 2007. Found via Library Juice.

Discusses the impact of technology on the self.

self, psychology, technology, virtuality, fragmentation

Hall, Stephen S. “The Older-and-Wiser Hypothesis.” The New York Times. 6 May 2007. Found via 3 Quarks Daily.

Article on the history and state of wisdom research.

research, wisdom, aging, cognitive, reflective, affective

Thursday – Friday, 10 – 11 May

Machery, Edouard. “Concepts Are Not a Natural Kind.” Philosophy of Science 72 (3), July 2005: 444-467.

Originally read 23 March 2006, but was cited in a review of Lenny Moss’ What Genes Can’t Do by Machery in the newest Philosophy of Science so decided to re-read it.

If you are interested in concepts/categories ala Lakoff and others and would like an entry into the philosophical literature then this would be a good piece for you. It’s actually quite easy to follow compared to much of philosophy.

concepts, natural kinds, philosophy, argument from explanatory necessity, categories, prototypes, theories, examplars

Friday, 11 May

Blessinger, Kelly and Michele Frasier. “Analysis of a Decade in Library Literature: 1994-2004.” College & Research Libraries 68 (2), March 2007: 155-169.

Interesting article, as citation studies go, that looks at the top subjects, resources and authors for the decade from 1994-2004. It is, of course, based on a sample so one question is how representative is it really?

The study looked at 2,220 articles in ten journals. I find it interesting that the highest number of articles were on cataloging, 548 (24.7%), and the 2nd highest on user studies, 449 (20.2%). That’s approximately 20% more articles on cataloging than the next highest subject. Intriguing. Maybe that’s why I don’t find it so hard to find good articles; not that everything I read is on cataloging. I read from all of the categories (5) in the article, if not all subjects.

citation studies, LIS literature, Walt Crawford

Svenonius, Elaine. “Reference vs. Added Entries.” [link] Paper presented at Authority Control in the 21st Century: An Invitational Conference, Dublin, OH, March 31-April 1, 1996.

Found via a 8 May 2007 posting to AUTOCAT by Bryan Campbell, “246 and variant title access.”

Oooh, lots of interesting looking things to warm a boy’s heart on that conference page.

The article pulls apart the difference between added entries and references and how their functions are confused and often collapsed due to our cataloging rules. Presents a proposal to fix the issue.

authority control, added entries, references, collocating function, finding function

I’m going to go ahead and post this a day early as tomorrow will not likely include any new reading due to the amount of transcription I have to do. If I do read something, I can easily enough tack it on next week’s list.