Re: Slightly OT: MARC

Hi,

Patrick Durusau <patrick-Q/[email protected]> wrote:
> What problem do you want them to recognize?

A few items off the top of my head I would love them to do ;

 - serious efforts at proper identity management
 - open collaboration for merge / match
 - join KM / SemWeb efforts seriously as experts
 - stop obsessing in only bibliographic meta data
 - stop thinking your opinion shouldn't be part of your service

I think the rest will follow from those items. There is the additional
problem of the library world inventing or re-inventing stuff for their
own special bibliographic purposes rather than extend or join efforts
made elsewhere, but it's a bit fuzzier to pin down, of course.

> It may well be that they don't see the problem any more than other groups
> fail to understand that inventing more identifiers for subjects in hopes
> their identifiers will become universal is a lost cause.

Well, I don't know if lost is the right word. In fact, to some degree,
WikiPedia have mostly succeeded in creating a bare platform for
knowledge. Sure, not totally reliable, but a poor-mans solution that
actually works is not bad for someone who never intended to do so.

Personally, I've long hailed the library world as the perfect
protectors of an infra-structure that could support global
identifiers, to be honest. Something like a Wikified subj3ct.com for
the world curated by trained librarians to me seem like a darn good
alternative, even if it will not encompass everything we might
possibly need. But to get that kind of support it first needs the
library community to recognize that a) this is needed, and b) that
they can do it. Either of these might fail.

> I would much prefer to devote time and energy to mapping between
> inconsistent identifications than trying to invent yet another inconsistent
> set of identifiers that won't be universally adopted.

The only problem with the mapping is the semantics lost and gained in
the process itself. It's no fool-proof either, and to me seems like a
lot of wasted repetition between us all. Don't know.

> BTW, I do think you make a positive contribution with your posts, even when
> they have me grinding my teeth. ;-)

If you weren't grinding your teeth, I am doing something wrong. :) No,
seriously, I love our discussion of late as it has helped me greatly
to focus my thinking, and perhaps more importantly be challenged by a
library expert on my many crazy notions.

You'd be surprised at how many catalogers around the world I've
privately befriended through my tougher stance on meta data
negligence. :)

> Hope you are at the start of a great day!

Lunch! Yeah!


Regards,

Alex
-- 
 Project Wrangler, SOA, Information Alchemist, UX, RESTafarian, Topic Maps
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