________________________________________ From: Resource Description and Access / Resource Description and Access [rd...@listserv.lac-bac.gc.ca] On Behalf Of Weinheimer Jim [j.weinhei...@aur.edu] Sent: December-04-10 6:15 AM To: RDA-L@LISTSERV.LAC-BAC.GC.CA Subject: Re: [RDA-L] Protesting RDA, <original message> .... In my opinion, one of the major problems I see with RDA is that it doesn't go far enough. As an example, we should not pretend to ourselves that changing Elvis Presley's or Richard Wagner's authorized form, in other words, changing one *textual string* into any other *textual string*, is any kind of a change at all. This is the sort of "change" that allows others to make fun of us and that gives cataloging and catalogers a bad name. We must face facts: can anyone maintain with a straight face that the form "Presley, Elvis (Elvis Aron), 1935-1977" instead of "Presley, Elvis, 1935-1977" will make any kind of substantial and meaningful difference for our patrons, instead of...
If we are really aiming to change matters, we should replace the textual string with a URI and then lots of people will gain multiple options that we can only imagine at this point. So, if the textual string for Elvis actually changed to http://dbpedia.org/page/Category:Elvis_Presley or http://viaf.org/viaf/23404836/#Presley,_Elvis,_1935-1977 or something in this vein, it would be a genuine gain for our patrons that *every single person* could point to--from searchers to catalogers to budget administrators. .... <original message> *************************** Throughout the RDA text, the first choice listed for identifying entities or showing relationships is to use an identifier (such as a URI). This is followed by an authorized access point, and then in some areas, by textual descriptions. The reason for this is RDA's objective in supporting three scenarios: catalog card production, MARC catalogs that rely on linked headings, and object-oriented databases (http://www.rda-jsc.org/docs/5editor2.pdf). What is clear though is that access points are a permanent feature of the cataloging landscape-- they will always exist and are part of all three scenarios. The main difference is that relating entities in the future won't be dependent on the form of access points, which is a good idea considering how often they can change. For example, headings change with the addition of death dates, or when authors request that elements be removed (as I discovered recently for an author whose name was attached to many series headings and subject headings). In addition, the arrangement of RDA into elements that support attributes and relationships for entities is the basis of interest in the Linked Data community. There is a W3C Incubator Group discussing such issues now, and RDA is the game in town in support of these efforts (http://www.w3.org/2005/Incubator/lld/). In addition to promoting the use of identifiers for specific entities, all RDA elements (and a lot of controlled vocabulary) have registered URIs (http://metadataregistry.org/schema/list.html). 100 $q or Fuller Form of Name is a registered element http://RDVocab.info/ElementsGr2/fullerFormOfNamePerson Encoding elements in MARC records is what is required in the short term. The specific choice of adding the element to the authorized access point is likely based on the fact that in current environments that is the only place to see that information. The current practice of not anticipating conflicts in headings means that reworking undifferentiated headings is an ongoing maintenance issue for authorized headings, and so adding one identifying element consistently is probably a good idea. When I look through a browse list of authors with identical names to select one for a record, I find the use of the birth date great for dividing up the names, but not very good for narrowing down the choice. I would prefer other identifying elements present in the access point. By way of comparison, look at how Internet Movie Database differentiates names. A search for Michael Douglas will produce a list of exact matches that use identifying elements quite effectively http://www.imdb.com/find?s=all&q=michael+douglas. RDA moves us in the direction where those kinds of user-friendly search results are possible. Thomas Brenndorfer Guelph Public Library
