Quality of Library Catalogs and Value of (Good) Catalogs

Abstract

The quality of large catalogs is uneven and often low, but this issue is underrated and understudied. Library catalogs often fail to communicate correct and clear information to users and their low quality is not simply due to faults, duplications, and so on but also to unwise cataloging standards and policies. While there is plenty of uncontrolled information about books and other publications, the need for good-quality bibliographic information is apparent and library catalogs may provide a trustworthy map of the publishing output, with full control of editions, works, authors, and so on and effective navigation functions, which are lacking in today's information-rich environment.

KEYWORDS:

• cataloging evaluation
• cataloging quality analysis
• cataloging standards
• library catalogs
• OPACs
• authority control
• catalog indexing
• catalog display
• catalog design

Notes

¹Antonio Panizzi, in Report from the Select Committee on Public Libraries (London: House of Commons, 1850), 61.

²Barbara Schultz-Jones, Karen Snow, Shawne Miksa, and Richard L. Hasenyager Jr., “Historical and Current Implications of Cataloguing Quality for Next-Generation Catalogues,” Library Trends 61, no. 1 (2012): 49–82. For a more thorough treatment, cf. various papers by David Bade, The Creation and Persistence of Misinformation in Shared Library Catalogs (Champaign: Graduate School of Library and Information Science, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2002) (Occasional Papers, no. 211); Misinformation and Meaning in Library Catalogs (Chicago: privately printed, 2003); “Colorless Green Ideals in the Language of Bibliographic Description: Making Sense and Nonsense in Libraries,” Language & Communication 27, no. 1 (2007): 54–80; and Politics and Policies for Database Qualities ([Chicago?]: privately printed, 2006). Widespread quality problems in bibliographic data are often mentioned in papers addressing different issues (e.g., Susan C. Wynne and Martha J. Hanscom, “The Effect of Next-Generation Catalogs on Catalogers and Cataloging Functions in Academic Libraries,” Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 49, no. 3 (2011): 179–207; Myung-Ja Han, “New Discovery Services and Library Bibliographic Control,” Library Trends 61, no. 1 (2012): 162–172).

³Bade, Misinformation and Meaning in Library Catalogs, 10.

⁴Evidence and debate about management of outsourcing activities and staff qualifications may be found in the largest Italian discussion list for the library field, AIB-CUR, http://www.aib.it/aib/aibcur/aibcur.htm3, with over 7,000 recipients in November 2014.

⁵Cf., for example, the proceedings of the first conference wholly devoted to the FRBR study: FRBR Seminar = Seminario FRBR: Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records: Florence, 27th–28th January 2000, ed. Mauro Guerrini (Rome: Associazione Italiana Biblioteche, 2000).

⁶Ákos Domanovszky, Functions and Objects of Author and Title Cataloguing: A Contribution to Cataloguing Theory (München: Verlag Dokumentation, 1975), 97–101.

⁷Cf. Richard P. Smiraglia, “Be Careful What You Wish For: FRBR, Some Lacunae, a Review,” Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 50, nos. 5–7 (2012): 360–368; Alberto Petrucciani, “From the FRBR Model to the Italian Cataloging Code (and Vice Versa?),” Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 50, nos. 5–7 (2012): 603–621.

⁸Cf. Patrick Le Boeuf, De FRBRer à FRBRoo: Lectio magistralis in library science (Fiesole: Casalini, 2009), http://digital.casalini.it/9788885297883, and “A Strange Model Named FRBR_oo,” Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 50, nos. 5–7 (2012): 422–438.

⁹S. R. Ranganathan, The Five Laws of Library Science (Madras: Madras Library Association, 1931).

¹⁰Cf. William Denton and Sarah J. Coysh, “Usability Testing of VuFind at an Academic Library,” Library Hi Tech 29, no. 2 (2011): 301–319; Rice Majors, “Comparative User Experiences of Next-Generation Catalogue Interfaces,” Library Trends 61, no. 1 (2012): 186–207.

¹¹An interesting example of irrelevant “relevance ranking” in WorldCat is presented by Carlo Bianchini (“FRBR prima di FRBR,” JLIS.it 1, no. 1 (2010): 11–39). The sixth record listed is very appropriately titled (in Italian), The logic of nonsense.

¹²Report of the Commissioners Appointed to Inquire into the Constitution and Government of the British Museum, with Minutes of Evidence (London: H.M.S.O., 1850), 695 (emphasis in the original).

¹³Jan Pisanski and Maja Žumer, “Mental Models of the Bibliographic Universe. Part 1: Mental Models of Descriptions,” Journal of Documentation 66, no. 5 (2010): 643–667.

¹⁴Cf. Alberto Petrucciani, “Every Reader His Work, Every Work its Title (and Author): The New Italian Cataloguing Code REICAT,” International Cataloguing and Bibliographic Control 39, no. 2 (2010): 23–27; Petrucciani, “From the FRBR Model to the Italian Cataloging Code.”

¹⁵Elad Segev, Google and the Digital Divide: The Bias of Online Knowledge (Oxford: Chandos, 2010), 75–108, 183–190; Vivienne Waller, “Searching Where for What: A Comparison of Use of the Library Catalogue, Google and Wikipedia,” Library and Information Research 35, no. 110 (2011): 65–82. Always useful is the detailed list of differences provided by Bernhard Eversberg, “On the Theory of Library Catalogs and Search Engines,” 2002 (rev. 2007), http://www.allegro-c.de/formate/tlcse.htm.

¹⁶Cf. Tanja Merčun and Maja Žumer, “New Generation of Catalogues for the New Generation of Users,” Program 42, no. 3 (2008): 243–261; Antonio Scolari, “OPAC & dintorni: essere o non essere nella rete,” DigItalia 5, no. 2 (2010): 29–40; Louise F. Spiteri and Laurel Tarulli, “Social Discovery Systems in Public Libraries: If We Build Them, Will They Come?” Library Trends 61, no. 1 (2012): 132–147.

¹⁷Martha M. Yee, “FRBRization: A Method for Turning Online Public Finding Lists into Online Public Catalogs,” Information Technology and Libraries 24, no. 3 (2005): 77–95.

¹⁸Scolari, “OPAC & dintorni,” 33.