Record Authentication as a Barrier: Reflections on Returning to CONSER

Abstract

This article offers reflections on the frustration of not having Program for Cooperative Cataloging (PCC)–conferred enhancement powers over the national database. The writer, trained at a Cooperative Online Serials (CONSER) institution, ponders the lessons of losing, and then regaining, the ability to enhance, correct, or authenticate bibliographic records in tbe Online Computer Library Center (OCLC) WorldCat, with special reference to the shortcomings of vendor-supplied records for e-journals and the need to reconcile local legacy data with the national master record. Attention is drawn to obstacles to sharing enhancement and maintenance responsibility for serial records in particular.

KEYWORDS:

• CONSER
• authentication
• participation
• record maintenance
• OCLC

Notes

1. Estimate from “WorldCat Facts and Statistics,” posted at www.oclc.org (accessed October 26, 2009).

2. Bibliographic Standards Committee, Rare Books and Manuscripts Section, Association of College and Research Libraries. Descriptive Cataloging of Rare Materials (Serials) (Washington, D.C.: Cataloging Distribution Service, Library of Congress, 2008).

3. Robert Maxwell, Maxwell's Handbook for AACR2 (Chicago: American Library Association, 2004).

4. Robert Maxwell, e-mail exchange with the author, August 2009.

5. OCLC's guidelines for the various levels of enhancement and record enrichment are posted online at http://www.oclc.org/bibformats/en/quality/default.shtm

6. Ruth Hughes, personal communication to the author at the Denver ALA Conference, January 2009, continued by e-mail in August 2009.