Wales = Brilliant Librarians + Digitization
Have you seen this “A Librarian Takes on Google Books“*? It is just brilliant on so many levels:
- librarians not just recognizing the need but taking action
- non-librarians seeing the worth of the project
- purchasing and utilizing appropriate technology
- quality AND quantity being considered and acted upon
Best of all? This near the end of the blog entry:
The librarian believes he has found a new cause for his profession, to give a secure home to digitized texts produced with the highest quality standards and available freely to all. “These are huge benefits,” he says, “and should be fought for by all of those who care about unimpeded public access to knowledge.”
I think Andrew Green is my new hero (then again, I haven’t yet seen what he is doing about metadata).
*Please note, the idea of the Google Book project is lovely. Let’s get everything so everyone can access it. The issues involved in such an endeavor are incredibly complex (from copyright to access to cost to quality and beyond). I admire the ideal but am not enamored with the reality. For your edification, Library Journal has published a list of links regarding the topic. You can also just search for tons of for/against articles, blogs, etc.
I am delighted to read your blog. I can identify with “Andrew Green is new hero (then again, I haven’t seen what he is doing about meta-data)”. The hero part I can identify with — he is a leader for many librarians. So let me say a few things about what he is doing about meta-data. His library is one of the few libraries in the world that have implemented FRBR and taken it further. They have extended FRBR to address the difficult issues dealing with archives. Working together with VTLS, NLW provided insights into the extensions of FRBR to meet the archival standards as presented in ISAD. To quote Andrew — “Many libraries, including the National Library of Wales, hold substantial archive collections which require different descriptive standards from printed materials. The National Library’s new Information Management System allows for integrated searching of the Library’s large archive collection. Although the current service needs further enhancement, we are delighted that VTLS is pioneering this new development and trust that libraries and other memory institutions throughout the world will benefit,” says Andrew Green, Librarian of NLW.
This quote from Andrew can be found in
http://www.vtls.com/pressrelease/VTLS-Introduces-Archives-Management-for-Libraries-39
Thank you very much! I have been watching what VTLS is doing (and written a bit in the blog) with FRBR and RDA ideas. I’ve been impressed. Someday I want to get ‘under the hood’ and play with it but from what I’ve seen, I like it.