hi,
i suspect dempsey was making the point that the holdings per record
were much greater for LoC records than for any other category.
not necessarily that the 12% was significant--only that the
12% probably has more total holdings than the the remaining
88%. i think i've read something like that somewhere.
in that sense the LoC records could be considered a "primary source"
--always moving forward
p.s. i've noticed recently that "moving forward" has become the
slogan of the day. why is that? why must we move forward.
is sideways so terrible? this phenomenon seems to occurring
in sports, academe, librarianship and many other areas of
human endeavor. does moving forward have to do with global
warming?
A. Ralph Papakhian, Indiana University Music Library
Bloomington, IN 47405 812/855-2970 [EMAIL PROTECTED]
co-owner: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
On Sun, 2 Dec 2007, Diane I. Hillmann wrote:
Karen Coyle wrote:
Diane, during the last open meeting, Lorcan Dempsey read a few figures
from a statistical report of OCLC's. I don't remember the details, but
it was about the number of holdings attached to LoC records v. non-LoC,
and his point was that LoC records are favored heavily. The WorldCat
site lists LoC as 12% of the contributed records, 86% "participant" and
2% "participant-entered LC". (Anyone know what that latter is?)
I suspect those are old, pre-MARC records entered into the database
by a member library. They would probably have an 040 with LC as $a
and some other library as $c, thus being distinguishable from
standard LC contributed copy.
Hmm, 12% sounds like a long way from the " ... primary source of
bibliographic data ... " to me.
