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CONFERENCE REPORTS
Jan Mayo, Column Editor

** REPORTS FROM THE **
2005 ALA Midwinter Conference
Boston, Massachusetts


Machine-Readable Bibliographic Information Committee (MARBI)
Liaison Report
submitted by John Attig
Pennsylvania State University

The Machine-Readable Bibliographic Information (MARBI) Committee and the USMARC Advisory Committee met for two sessions during the ALA Midwinter Meeting in Boston, Massachusetts. The following is a brief summary of the meeting. More information is available on the MARC Advisory Committee Web page at <http://www.loc.gov/marc/marcadvz.html>.

Proposal No. 2005-01: Definition of Field 766 in the MARC 21 Classification Format
This proposal adds an additional subfield required in order to calculate numbers using some of the tables. MARBI approved the proposal.

Proposal No. 2005-02: Definition of Subfield $y in Field 020 (International Standard Book Number) and Field 010 (Library of Congress Control Number)
This proposal called for the definition of subfield $y in fields 020 and 010 in order to distinguish between cancelled/invalid numbers (encoded in subfield $z) and numbers that are valid but are either non-unique or not applicable to the resource being described.

In discussion, it was finally decided that the only distinction that needed to be made in the case of ISBNs and LCCNs was whether the number was a valid number that could be used for matching (subfield $a) or a number that was in any way unreliable for matching (subfield $z). MARBI defeated the proposal. Some clarification of the scope of subfield $z will be added to the format documentation.

Proposal No. 2005-03: Definition of Subfield $2 and Second Indicator Value 7 in Fields 866-868 (Textual Holdings) of the MARC 21 Holdings Format
This proposal calls for adding indicator value 7 and subfield $2 to the textual holdings display fields, in order to identify the display standard used. MARBI approved the proposal.

Proposal No. 2005-04: Hierarchical Geographic Names
At previous meetings, MARBI had decided that the format should support the use of hierarchical place names as both place of publication and as subject, and that a new field (662) should be defined for the latter. The current proposal dealt with the subfield codes that should be defined for fields 662 and 752.

The discussion was inconclusive; it was very difficult to balance the needs to support particular conventions for encoding place-name hierarchies and the desire for subfields that would be generally applicable to any place-name hierarchy. It was decided to investigate further the existence and requirements of other standards, in particular the Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names. The saga will continue this summer at the ALA Annual Conference in Chicago.

Proposal No. 2005-05: Change of Unicode Mapping for the Extended Roman &quor;alif" Character
This proposal corrects an earlier choice for mapping the character in question. MARBI approved the proposal.

Discussion Paper No. 2005-DP01: Subject Access to Images
This discussion paper talks about the distinction between what an image is about and what is depicted in the image. MARBI had an interesting discussion. It seems clear that there is an issue here that should be explored further. The next step will be to determine the functional requirements for making this distinction in MARC records and in MARC-based systems: searching/indexing, display of results, etc.

Other Business: MARBI received a motion from the ALCTS Committee on Cataloging: Asian and African Materials in support of recording vernacular scripts and implementing Unicode. MARBI asked the Library of Congress for a progress report, and were informed that there should be a discussion paper or proposal dealing with some of the outstanding Unicode issues ready for discussion at the 2005 Annual Conference in Chicago. While this will not resolve all the outstanding issues, it should be a major step forward.


Committee on Cataloging: Description and Access (CC:DA)
Liaison Report
submitted by Greta de Groat
Stanford University Libraries

This report covers amendments to AACR2; plans for AACR3 Part 1; CC:DA discussions and actions at ALA Midwinter in Boston.

AACR2
There is one more short amendments package planned for AACR2. The 2005 Amendments should be published this summer. They will probably contain revisions to the rules for capitalization to accommodate unusual corporate names such as "eBay" and "netLibrary", as well as revisions to the capitalization of German, removal of the Turkish word "bir" from the list of initial articles, and revisions to the definition of "colored illustrations". The proposal to revise 21.0D to allow wider inclusion of relator terms in headings has been withdrawn, to be considered in the revision of rules for access points in AACR3. This amendments package will be the last for AACR2; all efforts for the next few years will be given over to preparation of AACR3.

AACR3
The drafting of AACR3 is proceeding according to a very aggressive timetable. The draft of Part 1, "Description", was issued to CC:DA members for review in late December, and has received a limited and controlled distribution outside of CC:DA. Comments regarding the draft were due to CC:DA by February 11 for synthesis into the CC:DA report, due March 28. In the meantime, the JSC and editor Tom Delsey will be drafting Part 2 on choice of access points, which should be sent to the JSC to review this May. There will be a Part 3 on form of access points (including authority control), plus an overhaul of the introduction and general principles. The aim is to send the completed AACR3 to the publishers by the end of 2006 with publication scheduled for summer of 2007. The rationale for the AACR3 is simplification and consistency, as well as to encourage its use as a content standard for metadata schema, and to incorporate FRBR terminology and concepts.

There is an excellent background on the draft of Part 1 at <http://www.libraries.psu.edu/tas/jca/ccda/docs/chair22.pdf>. To summarize the major changes from AACR3:

Part 1 is divided into 3 sections: "General rules", "Supplementary rules applicable to specific type of content" and "Supplementary rules applicable to specific types of media". The "General rules" section is further divided into: "General rules for description", "Resources issued in successive parts" (i.e. serials and monographic sets issued over time) and "Integrating resources". Most rules have been moved into the "General rules" section, with references to the other sections when applicable. A section has been added on determining the focus of the description (roughly, mode of issuance), which guides the choice of chief source of information. This and the prescribed sources of information have been incorporated into the "General rules" section. The GMD has been divided into two parts, with a term indicating content and a term indicating medium. The rules are designed to apply equally to published or unpublished materials; rules from Ch. 4 that were inconsistent with general practice were deleted. The current practice of recording "[S.l. : s.n]" for unknown place and publisher is changed in favor of simply not recording this information if unknown. Area 5 has been renamed from "Physical description" to "Technical description". The SMDs have been realigned to provide a more consistent division between physical units and either presentation units or logical aggregations of content. Aside from these changes, most of the content of the draft is similar or the same as AACR2, but rearranged into this general-content-carrier format.

CC:DA Actions and Discussions, January 2005

Three of the task forces preparing reports on the AACR3 Part 1 draft met in an lively all day meeting on the Friday before the formal CC:DA meeting. Discussion included concerns that the two part GMD and SMD schemas were unwieldy, inconsistent and confusing, and that the generalization of choice of chief source and prescribed sources would result in unintended title changes for serials and more bracketing for non-book materials. It was noted that description of digital media was still unclear.

Discussion of AACR3 provided the main order of business for the formal JSC meetings. Jennifer Bowen, ALA representative to the JSC, reported on the recent JSC meeting and gave background information on AACR3. Points were synthesized from the Friday meeting and discussion continued along similar lines. CC:DA will recommend that all digital sound and video recording media be treated as digital materials. Further concerns aired were that the accelerated production schedule of AACR3 was preventing a necessary re-thinking of the rules and therefore represented an opportunity lost. Some were interested in a "data dictionary" approach, others warned that library administrators would be disappointed that AACR3 would result in no significant change from current practice. A "Group of Five" produced a written statement and submitted it to CC:DA pointing out unresolved issues, such as multiple versions, acknowledgment of the automated environment, consistency with other metadata standards, more rigorous application of FRBR, and acknowledgment of the need to manage record sets and existing records.

Other CC:DA activities included reports on:

Also heard was a proposal to correct the example in AACR2 12.3G1, "Change in numbering". It was agreed that the example is in error and it will be forwarded to the JSC Examples Task Force.



Association of Moving Image Archivists (AMIA)
Cataloging Committee
Liaison Report
 submitted by Sueyoung Park-Primiano
New York University Libraries

AMIA’s Annual Conference was successfully held in Minneapolis, Minnesota, from November 10-13, 2004. In addition to the many workshops, sessions, and committee meetings, the highlight of the Conference was a special screening of the newly restored The King and I, one of the only two films made in CinemaScope 55, in its original aspect ratio on a big screen.

For AMIA’s Cataloging Committee, the torch has been passed on to Nancy Dosch, Archivist at the National Library of Medicine, to preside as Chair for the next two years.

The Cataloging Committee’s Standards Review Subcommittee, under the leadership of Sarah Ziebell Mann, has been very active in 2004. Reports were submitted to the Library of Congress CPSO relating to drafts 2 and 3 of the revisions to LCRI 25.5B. Comments related to direct-to-video releases and the qualifier “(Motion picture)”, distinctions in the publication/distribution statement, the unreliability of GMDs to collocate works, and the need for a uniform title main entry. A third report was submitted to the Society of American Archivists’ Description Section on Describing Archives: A Content Standard (DACS).

As mentioned in past reports, members of the Cataloging Committee continued to contribute to the ongoing development of the “MIC: Moving Image Collections” Website, which is now live at <http://mic.imtc.gatech.edu>. The Website has been greatly expanded and improved since this past August and September, so all are strongly encouraged to take a look, review it, and provide feedback. Comments and questions are most welcome and desired; they should be sent to <mic@loc.gov>.

Technical developments and specifications continue to be documented on the Project Website: <http://gondolin.rutgers.edu/MIC/>. MIC is built on a portal structure to customize information for its diverse audiences. "Choose a portal" to find resources and perform more complex searches for moving images ("Collections Explore") and organizations ("Archive Explore").

For the OLAC community, MIC’s Education and Outreach Committee will be of particular interest. Under the leadership of Andrea Leigh, the Education and Outreach Committee’s Cataloging and Metadata Portal has also recently been updated with links to resources on standards and tools, authority control, systems and utilities, and training and education. The site can be found at: <http://mic.imtc.gatech.edu/catalogers_portal/cat_index.htm>. Again, all are encouraged to visit the site and give feedback. The catalogers in the AMIA community would especially value input from the OLAC community. If anyone is interested in contributing, we are still recruiting volunteers, so please contact me in person or by e-mail or Andrea Leigh by e-mail at <aleigh@ucla.edu>.

For more information on the Conference, Committee projects, or general questions relating to AMIA, please feel free to contact me by e-mail <syp3@nyu.edu> and/or visit the AMIA Website <http://www.amianet.org>. For more information about MIC, please contact the Project Director, Jane Johnson <jdj@ucla.edu>, and/or visit the MIC Project Website <http://gondolin.rutgers.edu/MIC/>.

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Last updated: March 25, 2005
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