Greetings Karen Calhoun,
Given OpenSource/Apachešs SOLR 1.3 and its new features, VUfind are trying
to match headings from the bibliographic index to an authority index.
This thread has been focused on a notification for the weekly NAF updates
(not on getting the full NAF, nor on reminiscing, with all due respect,
NACOšs history and strength).
We have a way to harvest the LCSH and NAF files; we have a way to get the
LCSH updates from CSB. The only updates we can not get (without paying
annually $5,200 to an authority vendor) are the NAF updates. Since OCLC is
getting these NAF updates from NACO, making them available to OCLC members,
I have proposed that OCLC would also provide the 010 list for those weekly
NAF updates. Nothing else.
The OpenSource venues for metadata harvesting and discovery beyond the
traditional ILS are happening, right now. Possibly, practices and decisions
that seemed expedient 20 years ago grew out of touch. This is an opportunity
for a collaboration between your office, OCLC/WorldCat and Metadata Services
and CODE4LIB. If your reply is that we wait 2 years for this to be reviewed,
or that we go to another vendor, that will do.
Regards,
Yašaqov Ziso, eResources-Serials, Rowan University
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(from AUTOCAT)
Hello again Ya'aqov Ziso,
Sorry this is long, but I thought some clarity might be achieved by
providing a perspective on the partnership between LC, the bibliographic
utilities, and libraries that has brought the NACO program to its present
strength.
In answer to your questions:
1. OCLC has never charged for use of the LC NAF and does not intend to do
so.
2. Because there have never been charges, there have been no credits for
NACO authority records. Many years ago, OCLC experimented with building an
update service for authority records, but there was insufficient demand for
it among OCLC members. I am not sure, but this kind of service may be
available nowadays from one of the authority control vendors.
3 and 4a. For many years -- since about 1988 -- OCLC, RLG, and LC were
partners in the distribution and management of the NAF. (I wrote a paper
about this collaboration some years ago, which I believe can still be
accessed through a Google search--will try to send the URL separately).
Before 1988, NACO contributors typed paper worksheets and mailed them to LC
for rekeying. The CLR (now CLIR) provided seed money for RLG and OCLC to
build contribution and data exchange systems to support online NACO work in
both RLG and OCLC, together with the means to keep LC's and the two
utilities' copies of the NAF within 24 hours of synchronization with each
other. This was called the Linked Systems Project. Some old timers may
remember it.
The CLR seed funding was quickly exhausted, and the two utilities finished
the development and then supported the costs of file synchronzation and
online contribution by NACO participants on their own, without charging
fees. Since the RLG OCLC merger, OCLC has been supporting the NAF
contribution/data exchange system. Fees for the service have never been
charged.
Under the circumstances, LC and OCLC believe there is a mutual exchange of
value between themselves and the NACO libraries, and the partners have
called it even. To your point, LC does not charge OCLC for NAF data, and
OCLC does not charge LC or NACO participants for hosting the NACO
contribution/data exchange/synchronization system.
I have 20 years of perspective on this history of support for NACO, since I
was directly involved with building the Linked Systems Project as well as
getting NACO libaries trained to use it from 1988 through about 1993. It's
my belief that without the dedication, successful partnership, and
significant contribution of resources by the people at LC, RLG, and OCLC to
the system that underpins NACO, the NACO program woukd never have been able
to expand to what it is today. Obviously the thriving program that exists
today woukd never have happened without the commitment of the NACO libraries
either -- but it took all of us to build it and keep it going all these
years.
4b. I believe CODE4LIB could subscribe to the NAF through LC's Catalog
Distribution Service.
Hope this is helpful to you.
Karen
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