On Tue, Apr 29, 2014 at 1:02 PM, Laura Krier <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Hi Code4Libbers,
>
> I'd like to find out from as many people as are interested what barriers
> you feel exist right now to you releasing your library's bibliographic
> metadata openly. I'm curious about all kinds of barriers: technical,
> political, financial, cultural. Even if it seems obvious, I'd like to hear
> about it.

In the field (hah) of MARC records, some vendors charge for MARC as a
value-add on top of the electronic resources they provide. Here's one
I could think of off the top of my head:
http://gdc.gale.com/products/eighteenth-century-collections-online/acquire/marc-records/

So as soon as you start mixing records that you've purchased
(presumably under a license that restricts redistribution) into an
otherwise open set of metadata, you're in a world of pain... because
typically systems are binary (either they make all of the
bibliographic metadata openly available, or none of it). Of course
this means that many sites are probably serving up these sorts of
records via SRU or Z39.50 when they really should not be. But it
certainly gives pause to sites that might otherwise package up
one-time or monthly dumps of all of their data.

I suspect there are also lingering effects of OCLC's aborted attempt
to place restrictions on the transfer of records from WorldCat back in
2008 [1, 2]. This has now instead become a reasonable recommendation
concerning ODC-BY licensing [3] but the confusion and uncertainty
about which records an OCLC member may redistribute remains.

1. https://web.archive.org/web/20130925190859/http://blog.reeset.net/archives/574
2. https://coffeecode.net/archives/174-Archive-of-OCLC-WorldCat-Policy-as-posted-2008-11-02.html
3. http://www.oclc.org/news/releases/2012/201248.en.html

Dan