MARC
DISCUSSION PAPER NO. 2010-DP03: Encoding
the International Standard Name Identifier (ISNI) and the International
Standard Text Code (ISTC) in the MARC 21 Bibliographic and Authority
Format
This
discussion paper (DP), brought forward by the British Library, was
amended
before coming to MARBI to cover only the International Standard Name
Identifier. The ISNI is a draft ISO standard that would provide a code
uniquely
identifying the “public identities of parties.” It
is intended in part to
provide a machine-actionable identifier that will allow
“automated processes
between libraries, other data providers, and different rights
management
societies.” There was discussion about the sources of name
information and the
possibly ambiguous or conflicting nature of name information that could
come
from numerous possible sources. The British Library, however, feels
that it has
adequate control of name information sources in order to move forward.
The
discussion paper will be returned to MARBI as a proposal.
This
DP was brought forward by the RDA/MARC Working Group as a way to input
uniform
resource identifiers (URIs) for controlled values in the MARC fields to
which
they are appropriate. The paper suggests different possible input
scenarios,
typically using angle brackets to offset the identifiers from
surrounding text.
It was noted that because of the wide usage of angle brackets in
various coding
languages, primarily XML, angle brackets could be problematic for this
data.
The RDA/MARC Working Group and others will continue to experiment with
different
methods for encoding URIs in MARC; no decision was reached on the DP.
This
DP, from the German-speaking MARC constituency, discusses the
possibility of
providing a position in the 008 that will indicate that a bibliographic
record
was formulated according to ISBD, but that ISBD punctuation is not
included in
the record. This is because German and Austrian catalogers are
accustomed to
system-provided ISBD punctuation and generally do not input it
themselves. The
discussion covered many possible implications of such a scheme,
especially as
it might relate to cooperative cataloging with Anglophone and other
institutions. It was pointed out that some ISBD punctuation and
positions do
not have one-to-one relationships with the text that follows the
punctuation
and the absence of any punctuation before a $b in a 245 (for example)
would
leave record-users unsure what the relationship of the title and other
title or
parallel title was. The representative for German MARC users suggested
a new
code be defined in the 008 that would indicate that a record was
formulated
according to ISBD but did not use ISBD punctuation. The DP will return
as a
proposal.
This
proposal, brought by the Library of Congress, allows the use of $3 in
the 024
field to indicate to what part of a resource the coordinates in the 024
apply,
if there is possible ambiguity about the location; the typical example
is to
use the $3 to indicate that the coordinates apply to the mouth of a
river, not
some other part further upstream. The proposal was passed.
This
proposal, which has strong possible implications for music catalogers,
was
brought to MARBI by the RDA/MARC Working Group. It defines new fields
and
elements in the bibliographic and authority formats for works and
expressions,
with some implications for fields that had already been defined for the
formats, mainly moving some information from 6xx fields to 37x fields.
The
proposal defines fields for works, including but not limited to musical
works,
that indicate the form, date, medium of performance, key and mode, and
several
other aspects of the work, including the widely debated
“other distinguishing
characteristics of the work or expression,” which is somewhat
analogous to a
qualifier used to break a conflict in current name-authority practice.
These
new fields would allow music catalogers to include a great deal of
relevant
information in work-identifying headings in which the preferred title
(i.e.
uniform title) is formatted in such a way that this information is
missing from
the heading, as occurs with many distinctive titles.
This
proposal was passed with some editorial revision, and the proviso that
it would
initially be used primarily as a way to experiment with creating
work-and
expression-level records.
This
proposal from the RDA/MARC Working Group also has some strong possible
implications for music catalogers. Music catalogers attempting to
create
bibliographic records for sound recordings using RDA noticed that while
“date
of capture” and “place of capture” are
defined separately in RDA, they map to
two possible fields in MARC, and they are generally recorded in the
same place
in the 518 note without differentiation. Several possible remedies for
this
were proposed, including using multiple 518 fields, enhancing the
content of
the 033 field so that it could include full place of capture
information, or
adding subfields to the 518 note to make it possible to differentiate
between
place and time of capture through subfield parsing.
Use
of multiple 518 fields was generally thought to be an imperfect
solution, in
part because it could trigger bibliographic records with numerous 518s.
Both of
the other options had positive and negative aspects, as the discussion
of this
issue on the MLA list in January 2010 indicated. MARBI decided to
define the
033 $d so that the field can include not only a date or date range and
a place
indicated by the appropriate LC geographic cutter, but also a field for
free-text information on the specific location (i.e. a concert hall or
recording studio) in which the location took place.
MARBI
also decided to implement new codes in the 518 field, as the proposal
suggests.
Despite the sometimes-ambiguous information in the free-text 518, it
was felt
that this would bring both the 518 and 033 fields in line with RDA
requirements. The proposal passed with some editorial revisions.
This
proposal attracted a certain amount of controversy, because it was not
immediately apparent how series information could be
institution-specific.
However, LC and PCC representatives clarified one specific aspect of
the
proposal: that it is primarily for institutions contributing to the
Registry of
Digital Masters and some other digital preservation initiatives, in
which it
would be useful to include local series information indicating which
institution had contributed the record and some other information.
Also, it was
pointed out that series information can operate in a way similar to the
common
practice of citing named collections in some 7xx fields, and that
practice in
this area was so mixed that it was not thought feasible to choose any
single
solution. This proposal was passed with minor editorial revisions.
Although
there was somewhat heated discussion of this when it appeared before
MARBI as a
discussion paper, the wording has been modified and the scope of the
proposal
clarified considerably. It was decided to go ahead with new codes to
indicate
whether an electronic resource were web-based or direct access (e.g. a
DVD-ROM). One aspect of the proposal was changed, however: code s will
be
retained for use by institutions who do not wish to adopt the new codes.
Prepared
by Jim Alberts
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Last updated February 19, 2010