LISNews: Librarian News

Anonymous Patron writes "Tim Coates of the Good Library Blog says 'Within most of the 200 public library authorities in the UK there is a cataloguing operation which makes sure that the catalogue data sent with books conforms to the cataloguing procedures of that authority.' 'There is no need to do this work.' 'It is all a waste of money — but jolly good fun.' August 15, 2007Fifteen million pounds each year to re-catalogue books that have already been catalogued http://www.goodlibraryguide.com/blog/archives/2007 /08/fifteen_million.html September 7, 2007Carry on Cataloguing http://www.goodlibraryguide.com/blog/archives/2007 /09/carry_on_catalo.html September 9, 2007How many cataloguers are there in Essex Public Libraries? http://www.goodlibraryguide.com/blog/archives/2007 /09/how_many_catalo_1.html September 10, 2007Bibliographic Data http://www.goodlibraryguide.com/blog/archives/2007 /09/bibliographic_d.html September 13, 2007Cataloguing a go-go http://www.goodlibraryguide.com/blog/archives/2007 /09/cataloguing_a_g.html"

Eric Lease Morgan has created a simple and traditional library catalog of about 300,000 items using the MyLibrary software. From the about page:

This is an index of just less than 300,000 MARC records -- a
traditional library catalog. MARC records were downloaded from
the Library of Congress. MARC data was cross-walked to MyLibrary
(Dublin Core) fields and imported. The content of the MyLibrary
database was indexed with Kinosearch and made accessible via an
SRU interface. Search results sport cover art from Amazon.com. If
reviews exist, then they can be read. Users can to view the full
MARC records in tagged, MARCXML, and MODS formats. Users can
create accounts for themselves and have items (virtually)
delivered to them.

The implementation is not necessarily intended to be a production service but rather exists to demonstrate what can be done with MyLibrary -- an open source digital library framework & toolbox.

Video of presentation by Tim Spalding, the founder of LibraryThing.
Here is the overview of the program at the Library of Congress site.
The Library of Congress presents a program in its "Digital Future & You" series featuring LibraryThing, a social cataloging and social networking Web site.

Speaker Biography: Tim Spalding is the founder of the social cataloging website, LibraryThing. Before starting LibraryThing, he was a graduate student in Greek and Latin at the University of Michigan, worked for Houghton-Mifflin publishers in Boston, and as a freelance web developer and web publisher. He lives in Portland, Maine, with his wife, HarperCollins author Lisa Carey.

Above was the direct link to the video. This link goes to the LOC page and has the synopsis and also has a link to the video.