I'd like to second Kevin's view. What is the use of an authority 
record if it's not "authoritative."
SARs created without the piece in hand (and I refer primarily to 
CIP records) sometimes had headings which didn't match the actual 
piece, and these headings, instead of being corrected, tended to 
perpetuate themselves in bib record after bib record. The problem 
would probably only get worse if SARs were created, say, based on 
vendor records. Giving the source is so easy now using the macro, 
that I don't believe skimping in this area is worth it.
Ann

Ann Ercelawn
Vanderbilt University Library
phone:615-343-2088
fax: 615-343-1292
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--On Thursday, November 16, 2006 4:14 PM -0600 "Kevin M. Randall" 
<[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> At 07:03 AM 11/14/2006, Amy H Turner wrote:
>> The question is, which is less useful, an authority record
>> lacking  information about the source of the series, or no
>> authority record at  all?  What if PCC made this information
>> optional?
>
> One of the most important foundations of AACR2 cataloging is
> transcribing what you see on the piece.  And this makes
> correctly-created AACR2 records *infinitely* more valuable than
> pre-AACR2 records in doing research and problem-solving.
>
> Unfortunately, there are also a fair number of bib records in
> OCLC coded as AACR2 that do not meet the standards in AACR2.  I'm
> not sure if these were created by catalogers who started working
> before AACR2 and never got (or bothered to get) retrained, or by
> newer catalogers who got little or no training or supervision.
> Either way, the records are not up to snuff, and I am certainly
> *not* going to put any kind of PCC imprimatur on any record that
> I haven't compared with the physical resource and fixed up the
> errors.  (There is one particular library whose cataloging I am
> familiar with, and there have been times where virtually every
> single MARC field needed minor or major correction.  It's almost
> a rarity to come across a 245 that doesn't need to be fixed in
> that library's records.)
>
> While authority record creation procedures definitely need some
> loosening up, information giving the source and form found is not
> an area to do it, if the heading is to be called "fully
> established".  If there is an option to omit source information,
> then the record should be coded as provisional (and require
> source information before being called fully established).
>
> Kevin M. Randall
> Head of Serials Cataloging
> Northwestern University Library
> 1970 Campus Drive
> Evanston, IL  60208-2300
> email: [log in to unmask]
> phone: (847) 491-2939
> fax:   (847) 491-4345