Re MARC Discussion Paper no. 2008-DP04
This paper raises many areas where the current MARC structure does not
support the elements needed in RDA. If RDA is to be adopted by the
cataloging community, NLM believes we should see this as the ideal
opportunity to develop a new carrier for our bibliographic records and
focus our energy there, rather than spending time trying to continue to
tweak MARC and shoehorn in more data. The time spent in trying to
define new tags and indicators for the more granular RDA elements, as
well as trying to reconcile coded values with RDA controlled lists,
could be more productively spent on development of a new carrier that
truly supports FRBR cataloging and displays. Few of our vendors fully
support the MARC format as currently written, and they are unlikely to
make significant updates to their MARC ILS products. It is time to work
with vendors and develop a carrier for the next generation catalog.
Elizabeth Plantz
NLM rep to MARBI
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