"What we need next is a study that will take the additional cost of a full 
record and determine whether that extra work increases the discovery and 
selection of the resource by users. Difficult, but I think not impossible."

Amen to that. But very difficult. If someone would do that, I would be 
thrilled to see the data. But it is beyond the scope of what we can do 
here at UW.

Like I said, this was just one small limited study in one library.

And we will need to do a bit more testing ourselves. This was just the 
first step, to see if BSR was even worth pursuing.

Now we can see already that we will want the "floor plus". For instance, 
looking at the BSR MAP, it seemed that tracing publishers was not in the 
"spirit of the floor" (as we called it), but for gov't publications we 
will definitely want to trace gov. bodies as publishers. Things like that.

So once we decide what additional elements we need, then that will affect 
timing. We hope to test again, if we can manage it. Other factors as you 
mentioned could affect results.

That's why we really, really need other tests. Maybe many small tests with 
different materials and different libraries will add up to something more 
reliable.


************
Diana Brooking             (206) 685-0389
Cataloging Librarian       (206) 685-8782 fax
Suzzallo Library           [log in to unmask]
University of Washington
Box 352900
Seattle WA  98195-2900

On Wed, 7 Jul 2010, Laurence S. Creider wrote:

> Very interesting study, to which I would like to add a few comments.
>
> Your study seems to show that use of the BSR reduces the number of subject
> headings per record and thereby saves a considerable amount of time (ca.
> 25% for your sample).  This is great news for administrators, but the
> advantage to users is not so clear.  What we need next is a study that
> will take the additional cost of a full record and determine whether that
> extra work increases the discovery and selection of the resource by users.
> Difficult, but I think not impossible.
>
> Second, in order to reflect more accurately the sorts of things that
> original catalogers deal with, there should probably be more humanities
> and less scientific materials and more foreign language materials.  It is
> difficult to know whether these different materials would have
> significantly different savings from using the BSR record as opposed to
> the Full record.  Perhaps in literature and not in history?
>
> Thanks for sharing this and for providing good documentation.
>
> -- 
> Laurence S. Creider
> Special Collections Librarian
> New Mexico State University
> Las Cruces, NM  88003
> Work: 575-646-7227
> Fax: 575-646-7477
> [log in to unmask]
>
> On Wed, July 7, 2010 5:05 pm, D. Brooking wrote:
>> I gave a brief talk at ALA about a small time test of the BIBCO Standard
>> Record "floor" that was done at the University of Washington Libraries.
>> Here is the url for a more complete description of the test:
>>
>> http://staffweb.lib.washington.edu/committees/CPC/bsr
>>
>> This was just one test at one institution, so we would like to see if
>> others
>> could do their own tests of the BSR and share their results.
>>
>> If you have any questions, please email me or Joe Kiegel, [log in to unmask]
>>
>>
>> ************
>> Diana Brooking             (206) 685-0389
>> Cataloging Librarian       (206) 685-8782 fax
>> Suzzallo Library           [log in to unmask]
>> University of Washington
>> Box 352900
>> Seattle WA  98195-2900
>>
>
>
>