What can be done now to create the more accurate cataloging we all desire.

Is this a neglected implied mission of the ARSC Cataloging Committee?
Properly done, this benefits all, libraries as well as the general public.
If so should this be on their agenda at the ARSC conference?

AT the moment, the committee  seems to be working on issues related to
libraries only.  They also have met for the last 2  years opposite the
meeting of the Copyright Committee.  I'm interested in both but the
schedulers can't seem to separate the times for them and adjusting the
present copyright law, which impinges on musical creation, is my priority.

Steve Smolian



-----Original Message-----
From: Association for Recorded Sound Discussion List
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Tom Fine
Sent: Thursday, January 07, 2016 8:46 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: [ARSCLIST] A case in point why CDText should have been used for
metadata from Day 1

The 1995 Smithsonian collection "Big Band Renaissance: the Evolution of the
Jazz Orchestra" is a great example of group-source metadata FUBAR.
dBPowerAmp's CD ripper program allows use of multiple metadata sources, and
by default does some sort of amalgam of whatever sources you've told it to
check. The amalgam on this set is comical! So I manually checked metadata
from each source. They are all different, and only GD3 (whatever that is) is
anywhere near accurate. I find this often happens with compilations -- for
instance freedB and/or AllMusic will have different top-level stuff like
titles and whether or not it's a compilation for different individual CDs in
the same box set.

All of this could have been prevented if the industry embraced CDText from
the get-go and agreed on uniform naming standards for artists and song
titles. I remember the arguments back in the 80's -- it's hard enough to
enter PQ codes into these balky Sony editing systems, and no CD players have
displays for CDText, so why bother. Very short-sighted. The net-net today is
that anyone who wants uniform naming and accurate information in a digital
library has to spend a lot of time editing the crappy metadata that's out
there in group-source land. And, copyright owners have ceded control of
their metadata to a group-source no-QC cluter-you-know-what.

-- Tom Fine