An up date on the conference held at the National Library of Poland in August 2012 on the challenges facing national bibliographic services in the digital age. The presentation was made at the IFLA WLIC Conference as part of the IFLA Bibliography Standing Committee section of the conference.

1. Bibliography in a Digital Age
Report of the Satellite Meeting
Warsaw, 9th August 2012
Neil Wilson
Information Coordinator
IFLA Bibliography Section
1

2. National Bibliographies in the Digital Age:
Guidance & New Directions (2009)
“The changes brought about
by the World Wide Web & the
explosion of electronic media
have called into question
many of the assumptions on
which national bibliographies
have been founded…”
2

3. National Bibliographies in the Digital Age
2010-
“Considering that the
environment is evolving fast,
this document is expected to be
revised periodically … to reflect
the changes “
Libraries now require a more
flexible, open, & dynamic
solution than traditional
printed text
3

4. Warsaw Meeting
Purpose
To share:
• Experiences
• Techniques
• Challenges
…& begin to identify new themes & best practice
4

5. Bibliography in the Digital Age
Guidelines & Examples
• Neil Wilson: Guidelines for the future: sharing best practice
for national bibliographies in the digital era
• Aniko Dudás: Who are the users and what are their
expectations?
• Marcin Roszkowski: Integration of Polish National
Bibliography within repository platform for science and
humanities
5

6. National Bibliographies Around the
World Handling Online Materials
Practices, Challenges & Plans
• Karin Kleiber: Online materials published in Austria - collecting,
archiving and metadata
• Tuula Haapamäki and Sinikka Luukkanen: Cataloguing Policy in
the National Library of Finland - strategies and practices for the
metadata of digital resources
• Pat Riva: National Bibliography in Canada: Two national
bibliographic agencies, two approaches
• Anke Meyer: The management of a digital national bibliography
at the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek
• Hanne Hørl Hansen: Online materials in The Danish National
Bibliography
6

7. For Those Who Couldn’t Be There…
Presentations are now available from:
www.bn.org.pl/ifla-2012/presentations-and-videos
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8. Outcomes
Emerging Themes
• A need for pragmatic selection policies
• Open services to wider user groups
• Acquisition & application of new skills
• Linking & use of persistent identifiers
• Definition of ‘published’ digital material
• Targeted metadata transformation & crosswalks
• Requirement for multiple forms of metadata
8

9. Evolving Data Requirements
Evolving Market Requirement
National  Printed works + e-books, chapters, articles etc.
Bibliographic  Multimedia (video, audio, software games etc.)
Depth of description
Agencies:  Additional content (contents, reviews, book jacket
images etc.)
 Operate in a global
Traditional Library
market Coverage
 Core descriptive
 Create & supply information
 Authors, titles, ISBN,
metadata for a subjects etc.
 Printed books, serials
wider range of etc.
resources than ever Range of resources requiring description
before
9 9

10. Bibliographic Metadata
More Than Physical Description…
• Metadata can record
multiple properties:
 Licensing terms &
conditions
 Technical &
preservation data
 Structural
information
• To support:
 Collection
management
 Discovery
 Access to content 10

11. Pragmatism & Selection
No universal solution exists & national
variation exists between:
• Coverage of print, digital and multimedia
• Breadth & depth of descriptions applied
• Definition & treatment of materials
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12. Pragmatism & Selection
But agreement that:
• We can’t be exhaustive but we can be representative
• Should balance effort in creation of quality description &
access points
• ‘Minimal’ must still be accurate
• Must be selective in harvesting & enhancement
techniques
• Advance (e.g. CIP) data is still valued
12

13. Changing Environment
Who Are Our Users?
Library users were once
lone researchers but
may now include:
• Collaborative Learners
• Developers
• Machines

14. What Do They Need?
New user types require greater flexibility in:
• Support skills (e.g. IT, legal, library)
• Access options including connection to content
• Output formats & standards
• Personalisation of data and services
But all value consistency, authority &
persistence of services offered…
14

15. Open…
‘Open’ is becoming the
norm via:
• Open licensing models
• Open access routes
Free
• Open standards Offering
Charging is a ‘MARC’ or
‘premium service‘ issue
Increasing data re-use
requires proactive licensing
15

16. Growth Areas 1
• Automated data
creation - and
enhancement
• Web harvesting –
selection/domain/event
• Large scale processing
of e-publications – via
new workflows
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17. Growth Areas 2
• Growth in the use of
ontologies and
controlled vocabularies
• Semantic approaches
– from ‘tags to triples’
• Development and
maintenance of
persistent links & IDs
• Linking - to and from
resources
17

18. Guidance?
In such an era of
disruptive change
libraries need open
access to best
practice on:
• Service delivery & lifecycle
• Resource description &
standards
• Business models &
administration
And much more…
18

19. 2012 Guidelines Proposal
• Create a new web
resource describing best
practice
• Organise by theme
• Provide links to back up
sources to ensure
continuing relevance &
currency
• Supplement with real
world examples when
possible
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20. Proposed Themes 1
Context
The Value of
National
Bibliographies
• The mission of the national
bibliography
• Users & stakeholders
• International
recommendations
• The changing operational
context
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21. Proposed Themes 2
Organisation & Administration
Organisation
• Responsibilities of a national
bibliographic agency
• Legal deposit legislation
• National bibliographic control
• Cooperative options for data
creation
Administration
• Resource issues & business
models
• Measuring the effectiveness of the
national bibliography
• Service lifecycle
• Intellectual property & rights
issues 21

22. Proposed Themes 3
Scope, Selection & Standards
Scoping & Selection
• General selection criteria
• Resource format
• Exclusions policies
Resource Description & Standards
• Bibliographic control principles & content
standards
• Identifiers
• Metadata formats
• Character encoding standards
• Semantic web standards
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23. Proposed Themes 4
Delivery
Service Delivery
• Global context of national
services
• Common requirements e.g.
currency
• Management &
dissemination of changes to
metadata
• Delivery options e.g. online,
linked data, PDF etc
•
User support
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24. Timeline
At IFLA 2012 SC meetings:
• Discussed Conference outcomes
• Agreed methodology
Autumn 2012 – Summer
2013
• Allocate work for sections &
invite expert contributions
• Create site structure & begin to
populate sample sections
• Create initial text with links
• Offer sample pages for feedback
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25. New Best Practice Guidelines
How Can You Help?
• Web site: http://www.ifla.org/en/bibliography
• Blog: http://blogs.ifla.org/bibliography/
25 Images
from