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Edmunds states that training, technology, documentation, and staff development costs would be high, citing evidence presented by other notable library scholars, including Marshall Breeding, as well as financial cost information associated with grant-funded BIBFRAME efforts. According to Edmunds, Clarivate and (the much smaller but relevant) EBSCO will dominate the library landscape. While leasing or remote access to library materials is not new, Edmunds is correct that today's landscape of e-books and other digital content (Overdrive, Hoopla, etc.) are the norm. Edmunds highlights the irony of RDA development (in the context of BIBFRAME, the Library Reference Model (LRM), and library linked data) in truly addressing the realities presented by digital content presentation and discovery."
Making and Managing Metadata
Having written several articles on BIBFRAME, semantic architecture, and their relationship to traditional cataloging in these pages over the years, I was intrigued to read a series of articles entitled "BIBFRAME Must Die"! The article trilogy, written by Jeff Edmunds, is a thoughtful, impassioned view of BIBFRAMEss deficiencies, the Official RDA Toolkit, and the future o? MARC cataloging?
Edmunds, according to the Navobokian, the official website of the International Vladimir Nabokov Society, is the Digital Access Coordinator at the University Libraries of the Pennsylvania State University." He has served in this role for more than three decades. In addition to writing numerous articles about cataloging and digital libraries, Edmunds is a Nabokov scholar, whose works have appeared in notable journals including Nabokov Studies, The Slavic and East European Journal, McSweeney's, and Formules (Paris, France), among others. Translated into Russian, Edmunds work has also been featured in Nezavisimaia gazeta, Novaia IUnost', and Inostrannaia literatura.
Why BIBFRAME and Library Linked Data Models are Flawed
Edmunds quickly contends that the ideas of viewing library materials in terms of Works, Expressions, Manifestations, and Items are flawed today and probably always were. He argues that the bibliographic universe on which BIBFRAME is based has developed into what he identifies as a multiverse of
full-text indexing, big data, and increasingly impressive Al systems that can parse data and draw accurate inferences in the absence of clean, consistently packaged data, rather than on tenuous and ever-fluid relationships between entities that BIBFRAME and RDA try to "bake in," at enormous cost to catalogers, vendors, and libraries.·
Five Key Reasons BIBFRAME must Die
Edmunds outlines five key reasons BIBFRAME must die and offers rationale behind each:
1. BIBFRAME would cost libraries dearly. Edmunds states that training, technology, documentation, and staff development costs would be high, citing evidence presented by other notable library scholars, including Marshall Breeding, as well as financial cost information associated with grant-funded BIBFRAME efforts. These include costs incurred by Linked Data for Libraries (LD4L) project participants - the Library of Congress, Stanford, and the University of Alberta. Furthermore, Edmunds muses on his own employer's $140 million budget deficit and the odds that conversion to BIBFRAME would be funded under such budgetary conditions.
2. BIBFRAME is infeasible. A number of key factors, including abandoning MARC, building of a standard BIBFRAME, adopting BIBFRAME by major library vendors, and overhauling OCLC's WorldCat, all indicate that such a project would face major hurdles. Those facts, along with the requirements of interfacing with RDA and constructing a linked data-based central triplestore catalog (to house contributed cataloging structures) add additional credibility to Edmunds' infeasibility argument.'
3. BIBFRAME adds no value to the discovery ecosystem. Claims that BIBFRAME will create an enhanced user experience and promote better discovery are, according to Edmunds, without merit. He supports his "no added value" argument with expert reflections from Kyle Banerjee (creator of the Cataloging Calculator) and quotes Banerjee, who wrote,
Linked Data is a powerful tool, but only for problems that have technical origins. As the term implies, Linked Data depends on data. Metadata needs consistent and complete access points. Ontologies and vocabularies need to be comprehensive and wellmaintained. Systems need to know what to do with the data they retrieve. None of those requirements is met for general library use, nor is there reason to expect they will be $
4. BIBFRAME is user unfriendly. Noting that the Library of Congress will not officially adopt the RDA Toolkit until all catalogers are brought into BIBFRAME, Edmunds illustrates how user unfriendly BIBFRAME really is. Also, the slow rollout of the RDA Toolkit (anticipated to be from 2023 to 2027) reinforces the idea that many BIBFRAME adoption issues have not been fully resolved.
5. BIBFRAME is borne of and steeped in inequity. This claim, according to Edmunds, relates to his opinion that the majority of BIBFRAME institutions are "some of the most well-resourced, serving Predominantly White Institutions (PWIs) with multibillion-dollar endowments." He cites Karen Coyle's view that BIBFRAME"s promoters represent a small minority of the library community and may not serve the library community as a whole.
Edmunds closes out the first installment of the BIBFRAME Must Die trilogy with thoughts on his frustrations with the BIBFRAME replacement theory, which must have been motivating factors for writing the trilogy's second and third installments.
"BIBFRAME Must Die, Part II": Lamenting the Official RDA Toolkit
In Part II, Edmunds zeroes in on why the "underpinning the LRM, BIBFRAME, and RDA as expressed in the Official RDA Toolkit are so divorced from reality, and why this disconnect is so potentially disastrous for the cataloging profession." Following the model of his first "BIBFRAME Must Die" installment, he offers five fundamental reasons the Official RDA Toolkit and the theories on which it is based are fundamentally flawed.
1. Catalogs are over. Edmunds argues the traditional, holdingsbased library catalogs of the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s have been replaced by discovery catalogs that include a combination of full-text indexing, algorithmbased searching, and knowledge base content display and retrieval. He views the replacement of traditional, one-record-to-oneresource MARC model as a fruitless, unnecessary exercise that will be costly and yield minimal gains, if any, in resource discovery and retrieval.
2. The future of libraries is oligopoly. According to Edmunds, Clarivate and (the much smaller but relevant) EBSCO will dominate the library landscape. They Will, in his view, dictate content, searchability, and analytics, negating any opportunities for libraries (especially academic ones) to adhere to traditional non-RDA cataloging practices and explore truly local cataloging best practices.
3. Our collections are no longer ours. While leasing or remote access to library materials is not new, Edmunds is correct that today's landscape of e-books and other digital content (Overdrive, Hoopla, etc.) are the norm. No longer are library collections, in his words, "accumulations of discrete, owned materials, stored on shelves or in boxes and lovingly curated by trained professionals." They have been transformed into, "extraordinarily volatile batches of e-things in continuous, unpredictable flux over which libraries have no ownership and little or no control."
4. Our collections are extremely homogeneous. Again, the idea that one library's collection differs fundamentally from another library's collection has changed considerably. While there still may be a limited environment for what was traditionally interlibrary loan, the catalog's role in this effort has been significantly reduced.
5. RDA fails to acknowledge digital realities. Edmunds highlights the irony of RDA development (in the context of BIBFRAME, the Library Reference Model (LRM), and library linked data) in truly addressing the realities presented by digital content presentation and discovery." RDA rules and approaches, according to Edmunds, are often vague and overly obtuse as a result.
The Future of Cataloging and Edmunds' Thoughts on MARC Cataloging s Future
The third installment of the BIBFRAME Must Die trilogy is a global overview of what countries around the world plan to do relative to adopting the RDA Toolkit and BIBFRAME/LRM/Library linked data concepts." For example, Edmunds writes, "A report on the attitudes of Nigerian librarians about BIBFRAME was presented at the 2021 BIBFRAME Workshop but I am aware of no work being done in African libraries to transition away from MARC." Similar conditions exists in Germany, France, and New Zealand, where portions of RDA have been adopted and reworked, still primarily based on MARC concepts and processes.
Conversation with Jeff Edmunds"
As prompted by his articles and their strong comments, Edmunds offered his opinions as he answered several cataloging-based questions I asked him.
Adamich: Would you still attest to value in one-title cataloging at some level, for example, for special collections or frequently-circulated items (still prevalent in public/K-12 school libraries)?
Edmunds: Yes. In my research and discussions with hundreds of catalogers and librarians, I can see no cogent argument against the one-record-forone-resource approach. Library users still expect catalogs to describe items one by one.
Adamich: Would you advocate some sort of monopolistic break up of Clarivate/EBSCO/OCLC?
Edmunds: Clarivate, EBSCO, and OCLC are three very different entities. OCLC is a community-driven consortium, largely not for profit. It does not deal in content, just metadata and library services. Clarivate is a behemoth, peddling both services and content, and I think it would only benefit libraries and users if it were broken up. EBSCO is not nearly as gigantic and sprawling as Clarivate; 1 don't see a clear argument for breaking it up.
Adamich: What would be your ideal protocol of such a breakup (if you favor it)?
Edmunds: I lack the expertise to answer this question. It's unfortunate that regulation of mergers such as ProQuest->Clarivate is not more attuned to the needs of libraries.
Adamich: What would be your ideal alternative to the FRBR/LRM/ RDA/BIBFRAME exercise?!"
Edmunds: The most obvious is Linky MARC: leveraging MARC data to create linked data environments. This is already being done widely. My position is that the FRBR/ LRM/RDA/BIBFRAME enterprise is misguided and pointless. The "problems" it purports to address are manufactured. The conceptual model underpinning MARC (things described individually and then linked via various methodologies, uniform titles or authority records, for example) works fine.
Final Thoughts on FRBR/ LRM/RDA/BIBFRAME
I have to admit that, over my 30+ year career of traditional MARC cataloging, I often lamented traditional cataloging rules and structures. Yet, I cannot help but be gratified by Edmunds' thoughts on the FRBR/LRM/ RDA/BIBFRAME movement and its questionable value. I, along with other library cataloging and technical services professionals, often thought the same things and have wondered why the last two decades have been dominated by these discussions and activities that seem to make little progress, show few results, and have no signs of completion (as other efforts at rule making and development, including MARC cataloging policy have).
I am grateful to Edmunds for having the fortitude to write his "BIBFRAME Must Die" trilogy, and I use it as motivation to continue to progress on my own work-related project for my other employer to transfer our company's MARC cataloging rules tool to the MediaWiki platform. It validates the value of MARC structures and the efforts of the good people who labored to develop and administer MARCrelated policies over the last nearly six decades of MARC's existence.
References and Notes
1. Jeffrey Edmunds, "BIBFRAME Must Die," Oct. 15, 2023, https:// scholarsphere.psu.edu/resources/ fc19faee-70b9-44b3-934618e40a2cd990 (accessed Feb. 15,2025); Jeffrey Edmunds, "BIBFRAME Must Die, Part II: The Official RDA Toolkit," Sept. 18,2024, https://scholarsphere. psu.edu/resources/40be29ce4342-475f-b380-d8ed065b3643 (accessed Feb. 15, 2025); Jeffrey Edmunds, "BIBFRAME Must Die: Part Ш: A Brief History of the Future of Cataloging," Dec. 22, 2024, https://scholarsphere .psu. edu/resources/6100de9a-Sf6f-400f90ea-fe517d16152d (accessed Feb. 15, 2025).
2. RDA Toolkit: Resource Description and Access (Chicago: American Library Association; Ottawa: Canadian Library Association; London: Chartered Institute of Library and Information) Professionals; Joint Steering Committee for Development of RDA; American Library Association, 2010- ). The Official RDA Toolkit is at https://access.rdatoolkit.org and the Original RDA Toolkit has the URL of https://original rdatoolkit.org.
3. International Vladimir Nabokovian Society, The Nabokovian, https:// thenabokovian.org/node/52944 (accessed Feb. 15, 2025).
4. Edmunds, "BIBFRAME Must Die," Oct. 15, 2023.
5. RDA: Resource Description and Access is part of the RDA Toolkit: Resource Description and Access (Chicago: American Library Association; Ottawa: Canadian Federation of Library Associations; London: Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals; Joint Steering Committee for Development of RDA; American Library Association, 2010- ), a subscription product.
6. Edmunds, "BIBFRAME Must Die," Oct. 15, 2023.
7. Ibid.
8. Edmunds, "BIBFRAME Must Die, Part II: The Official RDA Toolkit," Sept. 18, 2024.
9. Ibid.
10.Ibid.
11.Pat Riva, Patrick Le Bœuf, and Maja Zumer, IFLA Library Reference Model: A Conceptual Model for Bibliographic Information, August 2017, revised after world-wide review; amended and corrected through Dec. 2017 (The Hague: IFLA, 2017), https://repository.ifla.org/ bitstreams/95db0627-0a52-466fa7d0-6842b6012838/download (accessed Feb. 15, 2025).
12.Edmunds, "BIBFRAME Must Die: Part III: A Brief History of the Future of Cataloging," Dec. 22, 2024.
13.Jeffrey Edmunds, e-mail message to the author, Jan. 6, 2025.
14.FRBR is the abbreviation for IFLA Study Group on the Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records, Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records: Final Report, approved by the Standing Committee of the IFLA Section on Cataloguing Sept. 1997, as amended and corrected through February 2009 (The Hague: International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions, 2009), https://repository.ifla.org/ bitstreams/42b598cb-9a1f-4edebe6d-468bc0f4e9bc/download (accessed Feb. 15, 2025).
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