{"id":2551,"date":"2008-11-03T21:28:49","date_gmt":"2008-11-04T01:28:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.libology.com\/blog\/?p=2551"},"modified":"2010-04-07T18:54:39","modified_gmt":"2010-04-07T22:54:39","slug":"oclc-worldcat-is-the-tiger-not-the-lady","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.libology.com\/blog\/2008\/11\/03\/oclc-worldcat-is-the-tiger-not-the-lady.html","title":{"rendered":"OCLC WorldCat is the Tiger, not the Lady?"},"content":{"rendered":"

OCLC released their updated Policy for Use and Transfer of WorldCat Records<\/a><\/strong> yesterday, with implementation scheduled for mid-February.\u00a0 If you see the phrase<\/p>\n

We are reconsidering some aspects of the policy. More information will be available in the near future.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

then you might suspect that it created quite a fuss.\u00a0 It did, and OCLC responded by removing the policy from their web site.<\/p>\n

Someone saved a copy of the web page<\/a>; I will include the text of the policy in the next post.<\/p>\n

The core criticism of the policy changes seem to revolve around the licensing of the records.\u00a0 OCLC planned to include a license statement in a 996 field (from Terry’s Worklog<\/a>):<\/p>\n

996 $aOCLCWCRUP $iUse and transfer of this record is governed by the OCLC\u00ae Policy for Use and Transfer of WorldCat\u00ae Records.
\n$uhttp:\/\/purl.org\/oclc\/wcrup<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Limits would include use of the records in anything that “substantially replicates the function, purpose, and\/or size of WorldCat, for example for the purpose of providing cataloging services to libraries or other organizations.”\u00a0 Cataloging services aside, how large does a union catalog have to be before it replicates the function of WorldCat<\/a>, namely finding a library that owns a particular book?\u00a0 Ohio’s Ohiolink<\/a> sized?\u00a0 Illinois’ I-Share<\/a> sized?\u00a0 Georgia’s Pines<\/a> sized?<\/p>\n

What about the OpenLibrary<\/a> project?\u00a0 Or LibraryThing<\/a>?\u00a0 Using information derived from an OCLC record without including the OCLC number and other OCLC references (like the above statement) would violate their terms, as I read them.\u00a0 However, the last time I checked, the data itself is not covered under copyright and should be able to be extracted and expressed in creative ways (as long as OCLC’s creative way of expressing the data is not infringed).<\/p>\n

We need to recognize the difference between the data held in these records and the expression of that data.\u00a0 To enter into license agreements that suggest that we cannot recognize the data separate from the expression goes against core library principles.\u00a0 This feels, in some ways, like the Major League Baseball statistics copyright battle from a few years back, in which the idea of the data itself being public domain<\/a> was upheld.<\/p>\n

One final note:\u00a0 keep in mind the who and how behind the creation of these records.\u00a0 We create them.\u00a0 OCLC gathers them, disseminates them, and puts them to mostly good use.\u00a0 If OCLC didn’t exist, there would be a need for some organization with a similar purpose.\u00a0 They are not evil, they are not out to get us; they are, however, overreaching at times.<\/p>\n

originally found via Thingology <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

OCLC released their updated Policy for Use and Transfer of WorldCat Records yesterday, with implementation scheduled for mid-February.\u00a0 If you see the phrase We are reconsidering some aspects of the policy. More information will be available in the near future. … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[2922,2925,2940,2943,2945,2948,2949,2951,2952,2953],"tags":[4067,3087,3149,5360,4686,4066,5363,5184,3210,4068,3021,3386],"class_list":["post-2551","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cataloging","category-copyright","category-ils","category-libraries","category-licensing","category-news","category-oclc","category-online-databases","category-online-services","category-opac","tag-cataloging-services","tag-georgia","tag-illinois","tag-licensing","tag-major","tag-major-league-baseball","tag-oclc","tag-oclc-records-use-policy","tag-ohio","tag-union-catalogs","tag-usd","tag-worldcat"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pSU5g-F9","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.libology.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2551","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.libology.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.libology.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.libology.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.libology.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2551"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.libology.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2551\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.libology.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2551"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.libology.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2551"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.libology.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2551"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}