** REPORTS FROM THE **
2010 ALA Midwinter Conference
Boston, MA

Machine-Readable Bibliographic Information Committee (MARBI)
Liaison Report
Submitted by Cathy Gerhart
University of Washington Libraries

This report includes updates on proposals and discussion papers of interest to the OLAC constituency from the recent ALA MARBI meetings in Boston, Massachusetts.  If you would like to see the complete list of topics discussed, they are available.

Proposal No. 2010-01: Defining codes for online and direct access electronic resources in 008/23 and 008/29 (Form of item)

This proposal defines two new codes for this fixed field.  The two new codes are “o” for online resources and “q” for direct electronic.  This applies to how they are issued, not how they happen to be accessed at a later date.  Originally the proposal also made the code “s” obsolete, but this part of the proposal was not passed, so you will be able to use code “s” (electronic) in the future, but it will be recommended that you use the new codes when they are implemented.

Proposal No. 2010-02: Addition of subfield $5 (Institution to which field applies) in the 80X-830 Series Added Entry Fields of the MARC 21 Bibliographic Format

This proposal was approved to cover situations such as digital collections that are treated like a series by a specific institution, even though some libraries use 7XX fields to collate such materials.

Proposal No. 2010-05: Adding subfield $3 (Materials specified) in field 034 (Coded Cartographic Mathematical Data) in the MARC 21 Bibliographic and Authority Formats

Recently the 034 was made valid for the Authorities Format and during implementation it was discovered that sometimes it would be very useful to be able to explain what part of the geographical entity is being described in that particular 034.  So, the $3 is now valid for both the Authority and Bibliographic Formats.  An example of when you might need the $3 in your heading is, for example, a river in which you would like to indicate which coordinates are for the “source” of the river versus the “mouth” of the river.

Discussion Paper 2010-DP01: ISBD punctuation in the MARC 21 Bibliographic Format

This discussion paper looks at the possibility of adding a new code to the Leader/18 (Descriptive cataloging form) that would indicate that ISBD punctuation had been left out of the record if it could be provided by the subfield following it.  This was proposed by the German community who has a history of leaving out the punctuation if the subfield can be used to provide it when displayed.  This discussion paper will likely come back as a proposal at Summer ALA.  A related issue discussed was how to code the use of the new RDA rules and whether additional changes need to be made to implement that, specifically making the 040 $e repeatable.

Proposal No. 2010-03: Recording Place and Date of Capture in the MARC 21 Bibliographic Format

This proposal passed but was heavily amended.  It will allow the place of creation, capture, recording, filming, execution, or broadcast to be entered in an eye-readable format in the $d of the 033.  In addition, in the 518 subfields d, p, o and 0 and 2 were defined so that the information in this field can be parsed.

Proposal No. 2010-04: New data elements in the MARC 21 Authority and Bibliographic Format for works and expressions

This proposal adds a number of new fields to the MARC format to support new RDA elements.  These all passed with small amendments. 

• The first adds field 380 (repeatable) which will indicate the form of the work, such as play or television program.  It will often hold the term that is, or would be, used as a qualifier for a heading. 
• The 046 is where the date of the creation of the work will go.  For instance, this is where we will put the original release date of a movie or the date a book was first published.
• The 381 field will contain other distinguishing characteristics of a work or expression.  It will hold the kind of data that will often be contained in a qualifier of a heading, like the publisher when a series has a common title, or the name of the director when there are two or more films with the same title. 
• The 382 will identify the “medium of performance” for music uniform titles; the 383 will hold the numeric designation of a musical work, and the 384, the key of the musical work.

Discussion Paper 2010-DP02: Encoding URIs for controlled values in MARC records

This paper looked at possible ways to use URIs in various places in MARC records.  It proposed various ways that these URI could live in MARC records but none of the ways was thought to be useful at this time, so no proposal will be forthcoming.  LC, however, will be doing some testing of the various solutions given in this paper and will be reporting in the future if something looks like it would be a good solution.

Discussion Paper 2010-DP03: Encoding the International Standard Name Identifier (ISNI) and the International Standard Text Code (ISTC) in the MARC 21 Bibliographic and Authority Format

This paper looked at options for encoding two new numbers, one for Public Identities and one for textual works.  There will be a proposal coming back this summer that will define a way of handling the new ISNI, but at this point nothing will be done to find a way of putting the ISTC in the record.  The ISNI number will be assigned by the ISNI Registration Authority who will create a unique identifier for public entities that create, produce, manage and distribute information.  This number will help in the future monitoring and management of rights.