Making an Impact with Metadata on Social Media

At the beginning of September 2014 I worked up the courage to present at my first national conference - CILIP CIG 2014. The theme of Metadata - Making an Impact really appealed to me (and not just because I was on the conference organising committee!). I decided to talk about a successful work project involving a Pinterest board which I created for the Cambridge Library Science Collection. The slides for my talk are included below together with the write up I produced for the Catalogue and Index journal. The latter is reproduced here with the kind permission of CILIP CIG.

Making an Impact with your Metadata on Social Media from Claire Sewell

We all know that cataloguers produce great quality metadata but we also know that our users seldom turn to the library catalogue as their first, or even second, source of information. However many users are active on social media on a regular basis, keeping in touch with their peers and their institutions. Libraries are taking advantage of this by promoting themselves and their collections on various social sites. This article will discuss the use of the website Pinterest to promote the Library Science Collection at Cambridge University Library. Pinterest is an online pinboard where users can share images of interest with their followers and at Cambridge we use this to share our metadata in visual form.

The Library Science Collection at Cambridge is a result of the library’s legal deposit status. This dedicated professional collection is made up of approximately 2000 items, mainly monographs and journals but also a growing ebook collection. After taking over the management of the collection one of my key goals was to advertise this valuable professional resource to both Cambridge librarians and the wider information world. The collection now has an established social media presence including a blog, Twitter account and Pinterest site.

Rise of the visual web

Pinterest has become increasingly popular in the last few years as part of the phenomenon of the visual web. Visual websites are overtaking text based sites as the main method of communication on social media. In recent years sites such as Instagram and Snapchat have launched to huge acclaim and almost instant popularity. Analysts claim that we are moving away from a text based web towards something more visual and people are designing image based websites as a way to tap into this trend. You need look no further than some of the newer templates on popular sites such as Wordpress to see where this trend is taking hold. Couple this with the general decrease in people's attention spans and it becomes clear that websites now need something different to draw users in and engage them with the content. In addition to this, image based sites offer a better display on mobile devices. Studies show that people are accessing increasingly large amounts of information on devices such as smartphones and tablets which may have problems with text based sites. As information providers we need to be aware of this when designing our web presence.

The visual web has several advantages over its text-based counterpart. Think back to a time when you have done a web search only to be confronted with one page full of densely packed text and another page full of images. There you can start to see how difficult text is to absorb quickly whereas carefully chosen images can make an almost instant impact.

Using Pinterest at Cambridge

So how can we use this knowledge of the visual web to make our metadata more discoverable?

As mentioned, Pinterest is a collection of online pinboards where users can upload, link to and share images which then link back to content. An example of a Pinterest board can be seen below:

Follow Cambridge University Library - the UL's board Library Science Collection on Pinterest.

Visitors to the site can browse the images and then click through to visit the original content such as a blog post or news item. Libraries can use the same mechanism to share their metadata with users in a visual form.

Currently at Cambridge we are using Pinterest to create an online new books display. Cover images of the books are displayed on our pin board and used can access the catalogue record by clicking on the image. This has obvious benefits over the traditional new books display still used by traditional libraries. With an online display the physical books are still accessible for use so users are not restricted from accessing the actual material. Users no longer need to be in the library building to see what has been added to the collection, opening it to a wider professional audience. Another advantage is the sites simplicity for both librarian and user. It is easy to navigate, even for those new to the format and does not require registration to browse. The images posted display in online image searches, further aiding is discoverability.

Fig. 1

Constructing a Pinterest board is a simple process. Obviously the first thing you need to do to set up a page is register for an account. Before you do this it is worth finding out if your institution already has an existing account which you can join as this can help to grow an audience for your site. Accounts can have multiple boards on a variety of subjects. Each individual image on these boards is known as a 'pin'. Pins can be uploaded from a computer or taken directly from a website. The easiest way to do this is to install Pinterest's Pin It browser extension (Fig 1). This extension is available for most browsers trombone from the Pinterest homepage and selects images with one click.

The crucial component of a Pinterest site is to link the image back to the content you wish to share, in the case of Cambridge this would be the metadata of the book represented by its cover image. When you pin an image from the Internet Pinterest automatically links back to the original content. As we use Library Search at Cambridge, Pinterest links to the main catalogue interface as a default. A small amount of editing is required to make sure that cover images link back to the stable URL of the item rather than the main homepage of the catalogue. This is achieved by using the Pinterest edit interface. If you select the small pen symbol (Fig. 2) on the pin this takes you to an edit screen where you can make the necessary changes to the source URL.

Fig. 2

As the image is uploaded Pinterest will provide a short description in the description box (Fig. 3). In order to increase metadata exposure, at Cambridge we expand on this to include the basic bibliographic details of the book - full title, author and classmark. This provides a quick reference to users without having to click through to the catalogue, although this is still the main aim of the project. When the pin in complete it functions as a visual link to the catalogue.

Fig. 3

The Library Science Pinterest board has been extremely popular, gaining nearly four hundred followers in the first few hours after its launch. Since then follower numbers have continued to climb and engagement via likes and shares has been positive. Individual pins and whole boards can be also be promoted easily. For a site which requires minimal work to produce this is an excellent outcome which has helped to promote the visibility of both the collection and its metadata.

Copyright

Like many other image sharing sites, Pinterest has been the subject of some copyright discussion. It goes without saying that libraries using Pinterest need to be mindful of copyright, particularly when using cover art as these are of course copyrighted works in their own right.

Prior to starting the Pinterest project at Cambridge we consulted the University Copyright Department who cleared us to use images that were available through our catalogue interface as long as they linked back to the source of the image - the catalogue record. Not all titles in Library Search have cover images so unfortunately we cannot include images for these unless we seek individual permission from the copyright holders. We decided early on in the project that this was not practical and so do not include these books on our board.

If you cannot obtain clearance from your institution’s copyright department or are in any way unsure if you can use the images then the safest policy is to avoid using them.

Other uses for Pinterest

Even if pinning cover images is not an option for your library there are alternative ways of using Pinterest to make your metadata more discoverable online.

Topic and resource boards are easy to assemble and can make a great visual impact. Using images you have either created yourself or found an appropriate Creative Commons license for  you can create eye-catching pins which you can then link back to your metadata. Topic boards focus on a theme and can take advantage of popular news stories such as the anniversary of the First World War. Resource boards use a similar approach but centre around popular academic topics such as How to write an essay. Using Pinterest in this way you can create a graphic reading list of items and ensure that your metadata is noticed.

Top pinning tips

If you do decide to pursue Pinterest there are some important points to bear in mind.  As with other social sites Pinterest allows account holders to write short biographies of themselves or their institution. In addition there is a chance to compose a short description for each board. Write these carefully and try to include relevant keywords to increase discoverability. Choose or create your images with care to create the maximum impact on both Pinterest and the Internet in general. The aim is to make people stop and look in an environment which is increasingly becoming image dependent.

Conclusion

Pinning images with links to our metadata has proved hugely popular at Cambridge. It provides us with a way to tap into the trend for the visual web using metadata - something not traditionally thought of as picturesque. Hopefully this helps us to make more of an impact with our metadata on social media.

Edited to add: Since this article was first published Pinterest have become more forceful in trying to get you to sign in/up to view pins. I think this is a real shame as allowing non-members easy access was one of the biggest selling points of Pinterest for me.

Originally published: Catalogue and Index, November 2014.

Fame at Last!

The International Librarians Network is designed to help information professionals across the globe connect with each other and grow their personal network. Having taken part in the first two rounds I can vouch for its usefulness. I've learnt a lot from my partners and it's helped me to see the similarities and differences across the profession.

My last ILN partner was Megan Hartline from the University of Michigan Library. Megan is part of a group that runs the Library Lost and Found blog and I was flattered when she asked if she could interview me. The link to the result is below:

If you haven't already checked out the International Librarians Network then I recommend that you do so here. It's a great way to connect with people you might not get to know in real life and who knows where it could lead ...

What's In a Name...? Library Job Titles

I’ve been thinking a lot about job titles recently, probably thanks to compiling my Chartership CV and applying for a couple of conference bursaries. I’ve tried to keep my CV up to date over the years but this is the first time I’ve really had to sit down and consider what it looks like to an outsider. One thing that has struck me through this process is that my current job title doesn’t really reflect what I do on a daily basis. Worse than this I’m starting to wonder if it’s putting people off!

Above is the section of my CV which describes my current role. When I was putting together my CV I realised that only the last four bullet points are directly linked to my actual job description. Everything else is something I have done out of need or a desire to develop my skills. At this point I should say that I am very lucky to work in a large library which allows me to develop and take on new things. I wonder though how many people read the heading Senior Cataloguer and look no further as they think that all I do is catalogue? This is probably not helped by the fact that I have worked in a number of cataloguing related posts over the years, many of which have the word cataloguer in the title.

I often get told by people that I’m not a “typical cataloguer” which I take as sort of grudging compliment but it does make me think again about my job title and if it’s giving people a certain impression of me. I’m sure I’m not the only person to wonder about this. In these days of constrained budgets and shrinking jobs is anyone a typical anything anymore? Aren’t we all having to take on jobs and responsibilities that we never thought we would have to, for better or worse? People short listing for interviews have very little time to read all the applications they receive so first impressions are important. I’m just wondering if the first impression that my job title sends out is the right one?

I started to wonder if other people felt the same way about their job titles so I compiled a very short and extremely unscientific survey which somehow managed to get nearly one hundred responses. 67% of respondents felt that their job title accurately reflected what they actually did whilst 33% felt that it didn’t. This was the final result but for a long time it was quite close. I asked those that didn’t think their job title was a good reflection of their work to expand on this. Below are a small sample of answers:

• "when I compare myself to others with the same job title I feel I carry out more varied and complex tasks"
• "job title does not clearly express my actual role, area of expertise or skills"
• "because I do so much more than that!"
• "librarian doesn't sum up the information literacy, training or general information wrangling that I do all day"
• "it's too general and doesn't reflect the degree of professionalism required"
• "for those in the library profession I think it's obvious ... however to the outside world I still use the word 'librarian' and this is what I put on my Twitter account for instance"
• "it doesn't include library or librarian"
• "it's a generic job title shared by several others who do jobs that differ from mine"
• "I have the word coordinator in my job title which means nothing to anyone, but not the word librarian"
• "library assistant implies I do non-professional work, which is not the case"
• "title is 'Faculty Librarian' which doesn't explain anything! No mention of liaison or teaching etc."

There were quite a few themes running through the answers. People felt that it would have been better to have the words library or librarian in their job title to give a better impression of what they do. This is an issue that needs a blog post all its own but it’s worth noting here. I think as the profession seeks to modernise itself and respond to critics who think the ‘L’ word is outdated we are in danger of giving ourselves titles that are too vague to be understood by the outside world but that’s just my opinion ....

Quite a few respondents highlighted this issue of vagueness, claiming that their title was too generic to reflect the variety of things that they do. With roles changing all the time I’m sure it’s not practical to keep updating job titles but what does that mean for their worth?

In contrast to this it’s interesting to note that people didn’t think their job titles would be too much of a problem on applications, as people within the library world would understand what they meant. This could be a positive or a negative and brings me back to my original point. People in the library world understand the term cataloguer but do they think all I do is catalogue books all day? Several cataloguers I know will tell you that we do a lot more than that! What all this adds up to is that there is no such thing as a perfect job title but there are several issues to think about.

Finally I asked people if they would be tempted to tweak their title to better represent what they do. 59% wouldn’t be tempted but 41% would, which was a higher percentage than I was expecting. I’ll admit that I’ve been tempted to change mine to something like Senior Library Assistant in the past to avoid people assuming that all I do is catalogue but I decided against it as I thought it would cause more harm than good!

I think what this very unscientific research has shown me is that I may be a little bit too sensitive when it comes to my job history. Having said that I think it would be a good lesson for us all to leave our perceptions of job titles at the door. Those judging applications need to look further than the title and see what the individual has achieved whilst the applicants (including me!) need to be better at demonstrating what they have done and not rely on their job title to tell the whole story.

Tagging Library School Reading Lists in the Catalogue

I've recently been given the opportunity to develop and promote the Library Science collection at Cambridge University Library and I'm really enjoying the experience so far. I've been given a fairly broad remit which means that I've been able to try out a lot of initiatives that I've read about or studied (such as using Pinterest to promote the collection).

Another thing I've been quite keen to develop is access to material on the reading lists of various library courses. Luckily we're a Legal Deposit library which means that we hold many of the titles already, it's really a matter of making sure the last few make it into the collection. In order to make it easier for users to retrieve the items on their reading lists I've been experimenting with tagging books in the catalogue and adding them to lists. The UL uses LibrarySearch which provides tagging and list functions through it's My Discoveries tab. I decided to use course codes to tag the items as I thought this would cause the least confusion. At the moment I've only made lists according to university rather than individual course but this is something I can develop in the future is needed.

The outcome of this is a reading list which displays like this in the catalogue:

Hopefully this will make it easier for users to see at a glance whether the library holds the item that they want. One of the main benefits of this feature is that users don't need to know what the tag is. LibrarySearch allows you to create your own search URL which can then be used as a link. For example clicking on Robert Gordon University : The Digital Age should bring up the reading list shown above

One major disadvantage that I've found is that LibrarySearch doesn't allow you to tag certain items, which results in an incomplete list. I'm looking into a solution for this and will hopefully be able to find one. The plan is to launch a dedicated website for the collection through the University Library website which will include links to reading list materials. Fingers crossed I can make it work before then!

CambridgeRDA

Any cataloguers out there will know that there has recently been a transition to a new cataloguing standard - RDA (Resource, Description and Access). I work at Cambridge University Library which has been using RDA since it's introduction at the beginning of April. This has been an interesting time for us and although it's been hard work I've enjoyed learning something new.

 

Before Cambridge began using RDA, cataloguers had to undertake some intensive training, including the theoretical background (FRBR), RDA basics and hands-on practical sessions. This training has recently been made available as a creative commons licensed resource on the CambridgeRDA site (which I'm happy to say I had a small hand in creating). Resources on the site include recorded Powerpoint presentations with audio and practical exercises. We hope that it will be useful to people who are currently putting together training programmes for their own staff or those that just want to know a little more about RDA.

CILIP Cataloguing and Indexing Group have also put together a list of other available RDA training that people might find useful. This can be found here.

I hope that these resources are useful to people, and if people know of any more then please leave me a comment. I think that there are a lot of really useful materials and discussions available out there about RDA and hopefully the cooperative nature of cataloguers will mean that we can make the transition as smooth as possible!



Libraries@Cambridge Conference 2013

The theme of this years conference was 'Making an Impact', something which I have been interested in since conducting research into impact for my MSc dissertation. I should add for anyone who read my blog on last years conference that this post will not be as controversial! I'm just going to focus on a few of the points that I found really relevant in the keynote sessions. For a full report of the day, see the official conference blog which has a report on each session.

Liz Jolly gave the first of the two keynote sessions. One of the points that she highlighted was that although as a sector we are good at measuring things, we need to make sure that we are doing this for the right reasons. This is something that I've come across a lot in my own research. Libraries tend to have all manner of usage statistics but do we actually use them effectively or do we just compile them for the sake of it? Liz talked about the importance of effective benchmarking and setting our measurements in context. This last point is particularly important as we should be measuring how we align our work with the goals of our institutions if we want to prove our worth.

This is something that I've often thought about with cataloguing. I know that to some we are a dying species but I think that a strong cataloguing department is essential to the smooth running of a library. The main problem is how to get this message across. There is lots of talk at the moment about how important the student experience is and I think that cataloguers need to make the point that even if we are in the back office, what we do is actually a very important user service. Without proper cataloguing our users will have trouble finding the resources that they need - isn't this one of the most important parts of serving library users?

Liz also talked about the importance of advocating what we do to our colleagues and users. She stressed that we need to make it clear that professional bodies such as CILIP are learning organisations and we are using membership to develop ourselves, hopefully leading to better service. This is something that was mentioned at the recent CILIP CIG conference where presentations highlighted the importance of getting involved with the library outside your own department. Liz talked about going to where our colleagues are and learning to speak their language, something which I think is important. We need to stop seeing our departments as isolated units and learn to work together and promoting ourselves to our colleagues is one way of doing this.

The second keynote presentation was given by Dave Patten and Graham Stone who talked about the Library Impact Data Project. The project is attempting to establish a link between library use and final degree level - something which is really interesting to a lot of librarians! Phase two of the project is more focused, looking at off campus resource usage, hours spent logged in and overnight use amongst other things. The results so far are really interesting, for example showing that mature students (anyone over 21!!) tend to use resources more than their younger counterparts. Dave and Graham have also broken down usage by ethnicity and country leading to some surprising results which need further investigation. The presenters made the point that even if some of the results that they are producing seem to be common sense, having actual evidence of the impact of the library should not be underestimated. Demonstrating the value for money that the library can bring to the student experience is vitally important - especially in the light of the current financial climate. This is an issue that I have seen raised many times in the course of my research on impact and I'm glad to see that someone has taken this further and is producing some quantifiable evidence.

Even though the issue of impact has been raised in the profession many times before I don't think that being reminded of it is a bad thing. It's important that we don't become complacent and continue to find new and innovative ways of demonstrating the difference that we make to our users and colleagues, whichever part of the library that we work in.

The conference was as usual really though provoking and provided the opportunity to meet up with colleagues who may work in the same city but don't always have time to get together. Roll on libraries @ Cambridge 2014!

photo credit: Vermin Inc via photopin cc

CIG 2012 - The Value of Cataloguing (Part Two)

This is my report on day two of the recent CIG conference. Part one can be found here.

New Challenges for Cataloguers

The first session of day two had the theme "new challenges for cataloguers", of which I'm sure we can agree there are many. Heather Jardine cut straight to the case by talking about the changes in the cataloguers role in 2012. She outlined three main changes:

• changing rules and formats - I think we can all agree that we're about to go through a big period of change here with the introduction of RDA
• changing materials - as cataloguers we're constantly being asked to keep pace with the latest materials. We're often faced with something new coming across our desks followed by the inevitable question: "how am I supposed to catalogue that?!" Heather showed us that this was nothing new since cataloguers have been dealing with new materials for decades and we have always managed to find a way to cope. Any future changes will be no different
• changing roles - there has been a change in expectations over what it is we actually do. With the cuts across all library sectors everyone has found themselves taking on increased workloads.

I think that these changes have both positive and negative points. Whilst no one wants cuts they are happening. The changing role of the cataloguer can be seen as an opportunity as well as a threat. Maybe a very long time ago all cataloguers did was catalogue books day in day out but I think that this has been changing for some time now. Cataloguers are much more adaptable than people think (see the above two points) and the changes currently taking place in libraries can help to showcase this. If we can prove to our colleagues that we are adaptable and indispensable then we can help to ensure our professional futures. No one can be trained in just one skill and expect to get a job out of it for the rest of their lives and so the more feathers in our caps the better. Proving our worth to our colleagues is an important part of advocacy - something which I feel very strongly that every cataloguer should be involved in. The flip side of this, as Heather rightly pointed out, is that all this extra work leads to a decrease in the time that we have for actual cataloguing. There is a balance to be maintained and I think that the true challenge will be in making sure that we still keep our cataloguing skills strong whilst taking on these new challenges. 

The next paper wins the award for best title, Gary Green's "the incredible shrinking cataloguer meets the Spaghetti Junction automation robot". Gary reminded us of the importance of  keeping abreast of the latest library technology even if we aren't using it ourselves. This is something that I try to do but sometimes struggle with so I know how hard it can be sometimes to take on yet another thing. The main body of the talk was focused on Gary's recent project to automate cataloguing and classification processes at his library service. This was tricky since computers haven't yet reached the level of intelligence of the average cataloguer (thank God!). For this reason Gary has tried to map these processes as if it were a human working on the changes rather than a computer. The project has resulted in a reduction in the amount of in-house manual work and faster processing which in turn has saved money - something which managers are finding especially attractive in the current climate. There are also of course some issues with the process; the mapping process is complex and anything which gets broken can have consequences which are equally complicated. One of the main things that Gary cautioned us about was that changes are not made in isolation, it's all part of a larger process. Work on the project is continuing in order to address some of these issues.

Helen Williams talked about the challenges involved in transforming copy cataloguers into 'metadata creators'. During her work at LSE Helen and her team were tasked with adding metadata to items added to the institutional repository. Helen reported that the same workflows used with print material could be applied to the repository material and helped in adding to the teams skill set. Using our skills in this new way can help to showcase the value of the cataloguing department to the wider institution, echoing the points made in previous sessions. Future-proofing the department and its skills is as vital right now as it has ever been. One point that Helen did raise is that whilst having a multi-skilled team has many advantages, it's also possible to consider specialising in some areas. All of the staff in a department can have a working knowledge of these new processes but since everyone has different strengths they will naturally develop a specialism in a particular skill. This is something to be encouraged from both the individual and institutional point of view. Projects such as this one at LSE make the bibliographic services team the place to go to for information within the wider institution - a definite plus point.

The next session was 'the problems of cataloguing in higher education' which was a slightly altered version of a presentation given at a CIG even earlier in the year. I'e already written a blog post about this event which is here if anyone wants to read it.

Lightning Round Talks

Celine Carty presented the first lightening round talk of the day and focused on the work of the High Visibility Cataloguing initiative. She outlined a project to set up a 23things style programme for cataloguers - Cat23. The first phase of the programme involves interviews with cataloguers working in a variety of roles. More can be read about the programme here on the HVCats website but I will say that I am really looking forward to it. When I first heard about the project I did wonder how it would work in practice but I think that the authors have done a wonderful job of coming up with something new and creative (and I'm not just saying this because I work for one of them!). I'm really looking forward to taking part and will be encouraging my colleagues to do so.

Karen Pierce talked about ways of promoting the work of the cataloguing department both internally and externally. This was a strong theme at the conference which came up in many of the papers. Karen talked about the importance of maintaining a physical presence and actually being seen by colleagues. Cataloguers are often tucked away in offices and too often it's a case of out of sight and out of mind. Getting involved in wider institutional events and committees are two ways in which the department can maintain a presence and raise its profile. One popular initiative that Karen talked about was "Do something different day" which gives staff at her institution a chance to do what it says on the tin. The day allows the cataloguing department to give an in-depth look at what it really does on a day to day basis and hopefully this will help to correct some common misconceptions about the work that the department does. Karen also gave us several hints on external advocacy:

• conferences - both attending and presenting. And don't think that you have to be limited to cataloguing conferences - get out of the echo chamber!
• report back from events - show people that you do sometimes escape from your desk
• have an online presence - this can be important in sharing your experiences with a wider audience

One of the key themes of Karen's presentation was to grab unexpected opportunities. The more widely you and your department get known the more chance that colleagues will approach you if they need something you can provide.

Rachel Playforth carried on the professional development theme by talking about her experience of changing her role from cataloguer to repository coordinator. Rachel pointed out that even if your job role changes you probably won't get training for your new role. I think this is something we can all relate to! She advised us to be strategic about taking on new responsibilities as it's important not to take on too much. We need to be selective and learn to say no occasionally. Consider how the change will benefit you in the long term - will it add a new skill? is it something that you've always wanted to try? Always be open to new opportunities but remember that you can't do everything at once.

Karen Pierce returned to tell us about the benefits of regionality when it comes to professional development. Karen was part of the organising team for Conversations with Cataloguers in Wales, an event which brought together a group of cataloguers with a common region. There are many benefits to holding regional events such as this; people often find these events easier to get to and they can be identity forming. One interesting point raised was that conferences and events can create a great sense of community but this is often only temporary. We need to be looking at ways of carrying this on and local groups are one way to do this. Karen encouraged us to look into developing our own local groups - you never know what could come out of it!

The open mike session was a chance for delegates to discuss any issues which had been raised so far. Unsurprisingly the chief topic of conversation was RDA and its impact on cataloguing practice. One issue raised was that of training. Once an institution has made the decision to implement the new standard the staff have to be trained in its use. There is lots of training freely available on the Internet but we were warned to check the material for currency. RDA is a constantly updated standard and so web-based content can become dated very quickly. The cost of RDA was also mentioned. It is not a freely available standard and this has caused problems for some libraries who would like to implement it. It was pointed out that whilst there is a cost to moving there is also a cost to not moving and the consequences of either action need to be weighed carefully.

Developing Working Practices

The theme of the final full session was "developing working practices" and began with a talk from Elly Cope about reclassification at the University of Bath. The library used a number of classification systems which had led to negative feedback from students. The decision was made to implement a more consistent system and gradually switch from UDC to DDC which is a more widely known system. User feedback to the change has been positive and plans have been made to continue with the scheme. Elly made the point that although it's a lot of work, one of the added benefits of reclassification is that it provides an opportunity to work on the records and ultimately produce a better standard of cataloguing.

Neil Robinson talked about his experience of developing cataloguing and classification at Marylebone Cricket Club library. The library houses one of the biggest research libraries on the sport and so is an important resource. Neil was tasked with updating the original classification scheme used by the library since the 1940s. The scheme was unsurprisingly out of date and in need of serious attention. The key decision to be made was whether to adapt the current system or to start again with something new. Neil went with the decision to adapt the scheme and said that it has led to an increased knowledge of the collection. One top tip that he shared was not to be afraid of changing something that you have just changed if you think you can make it better - be constantly on the search for improvement.

Daphne Kouretas from OCLC gave the final full paper of the conference on managing metadata for ebooks. Libraries need to acknowledge that resource discovery is changing and we need to keep up with these changes. She talked about the importance of cataloguing as a public facing library service, something which I am very keen to promote. Cataloguing is one of the backbones of a successful library and I think that this is something that non-cataloguers forget and that cataloguers forget to shout about.

Lightning Round Talks

The final lightning round talk session opened with Katrina Clifford talking about harvesting repository data for use in an LMS. She explained how rich data for repository contributions was available but all too often this wasn't being linked to records in the catalogue. Research has been done into this problem and although I'm afraid the technology is beyond me, a way to export this data into the LMS has been developed. This has led to an enrichment of the cataloguing records which had aided user discoverability. Needless to say, this is proving very popular with library users!

Helen Garner talked about cataloguing media materials and its associated problems and benefits. The workflow for this at Sheffield Hallam University has been streamlined so that cataloguing staff now only need to view the first iteration of a program in order to catalogue it. Helen also raised the point that libraries need to maintain a consistent display across the catalogue so that users understand that they are looking at a media resource.

The final two sessions by Emily Bogie and Christina Claridge focused on the issue of shelf ready. Working in a library which uses its own classification system this isn't something that I've had to deal with personally but it is still an interesting development which needs to be monitored. Both sessions reported on the advantages and disadvantages of projects at the speakers' libraries. The scheme provides an important way to free up staff time but it is important that errors, however small, are spotted and corrected. This of course requires human intervention. Accurate records are even more important in today's catalogues with their faceted searching capabilities. The most important thing to check is if the records reflects the item that you have, obvious but still easy to miss in a busy environment.

I really enjoyed the conference and came away really energised and positive. To me this is one of the primary benefits of any event. I will take away several points and try to spend my time until the next conference focused on advocating my job and keeping the momentum going!

photo credit: Rijksmuseum Research Library via photopin cc

CIG 2012 - The Value of Cataloguing (Part One)

I’ve just come back from an exhausting but enjoyable two days at the CILIP Cataloguing and Indexing Group conference in Sheffield. This was my second CIG conference and I enjoyed it as much as my first experience. The theme of the conference was “the value of cataloguing” and all of the speakers more than met the challenge. I tend to blog quite full reports since I use this blog for my own records as much as anything else but I do realise that many people have better things to do than read 1500+ words on one day of a conference, so I’ve highlighted in bold what I feel are the key points.

The conference opened with a keynote speech by Dave Pattern focused on the need to measure the impact of the library. Since measuring impact is my dissertation topic, this session was close to my heart (and interests). Dave showed that there was a lot of data collected by libraries and that we should do something proactive with it. He has recently taken part in a project to try and establish a link between library use and grade amongst degree level students at the University of Huddersfield. Although he hasn’t as yet established a statistically significant link his results do indicate that there is some correlation between the number of library resources used and the final grade achieved. The study also indicated that there was a link between low library use and dropping out of courses. This could provide a useful early warning sign for both lecturers and tutors. There is still more work to be done but I look forward to reading the future results. 

Working with New Standards

The first theme of the conference was “working with new standards”. Anne Welsh and Katharine Whaite discussed the history of the catalogue. They showed that even though there is a lot of concern about the MARC/RDA hybrid catalogue this is unnecessary since modern catalogues are already comprised of multiple bibliographic standards. Changing standards and different workflows over the years mean that true consistency has never been achieved and all catalogues contain a mix of record formats. In the days of active information professionals on social media, new cataloguing standards can be discussed like never before but cataloguers shouldn’t agonise too much over rule changes – everything evolves and needs monitoring. Just because a rule has been around for a long time doesn’t mean that it is above question.

Lucy Bell from the UK Data Archive discussed her work curating digital data sets. She illustrated users’ preferences for simple, Google-style interfaces but showed that these still needed to maintain a high standard of academic use meaning that they needed to be powered by powerful metadata. She explained her work in mapping keyword search terms to a controlled vocabulary language in order to give users the best access to the data possible. These controlled search terms allow more accurate usage data to be kept which in turn makes it easier to prove the value of the system to those that fund it.

Simon Barron took a philosophical perspective when discussing the impact of networked knowledge systems on cataloguing practices. He showed that many library classification schemes are based on traditional, hierarchical systems which try to subdivide knowledge in a top-down fashion. Knowledge is much more complicated than this and networks are a much better way to demonstrate links. This sort of thinking is already present in FRBR and RDA, which aim to show the multiple links between items found in the library catalogue. Whilst the technology doesn’t yet exist to allow cataloguers to represent these connections as we would like, this is still an important area to think about and I'll be monitoring future developments.

The final full paper of the morning was delivered by Michael Emly who talked about the importance of preserving collections for the future using metadata. I work in a legal deposit library where preservation is a primary concern so this was of great interest to me. He outlined a COPAC project which aimed to show through metadata if a library was committed to keeping a copy of an item. Hopefully this would mean that there was at least one copy of an item available somewhere, preserving our national collections. The metadata can also be used to make collection management decisions easier – libraries will be able to see if an item was held anywhere else and what the long term plan for that item is. Even legal deposit libraries can’t hold everything (despite what most people think) so this would be a welcome way to help safeguard items in the future.

Lightning Round Talks

The first short lightning round talk was an RDA update by Celine Carty and was clearly what many attendees had been waiting for. Celine was fortunate enough to be able to attend ALA and brought back a lot of important news. This time RDA is really coming, with the implementation date being set for March 31st 2013. It won’t be a matter of simply switching to the new standard – we're going to be working with a mix of standards for a while yet but this is something that most cataloguers are already used to. The rules are currently being reworded in response to feedback from users and the Toolkit is also being changed in response to criticism from testers. Celine also outlined how CIG plans to help cataloguers to get to grips with the new standard. As well as its highly successful FRBR for the Terrified workshops, the group ran an eforum for RDA discussion that was very well attended. Having been to one of the workshops I can highly recommend it!

The second lightening talk continued the theme of RDA with Stuart Hunt talking about how libraries can implement the new standard into library systems that were designed to cope with MARC. He produced a useful checklist of potential problem areas:

• loading: will RDA records load into your system in their entirety or will you start to see an increase in rejected records and error reports?
• validation: validation tables within your LMS will need to be updated in order to cope with the new standard, including any local customisations
• indexing: will the new RDA fields be included in your indexing? What will happen if you do/don't index the new subfields?
• display: this needs to be considered for both the staff and user view of the system
• discovery: if your discovery platform is supplied by a third part then will it be able to cope with the changes?
• exporting: export tables will need to be changed in order to reflect RDA

Katharine Whaite’s interesting talk focused on using the library catalogue as a way to understand the history of the collection and the way in which thinking about it has changed over time. She showed that librarians need to maintain existing catalogue records as well as creating new ones so that this important aspect of library history could be preserved.

Working cooperatively

The theme for the second session was ‘working cooperatively’. Deborah Lee from the Courtauld Institute discussed the progress that she has made since CIG 2010 on setting up a UK NACO funnel. She argued that this was not only a cost saving measure but that it would have multiple benefits for the professional development of those involved. Training could be cascaded down through organisations, allowing cataloguers to add a valuable tool to their skill set. The funnel also gives libraries a chance to promote authors and organisations who are important to the library’s specialism, for example by establishing a heading for an artist who is not well known but has significance. I have just started my own training in the world of NACO and I think it’s an extremely valuable skill to have. I look forward to further reports about the projects progress.

Ian Fairclough closed proceedings on day one by talking about how email lists and other tools can be used to improve bibliographic data quality. I’m sure everyone has seen the ‘typo of the day’ section on Autocat and had a good laugh but it does actually have a serious purpose. By adjusting just the mistake that appears in the list libraries can carry out low-cost bibliographic maintenance and work towards a better standard of catalogue record. Mailing lists can get the message out to a lot of people all around the world and the only cost to the cataloguer is the time that it takes to correct the mistake (which hopefully you shouldn’t find many of anyway!)

Hopefully my write-up of day two will be posted in the next few days.

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CIG Conference 2012 - The Round-Up

I'm still working on my write up of the CILIP Cataloguing and Indexing Conference but some other attendees have been much more organised than me! Below are some links to conference reports that I've seen, I'll try to add more as/when I see them. Hopefully at least part one of my version of events will be up sometime this weekend.

The Value of Cataloguing: CILIP Cataloguing and Indexing Group Conference 2012 / The Toast in the Machine

Quick Post About CIG12 / Blogging Cataloguing

Smug tweaking, shrinking cataloguers, and the corridor of uncertainty: CILIP Cataloguing & Indexing Group conference 2012 / dark-side-of-the-catalogue

CIG Conference 2012 / On cataloguing and the like


Most of the presentations are now available here on the CIG website

CIG eforum - Social media in the cataloguing community

This was the first CIG eforum that I’ve taken part in. I usually struggle to fit eforums into my day but I couldn't resist this topic, which is near and dear to my heart (and my dissertation research).

The opening topic focused on personal use of social media, and Twitter in particular. Many people said that they found it an invaluable tool for learning about new developments and opportunities. I agree with those that said it made them feel very much part of a community. I set up my own Twitter account a couple of years ago but I've only really been an active user for the last year or so. I could never really see the point when I started, but since then I've found it an invaluable tool for professional development. I've found out about conferences and training opportunities but also just the day to day "news" of the cataloguing world and it's something that I think I would struggle to be without now. Other people echoed this view, saying that without Twitter they would have been out of the loop and missed out on events and opportunities.

There was a lot of discussion over whether to keep Twitter accounts private or not. Personally I keep my account open because I think that it misses the point of a social network if you don't. Some people pointed out that it can be hard to follow the conversation if someone has a locked account since you can’t see all the tweets. I know that this has happened to me when trying to follow a conversation and it’s frustrating. Having said that, I’ve been getting more and more spam followers in the last few months so I can understand why people lock their accounts. Someone suggested that those just starting out begin with a locked account and then see how they go – sound advice.

There was also discussion of Twitter and other social media tools for work purposes. Some people used social media for their jobs but others had restrictions that meant that this wasn't an option. Popular tools used for work purposes included blogs and Facebook pages. Some people are using social media to keep colleagues up to date internally. Some institutions do this already and I know that I find it really useful. Ours is used to store information about cataloguing procedure that used to be sent out via email. This often meant that people knew they had received an email about something but couldn't find it when they needed it. Now, we can just search the blog and the information is there!

It was pointed out that one of the main benefits of any form of social media for cataloguers is that it can bring them together. I’m lucky enough to work in a large cataloguing department with lots of people on hand to offer advice and support but not everyone is that fortunate. For solo cataloguers in particular, social media can be a lifeline. Some cataloguers use Twitter to ask work questions and the speed at which these are answered never fails to amaze me. Cataloguers on Twitter are always so eager to help (much like in real life!).

There was also discussion over whether to have separate Twitter accounts for personal and professional use. My Twitter account (like most of my social media presence) is meant to be strictly business but there are the times when it lapses into more personal territory! I think that letting your personality show through in tweets or other social media will help to engage your followers, whether your account is personal or professional. I’m researching users opinions of library 2.0 at the moment and the comments so far all seem to suggest that they like the more ‘human’ face that social media puts on the library and its staff. I think constant ‘business’ tweets would seem a bit inhuman and undermine this benefit.

One of the issues raised was how to fit all of these tools into the day, especially if your access if restricted. I admit that I struggle with this. I think the best thing to do is to try a variety of tools and then pick the one(s) that work best for you and devote your time to them. I use Twitter everyday and I find that this leads me on to blogs and other posts which I find useful. Sometimes the last thing that people want to do after staring at a computer screen all day is spend the evening reading blogs and Twitter feeds. Twitter was compared to a river – you just have to go with the flow and read a snapshot of the tweets available at the time you are reading it. Otherwise I think people who follow more than about five people would go mad!

Social media training was also discussed. Whilst some had formal training, most people seemed self-taught and others came to use social media through various 23 Things programmes. I would recommend these programmes for anyone who wants an introduction to social media tools. Cam23 and cpd23 are just two of the recent programmes that I know of and although they are over, the how-to posts remain up. I think that these tools are best explored rather than taught, but that’s just my opinion.

The use of social media in catalogues was another topic. I have no experience with this so it was really interesting for me to see what others do. Tagging seemed to be the most talked about tool but there was a debate over how popular this was with users. I've read research which seems to suggest that users find it useful but don’t value it as much as controlled language subject headings. I work in a legal deposit library and get all sorts of material across my desk. Sometimes I think that it would help to have some outside input, especially with something mathematical and complicated, but I think that user based tagging has a LONG way to go before it can compete with the established subject headings systems.

One question asked was how people feel about social media and conferences. I know that I find conference blogs and tweets invaluable when I can’t get to an event, but some were worried that it would be anti-social to tweet from a conference. I think that although it can be annoying for some it's becoming more and more the norm nowadays and the advantages of being able to keep in touch far outweigh the disadvantages.

Some people raised concerns over the ownership of social media content and issues surrounding privacy. I think that this is an interesting area which deserves more thought. Most people are aware of privacy issues but I must admit that ownership isn’t something I had given much thought to. I’d like to think that since I created the so-called intellectual content of this site that it belongs to me but maybe not? Something worth looking into/thinking about.

Many useful suggestions were made about using social media for work as well as personal purposes. A Twitter marathon for cataloguers was suggested to highlight the variety of material that gets catalogued in a single day. I think this is a brilliant suggestion and I hope that it’s one that gets taken up – I know I’d love to be involved!

Overall the discussions raised some really interesting points and ideas that hopefully will get taken forward in the future. There were even some non-Twitterers who may have been converted which is possibly the best outcome of all!

One last thing I want to mention that was posted on the forum is this website for cataloguers to share pictures of what they are working on. It’s an excellent distraction when stuck on subject headings ;o)

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Essential Library of Congress Subject Headings

I recently wrote a review of Essential Library of Congress Subject Headings by Vanda Broughton for the CILIP CIG newsletter. The newsletter was published today and current members can read the latest issue here.

For anyone that doesn't have access to the newsletter I just want to recommend this book. It belongs with the two already well known books in the series on cataloguing and classification and is a worthy addition. The book makes the subject interesting when it could have been very dull indeed! I think it's definitely worth borrowing from the library or even buying whether you are new to subject headings or need a quick refresher.

November 2013: Edited to add that anyone can now read the review here.

Problems of Cataloguing in Higher Education - a CIG/ARLG event

Last night I attended the CIG/ARLG joint seminar in London. The topic was "The Problems of Cataloguing in Higher Education", which immediately appealed to me since it's relevant to my everyday job as a cataloguer in a university library. Robin Armstrong-Viner from the University of Kent gave the main presentation.

The current economic situation isn't news for anyone, but it has brought a lot of issues to a head. Everyone is under pressure to perform and libraries are by no means excluded from this. Cataloguing departments are sadly amongst some of the first areas targeted for cuts in organisations looking for ways to save money. One of the first questions that Robin asked was what level of value does cataloguing add for our users? He has calculated that, depending on the grade of the staff involved, each item costs between £5-£11 to catalogue. The crucial question is, does this reflect value for money? I think I (and plenty of others) would argue that it does. As Robin later pointed out, cataloguing is a core service of the library. Without it, libraries would not be able to provide almost all of their services for the basic reason that they wouldn't be able to find anything! I think that this is well worth the investment of £5-£11, but then I'm more than a little biased! It's an interesting concept and hopefully one that someone will take further one day. If someone could come up with a way to measure the impact of a catalogued book in £s and then compare this to the above figure we could be looking at some evidence that it would be hard for our managers to ignore.

Robin also touched on the now infamous amongst cataloguers blog post on LISNPN by Theresa Schultz. He argued that this sort of post shows the reason why cataloguers need to work to change the way that they are perceived. Again, this is nothing new to cataloguers but Robin managed to turn the words of the post and comments on their head. Instead of classing cataloguers as nitpicky and accurate to the point of pain he showed us to be a business critical and precise bunch. I especially liked the point about cataloguing being 'business critical' since it seems like the kind of phrase that would impress the management. Cataloguing is vital to the library and a core service, as touched on above and we need to work hard to promote this image to our colleagues and users.

We were also urged to remember that we have a choice in what we do from here. We can aim for more of the same, consolidate our professional knowledge and focus on the traditional expertise of cataloguing. Although this sounds tempting we then run the risk of becoming increasingly irrelevant. Our other option is to change. We can build on the core skills that cataloguers have and demonstrate other ways in which we can add value to the work of the library. With this second option the danger is that we risk losing our professional identity. Personally I sit on the fence with this one in that I think that we need a little bit of both. We need to work towards maintaining our high levels of professional knowledge whilst working to demonstrate how we add value outside of our departments. Maybe this is a touch idealistic but I sometimes think that people spend so much time thinking of ways in which they could change that they don't always stop to think if they should. I don't doubt that cataloguing needs to adapt but I do strongly believe that it has been considered a core skill for a reason - it's very much needed.

Also on the subject of perceptions, Robin pointed out that we need to go from expecting respect automatically to earning it. Users don't really care how material gets to the shelf, only that it is there when they need it. Cataloguers need to keep on demonstrating the value that they can bring to both library services and the wider community. We need to be on the ball responding to changing user needs and expectations as well as supporting the wider university and world. Cataloguers also need to think about sharing information in ways that allow it to be re-purposed, possibly for uses that we can't imagine right now.

I think for me one of the most interesting points of the seminar was the analogy between libraries and hospitals. It takes many different kinds of doctors, nurses and non-medical personnel to make a hospital function correctly. Their jobs may be small or large but they are all essential to the smooth running of the hospital. Libraries work in much the same way. Cataloguers may be only one part but they are vital in the smooth running of the library's functions. We need to interact more with our colleagues, both to promote ourselves and our role and to work together to help make the library the best that it possibly can be. I thought that this was an excellent analogy and one that I hope to be introducing to both my managers and my colleagues in the near future!

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#uklibchat - Cataloguing and Classification

Last Thursday I took part in the uklibchat on cataloguing and classification. For anyone who doesn't know, uklibchat is a Twitter chat which is held once a fortnight and discusses a wide range of library topics. Information about the chat, future topics and agendas can be found here.

Probably the question that caused most discussion was do you think that library schools should teach cataloguing and classification or is it best learnt on the job? There were a mixture of answers to this but the general consensus was that library schools should certainly teach at least the basics. More in depth knowledge could be learnt whilst in post but several people mentioned the idea that cataloguing is a fundamental part of our professional identity as librarians. This means that it needs to be an integral part of the library school curriculum.

I agree with these statements. When I took my cataloguing and classification module at library school I was already an experienced cataloguer and so there wasn't that much that was new to me. I have to say though that I sympathised with others who struggled with the module, having had little or no prior experience of cataloguing. Cataloguing is a very difficult subject to teach 'dry' without any practical experience. It is definitely a skill that needs to be practiced to be appreciated. Having said this I am aware that there are fewer cataloguing posts available than there used to be, with a lot of the work now outsourced. This makes studying the topic in library school even more important since it may be the only introduction that many people get. This also highlights the need for enthusiastic cataloguing teachers. I was lucky that my lecturer was able to make what could have been quite a dry topic very interesting due to her enthusiasm, but I appreciate that this might not be the case for everyone. This is especially true if people are learning on the job with a line manager who already has their hands full!

An interesting question was how can catalogues and their content be made more social? My suggestion was maybe the introduction of more user tagging. I think though that this may be more a case of libraries doing what they think their users want rather than what they actually want. There are too many inconsistencies for them to be the basis of information retrieval but they could provide an added extra. I know that in my job I am sometimes cataloguing books (such as complex maths or science books) that I have problems coming up with subject headings for. A user who is actually a specialist in the subject would have more of an idea what others in the field would be looking for and so could provide valuable subject ideas. I still think that traditional subject terms should remain the main way of indexing works.

Another question asked was what is the best way to get into cataloguing? The most popular methods seemed to be volunteering or asking to shadow someone who actually works in a cataloguing department. I think this is good advice, even to those of us already in cataloguing posts. There is always more to learn and new ways of doing things. Visiting others in the profession is a great way to update your own skills and I hope to be doing some of this myself in the near future. Just not sure where/how I am going to fit it in!

The issue of how to help people who have the desire to learn cataloguing but no opportunities to do so was raised. I'm fortunate enough to have the option of visiting others but I know that for many this isn't practical. There were many suggestions for some kind of online training and it sounds like CILIP CIG is on the case. Hopefully this will lead to more opportunities for people to learn cataloguing and classification.

What developments do you expect in how library catalogues are presented to users? Most people thought that Google style interfaces would become more the norm and I think that we are starting to see this in more and more libraries. It's what users are used to and what they expect and I think that this is one trend that librarians are going to have to accept.

A question which got me thinking was what is the best classification scheme for an academic library? Many different suggestions were put forward on the best scheme and I don't think a consensus was reached. Cambridge has its own unique system and it's the only one I've ever used (as a cataloguer). The question did get me thinking about the pitfalls of a library having its own system and multiple systems being used in libraries in general. Does this prepare users for finding information? Students at Cambridge have to use multiple schemes across different college and faculty libraries and I'm undecided about whether this is a good thing or a bad thing. On the one hand, if they only had to use one system this may make it easier for them to find resources across the libraries. On the other hand, having different systems can encourage them to actually use subject indexing to look for the resources. I'm sure there is no one perfect answer and the best method is something which makes it as easy as possible for users to find what they need.

There were other topics covered but I feel that I have gone on long enough! ukclibchat posts excellent summaries of their chats so I advise anyone interested to have a look there for a more thorough discussion of the issues.

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