What's so different about the net?

[The Big Glee Bopper]

On Tue, 17 Oct 1995, Tony Barry wrote:

> Centre for Networked Information and Publishing & also
> Centre for Networked Access to Scholarly Information  fone  +61 6 249 4632
> Australian National University Library                phax  +61 6 279 8120
> Canberra  A.C.T. 0200, AUSTRALIA                      tony at info.anu.edu.au

A bunch of relatively nice stuff but looks like CNI is yet another fish 
who hasn't discovered water.

OK, we've all agreed that people are the most important resource on the 
internet and probably the one significant new resource made possible by 
the internet, so we are back to the problem of accessing people -- I did 
this by fiat just to save a flame war

At the very least we could say: 

WE: Well Mr. Bopper there is the MARC record format we could use for
people. 

Bopper: Huh? 

We [ to a stunned Bopper]: Didn't you know that there is a MARC format for
people? 

Bopper: Huh?

We: The Community Information Format, designed for organizations and people.

Bopper: People? A standard for people?

We: Damned straight! Got people going to MARC meetings left and right and 
out popped a standard for people.

Bopper: So where is a people opac? Is that an oxymoron?

We: Well, actually we don't know but there must be one somewhere. We do 
know that there are lots of points of access for United Way and Big 
Brothers and even a few public libraries.

[ At this point the Big Glee Bopper turns straight toward his reading 
audience and says ]
 _______________   ________________________________________
|\-------------/| /					   \
||::::/   \::::||/  	Hey, web_4_libbers. Is anyone using \	  
||:::/     \:::|/	  this MARC Community Info standard  \  
||::( (o)(o))::||         for accessing folks??   	      \
||:::\  .. /:::||      					       \__		
||::::\ --/::::||         If not, how come?? Did those MARC folks \
||::::/\ /\::::||           create this standard for yet one more |
||:::/  ^  \:::||           rubber chicken lunch??		  |
|/-------------\|						  |
		\        -- Confused in Bloomington as usual,     /
		 \		The Big Glee Bopper	        /
	          ----------------------------------------------