Organizing Web Information : INFOMINE and LCSH

[Steve Mitchell]

Hi Karen and others,

Interesting comments re Organizing Web Information (was: Something Missing)...
We've been grappling with this for 2 1/2 years now as we've done our 7,000
record
strong virtual library of selected, annotated and LCSH indexed (as of 11/95)
links to
scholarly and educational resources. After looking at the time & $  involved
to do
anything close to real MARC (right, 1-1 1/2 hours cataloger time per newly
cataloged print item, just not gonna happen; even at 1/2 hour per item its not
gonna happen) and being painfully familiar with the growth rate of quality
resources on the Web we've developed what we think is a fairly streamlined,
quick,
workable way of using LCSH. Its based really on piggy-backing off the wealth of
cataloging already in our union catalog and on, where LCSH departs from anything
resembling natural language (as it will do from time to time), having 6
simple rules
for converting back to natural language (which could then  be called locally
assigned hdgs). About 10 minutes per add. Of course, we do hedge our bets
and believe that if the mega-bucks showed up to do it we could go MARC.
You're also right about Z39.50. Its good, its important and it may not be
taking off (if considered against the backdrop of the appearance of what
seems like several dozen to hundreds of serious, academically useful
databases every month which arent Z39.50 oriented and whose corporate
providers probably havent even heard of it and if they have dont appear to
care a lot). And, this is too bad. At any rate, the following documents may
be of interest: 

INFOMINE at: http://lib-www.ucr.edu
INFOMINE background article at:  .../pubs/italmine.html
INFOMINE LCSH Method article at:  .../pubs/postlcsh.html


Cordially,


Steve Mitchell
INFOMINE Co-coordinator
Bio-Agricultural Library
University of California, Riverside