Page 113 - Cataloging and Classification for Library Technicians, 2nd Edition

Copy Cataloging 99

cords cre ated by par tic i pat ing li brar ies. For au to mated li brar ies that
are part of a con sortium, copy cataloging can be done by re trieving
the re cord from the da tabase, and, si multaneously, if the re cord is not
in ex istence, cre ating a new re cord in the MARC for mat and add ing it
to the da tabase.
Copy cat aloging is done at different lev els. One level is true copy
cataloging, that is, du plicating a re cord so that it is an ex act copy of
the orig inal work. The sec ond level of copy cataloging is to use an -
other li brary’s re cord as a base and edit or mod ify the re cord to meet
local needs. If the description of the re cord is an ex act match, and if
the orig inator is a rep utable source such as the Library of Con gress,
usually the record is cop ied with out any changes. On the other hand,
if it is a so-called near match, or close copy, meaning that some in for-
mation, per haps the edi tion or the imprint, does not match what is
found, then a de cision has to be made. In some cases, a lit tle ed iting or
mod i fy ing will do. Ac cord ing to the OCLC stan dard fol lowed by au -
tomated libraries, a new re cord must be cre ated if the word ing in the
title is dif ferent; if it is a dif ferent edi tion; if the publication place or
the pub lisher is dif ferent; if the publication date is dif ferent; if paging
is dif ferent; and if the size has a dif ference of more than two cen time-
ters. Care ful judg ment dif fer en ti ates be tween a new re cord be ing cre-
ated ver sus an old re cord be ing du plicated. In serting re cords al ready
there re sults in a dirty database. The li brary tech nician must be very
familiar with a li brary’s policies and must ad here to such pol icies
when per forming the task of copy cataloging.

SOURCES FOR COPY CATALOGING

The Library of Congress

The most ex tensive and com monly used sources for copy cat alog-
ing come from the Li brary of Con gress in book form, on com puter
disk, or in CD-ROM for mat. The Cataloging Dis tribution Ser vice
(CDS) Di vision of the Li brary of Con gress has the fol lowing pub lica-
tions, which are all sources for copy cat aloging. For more in formation
and costs, check the CDS Web page <lcweb.loc.gov/cds/un ion.html>.