Taking up LESK's earlier question, BATTIN inquired whether LC, since it
is accepting electronic files and designing a mechanism for dealing with
that rather than putting books on shelves, would become responsible for
the National Copyright Depository of Electronic Materials. Of course
that could not be accomplished overnight, but it would be something LC
could plan for. GIFFORD acknowledged that much thought was being devoted
to that set of problems and returned the discussion to the issue raised
by LYNCH--whether or not putting the kind of records that both BATTIN and
HOCKEY have been talking about in RLIN is not a satisfactory solution.
It seemed to him that RLIN answered LYNCH's original point concerning
some kind of directory for these kinds of materials. In a situation
where somebody is attempting to decide whether or not to scan this or
film that or to learn whether or not someone has already done so, LYNCH
suggested, RLIN is helpful, but it is not helpful in the case of a local,
on-line catalogue. Further, one would like to have her or his system be
aware that that exists in digital form, so that one can present it to a
patron, even though one did not digitize it, if it is out of copyright.
The only way to make those linkages would be to perform a tremendous
amount of real-time look-up, which would be awkward at best, or
periodically to yank the whole file from RLIN and match it against one's
own stuff, which is a nuisance.
But where, ERWAY inquired, does one stop including things that are
available with Internet, for instance, in one's local catalogue?
It almost seems that that is LC's means to acquire access to them.
That represents LC's new form of library loan. Perhaps LC's new on-line
catalogue is an amalgamation of all these catalogues on line. LYNCH
conceded that perhaps that was true in the very long term, but was not
applicable to scanning in the short term. In his view, the totals cited
by Yale, 10,000 books over perhaps a four-year period, and 1,000-1,500
books from Cornell, were not big numbers, while searching all over
creation for relatively rare occurrences will prove to be less efficient.
As GIFFORD wondered if this would not be a separable file on RLIN and
could be requested from them, BATTIN interjected that it was easily
accessible to an institution. SEVERTSON pointed out that that file, cum
enhancements, was available with reference information on CD-ROM, which
makes it a little more available.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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