Structured data, Web 2.0, libraries

presented by Lorcan Dempsey

• Releasing value of classical bibliographic data

Web 2.0

• flat applications

• APIs

• lightweight service composition and web services
• stitching functionality and applications together

• AJAX

• GoogleMaps

• make data work harder
• collection, exploitation and mining of data

• Wish list and suggestion in Amazon
• Page Rank in Google

• the architecture of participation
• growth of social networking approaches (blogs, wikis, etc)
• Mobilizing the edge
• people contibuting to create additional value
• co-creation is central to a variety of these web services

Flat Applications

• audience level web service

• use library holds distribution to predict and display audience-level (a hint of what it might be. Doesn’t definatively say)
• every book has an audience level score

• ARL=1.0, Academic=0.66, Public=0.33, School=0

• Greasemonkey script interfaces with web service and inserts result in web page

• The selfish gene = .06
• The world is flat = .05
• Theories of the information society = .71
• This really needs to translated into something a bit more user friendly.

Rich Interaction (Ajax)

• Live Search

• Quick searches target with each additional keystroke of search term/phrase
• retrieves ordered FRBR-inspired records
• ranked by holdings
• Narrow-by Dewey attributes, top categories listed on side based on DDC
• satisficing engine – give them something immediately when they type in something (a single letter even)
• Also have it working with Library of Congress subject headings

• way to get subject headings to people without them having to know the nominclature

Making Data work harder

• (new) FictionFinder – http://fictionfinder.oclc.org

• Interface that supports searching and browsing of fiction materials
• retrieves ordered, FRBR-inspired results
• facted browse
• new interface 1st quarter 2006
• Start with alphabetical browse by genre
• retrieved works (FRBR-ized) are ordered by holding
• Click on an individual work and it aggregates the bib data from all the editions in multiple libraries
• can sort them in different ways
• link to OCLC find in a library service
• Can search by special indexes for fiction
• link to related works
• link to the same author

Participation

• reviews and WikiD

All of this makes me wonder if libraries should stop using their own catalogs and use OCLC Worldcat’s interface so that it is scoped for your library. Otherwise every library would have to reconstruct this type of system. This seems like a huge duplication of efforts for no reason whatsoever.