71 

Who Will Steer the Ship? 

During 1973, the existence of two study groups sponsored by the Council 
on Library Resources became informally known in the library automation 
community. By the time of the 197 4 ALA Midwinter Meeting, the lack of 
formal identification of these groups, their goals, and their relation to CLR 
provoked some spontaneous and possibly faulty responses from the ALA 
members present. In the March 1974 issue of lOLA, Ms. Ruth Tighe 
analyzed with perception and accuracy the behavior of information scien-
tists attending that meeting. 

However, we feel that further attention should be paid to the precise 
situation in which we find ourselves. The Council on Library Resources 
has, for eighteen months, funded a small group with the acronym of CEMBI. 
Informal communication had it that this group of library automation ex-
perts originally was to devise a standardized subset of the MARC mono-
graph format; however, a full year passed without public announcement 
of this work. Unable to come to an agreement, the group seems to have 
turned to specific strategies for interchange of machine-readable biblio-
graphic data. These goals are, of course, valid and worthy of pursuit. 

CLR also announced at Midwinter the intent to administer a system plan 
for large-scale serials conversion to create a national serials data base. This 
project draws upon the considerable efforts of the ad hoc "Toronto" group, 
which provided a status report of its efforts in the December 1973 issue of 
lOLA. 

In addition, an invitational conference was sponsored in April 197 4 by 
CLR, to discuss national bibliographic control, with a small number 
of conference attendees and with a total absence of publicity. 

There are three major problems inherent in the situation described above, 
affecting not only the library automation community but libraries as a whole. 

First, there is no apparent justification for the air of secrecy which has 
surrounded CLR' s direction of these worthy efforts. Surely it must be 
abundantly clear to all administrators these days that in order to imple-
ment a far-reaching program it is necessary to inform if not consult with 
the target population. Those librarians who are not associated with CLR do 
not necessarily have axes to grind or home-grown systems to foist upon 
the world. They do wish to be kept informed of discussion and develop-
ments which may eventually have a direct effect upon their work. While 
it is perfectly reasonable to foster technical progress in a difficult area of 
study by forming a closed working group of skilled professionals, there 
seems to be little gained by avoiding recognition of such a group. 



72 Journal of Library Automation Vol. 7/2 June 1974 

Second, the approach of these projects has sidestepped all the existing 
channels of operation and communication which we have been striving for 
over a decade to create. Should CLR wish a certain task perfornied, it 
should be able to contract with the Library of Congress or to fund an existing 
ALA committee to carry out the work Under the present circumstances, 
these established channels are likely to find their deliberations bypassed and 
superseded by these ad hoc groups. 

Third, it seems important when determining issues (ad hoc standards for 
local input of MARC-like monograph and serials records) which are of long-
range concern to many libraries, that it is particularly important not to bias 
a development effort toward the needs of one type of library. The approach 
of the large research library, while important:'is not the only vantage point 
from which to perceive the problems of nationwide bibliographic systems. 

We recommend that the Council on Library Resources find an alternate 
method of accomplishing its goals-a method which includes provision for 
adequate communication and which takes advantage of existing channels. 
Such a method, for the CEMBI group, might be to declare its deliberations 
to be a user-group standards proposal for submission to the RTSD/ISAD/ 
RASD Representation in Machine-Readable Form of Bibliographic Infor-
mation Committee ( MARBI), the appropriate ALA committee. If CLR 
wishes more intensive review of this or any other proposal from MARBI, it 
could fund the necessary expenses for more frequent meetings of MARBI. 
An analogous method would establish the serials project as a funded program, 
with the desired task goals, within the Library of Congress, the National 
Serials Data Program, or an appropriate library union serials organization. 

CLR has done many good deeds for the library world in its lifetime; it 
would indeed be unfortunate were it to inadvertently allow the growth of 
professional confusion and resentment that were evident at the Midwinter 
Meeting. 

SusAN K. MARTIN