The history of the near-success of the 1958-59 experiment with cataloging-in-source and the subsequent refusal of the library community to accept its failure are punctuated by data from a recent survey of 391 libraries in 18 categories regarding attitudes toward prepublication cataloging.
The dictionary catalog is described as, a logical answer to the inadequacies of the divided catalogs of the nineteenth century. The claims in behalf of a return to the divided catalog are challenged. The author suggests that the divided catalog actually intensifies the problems of congestion and confusion at the catalog. He contends that the dictionary catalog is more compatible with current library practice, avoids redundant entries, eliminates double searching, and is less likely to mislead the library user.
Data from a two-year survey of the reprint industry based on person-al interviews and questionnaire responses are summarized. The industry is described in terms of type of firm, geographical distribution, various formats of reprints, and general marketing strategies. While the lack of bibliographical control is stressed, considerable attention is also given to the lack of communication among reprinters and between reprinters and librarians about the problems of the industry.
Reprinting is an industry which has emerged in response to the demands and needs of the academic world. Its rapid growth has occasioned changes in the methods of selecting titles, pricing, promotion, and dissemination of information.
Librarians have charged reprint publishers with deceptive marketing tactics,
high prices, and needless duplication of titles-practices which would seem to
reflect a questionable code of ethics. In reality, these practices reflect deeper
problems: poor communications and understanding both between the librarian and
the reprint publisher and within the industry itself.
Some possible solutions to these problems include: (2) the formation of a reprint
publishers' association. which would set up self-policing guidelines; (2) formal
complaint committees set up between RTSD and the new association; and (3) active
direct communication by librarians with reprinters.
Microforms produced for library purposes have made available reprints, original publications, and replacement copies. While microforms have not been completely accepted by users, they have provided a low cost, quality product which, in many cases, can be produced on demand.
In a relatively short period, reprint publishing has progressed from being an adjunct of the antiquarian book trade to a position as a large-scale, self-justified industry, but altitudes and controls have not kept pace. There is evidence that reprints are amenable to conventional bibliographic control, and librarians and publishers must cooperate in improving it by bringing reprints into the publishing mainstream.
Public service librarians generally welcome reprints because they can give much better service to patrons through their use. They have some slight problems in the loaning of materials to reprinters, but the possibility of acquiring valuable titles, hitherto unobtainable, through hard copy reprints and micro forms, far outweighs any problems. Academic and research libraries are the chief purchasers of reprints. Reprint houses offer almost any standard reference work, any worthwhile out-of-print title, catalogs of other libraries, periodical files, government documents, etc. The hard-copy format is good, and although microforms are less desired by patrons they are welcomed for their content. Public service librarians would like to see more communication between library and reprinter.
An abridged account of the proceedings and results of a conference on Southeast Asian research materials, held in Puntjak, Indonesia, April 21-24, 1969. The abridgment is designed to highlight the bibliographical and microform aspects of the conference.