Letting the Cat Out of the Box?

Abstract

Libraries have made huge investments to purchase physical print materials and to enter bibliographic records into their online catalogs. However, studies have shown that for many patrons this is not the first place they go when they are seeking information, if they go to the library catalog at all. In order to better serve patrons at the time of need and at the point of need, libraries need to make bibliographic information available in places other then the OPAC. This presentation will describe methods that The College of New Jersey Library and other libraries are using to make library catalog bibliographic information available outside of the box. These projects include automatically displaying new acquisitions in course management systems, library catalog search boxes in student portals (and other portal systems such as My Yahoo!), and how libraries can make OPAC content available via social networking sites. The technical details and public relations aspects will be discussed. This presentation will also explore the impact of OCLC making library holdings searchable on the Internet via Open WorldCat and Internet search engines such as Google.