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Deanna Marcum, Associate Librarian for Library Services Library of Congress

Service units, divisions, and offices within the Library have submitted the information in this briefing document for the attention and use of Library of Congress staff who will attend the American Library Association (ALA) Annual Conference in Washington, D.C., June 25-30, 2010. The document covers initiatives undertaken at the Library of Congress since the ALA Midwinter Meeting in Boston, Mass., in January 2010.  Information in the printed document is valid as of June 4, 2010.  This document will be updated regularly until the close of the Annual Conference

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Library of Congress Exhibit Booth

Visit the Library of Congress Exhibit Booth #3751 at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center (801 Mount Vernon Place NW, Washington, D.C. 20001). The exhibit booth coordinator is Jane Gilchrist. Exhibit hours are:

• Friday, June 25, 5:30-7:30 p.m (ribbon cutting at 5:15 p.m.)
• Saturday-Sunday, June 26-27, 9:00 a.m. -5:00 p.m.
• Monday, June 28, 9:00 a.m. - 4:00 p.m.

Library of Congress staff making presentations in the booth theater include: Martha Anderson, Colleen Cahill, Mi Chu, John Cole, Reggie Downs, David Fernández-Barrial, Ivey Glendon, Judy Graves, Rebecca Guenther, Patricia Hayward, John Hébert, Margaret Kruesi, Guy Lamolinara, Everette Larson, Cheryl Lederle-Ensign, William LeFurgy, Jane Mandelbaum, Chamisa Nash, Barbara Natanson, Tracy North, David Pachter, Laverne Page, Amber Paranick, Robert Patrick, Michelle Rago, Ed Redmond, Mary Lou Reker, John Sayers, Diane Schug-O’Neill, Christine Sellers, Taru Spiegel, Deb Thomas, Peter Vankevich, Janis Young, and Peter Young.

A complete schedule of booth theater presentations is found on the Library of Congress at ALA Annual Conference Web site at URL: <http://www.loc.gov/ala/an-2010-booth.html>.  Of special note are two showings of the HISTORY Modern Marvels program featuring the Library of Congress that aired on June 10, 2010.  In the hour-long episode, titled “The Real National Treasure,” more than 50 staff members of the Library and the Architect of the Capitol are interviewed about the Library’s vast array of activities. The program will be repeated in the booth on Sunday, June 27, at 9:00 am, and on Monday, June 28, at 3:00 pm.Also at the booth, the Center for the book will host two important presentations: a one-hour presentation with National Ambassador for Young People's Literature Katherine Paterson (Sunday, June 27, 12:00-1:00 pm); and a 30-minute presentation on the Center for the Book’s Reading and Literacy programs (Monday, June 28, 9:30 10:00am).

Incentive give-away items at the booth include, from the Cataloging Distribution Service: Class Web keyboard brushes and computer clips; copies of What Is FRBR?, Understanding MARC Bibliographic, and Understanding MARC Authority Records; LC Classification Poster and Pocket Guide; the CDS Catalog of Bibliographic Products and Services; flyers about recent CDS publications;and assorted reference guides and brochures. The giveaway items also include fine-art-quality images of the U.S. Capitol Building and downtown Washington, D.C., in 1869.

Library of Congress staff will be available at the booth throughout the day to answer questions and to demonstrate ClassificationWeb and Cataloger’s Desktop.  Selected merchandise from the Library Shop will be available for purchase and free 2010 National Book Festival posters will be distributed.  There will be a lottery drawing each day at 11:00 am for an 11” by 14” digital print.  Entrants must attend the drawing to win.

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U.S. COPYRIGHT OFFICE

Backlog Reduction

In December 2009, the Copyright Office initiated a concerted effort to reduce the number of backlogged claims in process. The Office focused on reducing the number of backlogged claims filed on paper applications, which are relatively more labor-intensive to process compared to claims filed online, and the effort was bolstered by the Librarian of Congress, who authorized short-term details of 51 Library of Congress employees to the Copyright Office to assist the the Office in backlog reduction.

By concentrating staff throughout the Copyright Office on the project, and with the help of the additional, short-term Library staff, the Office cleared more than 200,000 claims during the first three months of 2010, thereby accomplishing the effort’s goal of reducing the total number of backlogged claims in process by 100,000 by April 1, 2010. Efforts to further reduce the backlog of claims in process are continuing.

Costco Wholesale Corp. v. Omega, S.A.

Omega is a watch company that produces its watches in Switzerland and exports them globally.  Omega’s watches are engraved with a design that has been registered with the U.S. Copyright Office.  The watches at issue in this case were first sold by Omega outside the U.S.  The watches were then sold to other parties, and eventually were purchased by Costco, which sold them to consumers in California.  Omega did not authorize the importation of the watches into or their subsequent sale within the U.S.
Omega filed this lawsuit claiming that Costco has infringed its rights of importation and distribution under sections 602(a) and 106(3) of the Copyright Act.  Costco argued that those rights had been exhausted by the application of section 109(a) of the Copyright Act.  The District Court for the Central District of California granted Costco’s motion for summary judgment without discussion.

The Ninth Circuit reversed, holding that section 109(a) “is unavailable as a defense to the claims under §§ 106(3) and 602(a)” because the watches were manufactured outside the U.S., and thus outside the reach of section 109(a). 

Costco petitioned the Supreme Court for certiorari.  The Court asked the Solicitor General for her views.  The Solicitor, in consultation with the Copyright Office, Patent and Trademarks Office, and other agencies, advised the Court that the Ninth Circuit decision was correct in light of the Supreme Court’s 1998 ruling in Quality King Distribs., Inc. v. L’Anza Research Int’l, Inc. and thus that certiorari should be denied.  Notwithstanding the Solicitor’s recommendation, the Court decided to hear the case.  Briefing is scheduled to occur over the summer and early fall of 2010. Library organizations have expressed interest in the case because of the potential effect of a decision on the domestic distribution of copies of books and other works that are made outside the U.S.

Digitization of Pre-1978 Registration Records

A long-anticipated project to digitize pre-1978 copyright records has moved from the planning stage to implementation. These records reflect the copyright status and ownership of millions of works and are of vital importance not only to the public, but also to the copyright industries that make up a significant part of the U.S. economy. The digitization project aims to preserve the records and make them publicly available online.

The first phase of the project, started in February, involves scanning approximately 2.3 million assignment cards, which serve as indexes to documents recorded in the Copyright Office going back to 1870, and scanning all 660 volumes of the Catalog of Copyright Entries (CCE), an index of U.S. copyright registrations and assignments published from 1891 to 1982.

The second phase of the project, which will commence in fiscal year 2011, will involve scanning approximately 9 million registration index cards covering the period 1971-1977.

Google Book Search Litigation

Proceedings relating to the settlement of the Google Book Search litigation continued throughout 2009 and into 2010.  The underlying lawsuit was based on Google’s systematic reproduction of millions of protected books in their entirety, without permission of the copyright owners, through scanning operations set up with large research libraries.  Once scanned, the books are indexed electronically, allowing end-users to search by title and other bibliographic information.  Google returns hits to searchers that include the option of browsing “snippets” (e.g. several lines of the book), except for public domain books, which can be viewed and downloaded in their entirety.
The settlement between Google and the plaintiffs, the Association of American Publishers and the Authors Guild, resulted in an agreement hundreds of pages long with numerous appendices.  That agreement is subject to the approval of the United States District Court for the Southern District.  The court had postponed, to Sept. 4, 2009, the deadline for authors and publishers to file objections to the settlement or to opt out of the settlement. 

On Sept. 10, 2009, the House Judiciary Committee held a hearing on “Competition and Commerce in Digital Books: The Proposed Google Book Settlement.”  The Committee invited the Register of Copyrights to testify and present her views on the settlement.  In that testimony, the Register expressed three major concerns.  First, allowing Google to continue to scan millions of books into the future, on a rolling schedule with no deadline, is tantamount to creating a private compulsory license through the judiciary.  Second, certain provisions of the proposed settlement dramatically compromise the legal rights of rights holders in out-of-print books, by, among other things, allowing Google to sell such works without permission.  The out-of-print settlement provisions would also inappropriately interfere with the ongoing efforts of Congress to enact orphan works legislation.  Third, foreign rights holders and foreign governments have raised concerns about the potential impact of the proposed settlement on their exclusive rights and national digitization projects. 

The Department of Justice (DOJ), with the assistance of the Copyright Office and other federal agencies, filed a Statement of Interest of the United States on the proposed settlement with the court on Sept. 18, 2009.  The Statement of Interest expressed concerns about the proposed settlement in the areas of copyright, Rule 23 class action procedures, and antitrust law.  In response to that Statement of Interest, the parties to the settlement asked the court to postpone its fairness hearing, and revised the settlement in order to take into account some of the concerns expressed by the Justice Department. 

On Nov. 13, 2009, the parties submitted a revised settlement agreement, which significantly reduced the number of works by foreign authors included within the settlement’s scope, but did not alter the basic structure of the agreement among the parties.  The amended settlement also extended the deadline for interested persons to object or opt out of the settlement to Jan. 28, 2010.  Once again, the Office worked with other agencies and provided extensive analysis to the Department of Justice for its second Statement of Interest of the United States, filed on Feb. 4, 2010.  This statement also expressed serious concerns about copyright law and concluded that some of the terms proposed by the parties are a better fit for legislative review than judicial action.  The fairness hearing took place on Feb. 18, 2010, and Judge Chin, of the Southern District of New York, is still considering whether to approve the amended settlement agreement or not.

Public Process About Access to Copyrighted Works for the Blind and Visually Impaired Continues

The Copyright Office continued its public process to gather information about access to copyrighted works by blind and other persons with disabilities by holding an additional comment proceeding in November and December, 2009.  The proceeding was part of a fact-finding effort undertaken by the Copyright Office and the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to prepare for a Dec. 14-18, 2009 meeting of the Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights (SCCR) of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO).  Comments and reply comments were received on a treaty proposal introduced at the previous SCCR meeting in May 2009 by the delegations of Brazil, Ecuador, and Paraguay, which would mandate certain exceptions and other practices regarding the cross-border import, export, and qualified distribution of copyrighted works for the blind, visually impaired, and other reading-disabled persons, without permission of the rights holders.  The treaty proposal is based on text that was prepared under the auspices of the World Blind Union.  For the full record in this public inquiry, including notices, comments, and transcripts, see URL: <http://www.copyright.gov/docs/sccr/>.

At the December SCCR meeting, member states of WIPO, including the U. S., discussed possible solutions relating to access to copyrighted works, including the treaty proposal introduced by the delegations of Brazil, Ecuador, and Paraguay. The member states agreed to initiate consultations aimed at producing an international consensus regarding copyright limitations and exceptions for persons with print disabilities.

In March, 2010, the Office hosted representatives from developing countries and countries in transition in Washington, D.C. for a week of training on U.S. and international copyright law.  Co-sponsored by WIPO, the training focused on exceptions in the law for the blind, and a series of timely questions about resources, technical standards, and market solutions designed to improve accessibility in the digital world.  The event included several speakers on the topics at hand, including Nancy Weiss, General Counsel for the U.S. Institute of Museums and Library Services, George Kerscher, Secretary General of the DAISY Consortium, Allan Adler, Vice President for Legal and Governmental Affairs for the Association of American Publishers, Frank Kurt Cylke, Director of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, and Marc Maurer, President of the National Federation of the Blind, among others. 

Discussions about access to copyrighted works by the blind and visually impaired persons continue at the WIPO SCCR meetings.  In May 2010, a representative from the Copyright Office attended Informal Consultations at WIPO aimed at discussing this topic, where the U.S. delegation tabled a Draft Consensus Instrument for access to copyrighted works by the blind and other visually impaired persons.  This document may be found at URL: <http://www.copyright.gov/docs/sccr/drafts/>. 

Reed Elsevier v. Muchnick

In March, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously (with Justice Sotomayor recusing herself) that section 411(a) of the Copyright Act does not restrict a federal court’s subject-matter jurisdiction.  Section 411(a) states that a copyright owner cannot sue for infringement until the work at issue has been registered with the Copyright Office.  The Supreme Court’s decision means that, while registration is still a requisite element of an infringement claim, the failure to register does not deprive a federal court of the jurisdiction to adjudicate such a claim.  The case, Reed Elsevier v. Muchnick, was an appeal of a Federal Circuit Court opinion that invalidated a settlement reached between freelance writers and publishers in relation to the Supreme Court’s 2001 decision in Tasini v. New York Times. As a result of the Court’s decision, Reed Elsevier v. Muchnick will go back to the Second Circuit for further proceedings.

In Tasini, the Court found in favor of freelance writers who claimed their copyrights had been infringed when publishers licensed inclusion of the writers’ articles in online databases without further compensating them or requesting permission. In its ruling, the Court noted that the parties could enter into agreements that would allow the writers’ works to continue to be included in online databases, such as the New York Times archives and Lexis-Nexis.

In 2005, after lengthy negotiations, they did so, consenting to a class-action settlement involving $18 million that provided payment to writers depending on whether and when they had registered the copyrights to their works with the Copyright Office. As a class action, the settlement required approval by a federal court, which the Southern District Court of New York subsequently provided.

However, a group of freelance writers appealed, claiming that the settlement allocated insufficient funds to authors of unregistered works. In November 2007, the Second Circuit Court of Appeals declined to approve the district court ruling, finding that under section 411(a) of the Copyright Act, only writers who had registered their works with the Copyright Office were eligible to file claims for damages. Most of the freelance writers involved in the class action had not registered their works. The appeals court held that federal courts have no jurisdiction over unregistered works, and the district court erred in ruling in a case made up mostly of such works.

The Supreme Court agreed to review the case in order to decide whether section 411(a) limits the jurisdiction of federal courts over copyright infringement actions. The Copyright Office assisted the U.S. Department of Justice on a brief by the Government submitted to the Court that took the position that, although the registration requirement is not jurisdictional, it nevertheless serves important public interests beyond those of the parties to an infringement suit.  Those interests include the interest of the Library of Congress in receiving copyright registration deposits to add to its collection, as well as the public interest in maintaining the Copyright Office’s public record of copyright ownership, and the interest in giving the courts the benefit of the Register’s expertise on issues of copyrightability of works that are the subject of copyright infringement suits.  Therefore, the registration requirement ordinarily should be strictly enforced by the courts.  However, in this particular case, the Solicitor General’s brief argued that the interest in enforcing the registration requirement must be balanced against the public interest in approving an industry-wide class action settlement that would recognize freelance authors’ copyrights while ensuring the public availability of their works.  Accordingly, the Government argued that the lower courts should be permitted to consider the merits of the settlement in this particular case.

The Court’s opinion in Reed Elsevier affirmed that “section 411(a)’s registration requirement is a precondition to filing a copyright infringement claim,” but it also stated that a “copyright holder’s failure to comply with that requirement does not restrict a federal court’s subject-matter jurisdiction over infringement claims involving unregistered works.” It reaffirmed prior decisions that a statutory requirement is jurisdictional only if Congress “clearly states” that it is so, however, Congress did not do so in section 411(a).

Revision of Mandatory Deposit Requirements to Assist the Library of Congress in Acquiring Online-Only Works

On Jan. 25, 2010, the Copyright Office issued an interim regulation regarding the mandatory deposit of online-only works (see URL: <http://www.copyright.gov/fedreg/2010/75fr3863.pdf [PDF]>). The regulation exempts electronic works published in the U.S. and available only online (e.g., with no print version) from the mandatory deposit provision, subject to a demand for deposit of copies or phonorecords of such works issued by the Copyright Office.  Under the new rule, demands will initially be limited to electronic serials; other categories of online-only works may be added by subsequent regulatory changes pursuant to the Library’s collection needs.  The regulation also specifies that a complete copy of an online-only work must include metadata and formatting codes and establishes new best edition criteria for electronic serials available only online.

Prior to this regulatory amendment, Copyright Office regulations exempted “automated databases available only online in the United States” from mandatory deposit.  The Copyright Office had interpreted this exemption broadly to apply to all electronic works published only online, in part because the Library of Congress had previously neither the inclination nor the technological means to collect online-only works. However, because a significant amount of creative and scholarly work is now available only on the internet, it has become imperative for the Library to acquire such works through mandatory deposit.

The regulations apply to the mandatory deposit requirement of copyright law and are part of a larger effort by the Library of Congress to build its collection of electronic works, starting with online journals. The interim regulations are structured so that online-only works remain exempt from mandatory deposit until the Copyright Office, at the request of the Library, issues a demand for deposit copies or phonorecords. Under this plan, the Copyright Office will initially limit its demand to 100 titles from 38 publishers of electronic serials, specifically journals that publish no more often than weekly and have the same appearance, formatting, and regular publication schedule as print serials. The Library estimates that more than 5,000 scholarly journals are now available only online with no print counterparts.

The Copyright Office proposed a qualified, demand-based exemption for online-only works in a July 2009 Federal Register notice (see URL: <http://www.copyright.gov/fedreg/2009/74fr34286.pdf [PDF]>). The proposal received seven comments and three reply comments from the public (available at URL: <http://www.copyright.gov/docs/online-only/>), which were reviewed and discussed by the Copyright Office in close consultation with other divisions of the Library. 
This qualified exemption is a first step in the Library’s larger effort to acquire and preserve material available on the Internet.  The regulation is classified as “interim” so that it can be fine-tuned over time.  Accordingly, the Library and the Copyright Office held a publishers’ forum on May 10-11, 2010 in order to discuss file transfer protocols, packaging and transmission standards, content and data models, and metadata and naming conventions related to the deposit of electronic serials.

Later this year, the Copyright Office will invite public comment on the operation of the new demand-based system, after which it will finalize the regulation. Each time the Library identifies a new category of work to be subject to demand, the Office will seek public comment and revise the regulations accordingly.

Upgrade of Copyright Office Electronic Processing System

Last September, the Copyright Office launched a project to upgrade the electronic Copyright Office (eCO) with the latest version of Siebel/Oracle, the software application on which eCO is built. The project will improve the way eCO functions for staff and public users who come to the Copyright Office Web site to register copyright claims and conduct other business.

Based on best practices in the information technology industry, the Office selected an incremental strategy for the upgrade. Phase one includes installation of the new software configured to mirror current system functionality, plus new hardware in the production environment. To users, the upgraded system will initially appear to operate the same way it always has. Phase two, which will begin immediately following the initial upgrade, will involve building in new functionality and enhancements through periodic code releases.

Copyright Office administrators anticipate that the new version of Siebel/Oracle will be implemented by September 2010 (phase one).

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OFFICE OF THE LIBRARIAN

Jo Ann Jenkins, chief operating officer, left the Library of Congress to become president of the AARP Foundation on June 1, 2010.  She came to the Library as senior advisor to the Librarian of Congress in 1994, became chief of staff in 1996 and chief operating officer on Jan. 1, 2007.  She played a central role in restructuring the Library’s diversity and inclusiveness initiatives and in other initiatives to improve the quality of worklife and career opportunities for staff; oversaw the Library’s Bicentennial and the nine National Book Festivals from 2001 through 2009; and introduced the Library of Congress Experience for on-site and virtual  visitors.

Robert Dizard, Jr., became the chief of staff of the Library of Congress on May 24, 2010. He has direct responsibility for the executive functions of the Librarian, including the offices of the General Counsel, Public Affairs, Congressional Relations, Development, Special Events and Public Programs, and the Office of the Chief Financial Officer.

Lucy Suddreth, assistant chief operating officer, became chief of support operations on Mary 24, 2010.  She has direct responsibility for the Library’s infrastructure operations, including the Human Resources Directorate, Office of Contracts and Grants Management, Integrated Support Services, the Office of Opportunity, Inclusiveness, and Compliance, and the Office of Security and Emergency Preparedness.

CONGRESSIONAL RELATIONS OFFICE

The following are recent legislative activities relating/of interest to the Library since the ALA 2010 Midwinter Meeting in Boston, Mass.

Changes on House Appropriations Subcommittee
Shortly before leaving for Memorial Day recess, the House Appropriations Committee made several changes in membership on the majority side.  On the Subcommittee on Legislative Branch, Reps. Betty McCollum (D-MN) and Tim Ryan (D-OH) have been replaced by Reps. Patrick Murphy (D-PA) and Lincoln Davis (D-TN).  No changes were made on the minority side.  The current membership of the Subcommittee is: Chair: Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL); Michael Honda (D-CA), C.A. "Dutch" Ruppersberger (D- MD), Ciro Rodriguez (D-TX), Lincoln Davis (D-TN), and Patrick Murphy (D- PA); Ranking Member Robert B. Aderholt (R-AL), Steven C. LaTourette (R-OH), and Tom Cole (R-OK).  Full Committee Chairman David R. Obey (D-WI), who has announced plans to retire at the end of the current Congress, and Ranking Member Jerry Lewis (R-CA), are ex officio subcommittee members.

Collaboration with GPO
At the request of the Senate Committee on Rules and Administration and the Committee on House Administration, CRO worked with the Law Library and ITS to provide briefings on the Library’s collaborative efforts with the Government Printing Office to retrospectively digitize federal legislative content to make this information available to the public.  The Library staff explained how the two agencies are drawing on their respective skills and the collections to digitize the Statutes at Large and Congressional Record, and prepared a Memorandum of Understanding between the agencies to generally govern the collaborative effort and lead to other digitization projects of mutual interest.

Improving Access to Government Information:  H.R. 4983
H.R. 4983 was introduced on March 25, 2010 by Rep. Mike Quigley (D-IL) and referred to the Committees on Oversight and Government Reform, Rules, House Administration, Judiciary, and Standards of Official Conduct.  Rep. Quigley also announced the recent formation of the Congressional Transparency Caucus, which has a bipartisan membership of 20 House members.  Along with other provisions relating to changes in ethics and lobbying disclosures, the bill Calls for the creation of a centralized database where all earmarks are available in an easy to access, searchable format, free to the public.  Committees would be required to post recorded votes, schedules, and amendments online promptly, and legislation must be publicly available 72 hours before consideration.  The House Clerk would publish recorded votes of all Members online; and certain CRS information, paid for with taxpayer dollars, would be available online free of charge to the public.

Law Library of Congress Private/Public Financing: H.R. 2728
Last year, Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) introduced H.R. 2728, the William Orton Law Library Improvement and Modernization Act, providing separate budget treatment for the Law Library of Congress.  The bill also authorizes $3.5 million for Law Library operations, and creates a new private, nonprofit foundation (the AWilliam Orton Program@) to provide supplemental funding for the general operation of the Law Library.  The Library took no position on the bill as introduced, although the Librarian stated for the record in a letter to members of the Committee on House Administration his objection to a separate line item for the Law Library.  The House Administration Committee adopted an amendment offered by Rep. Lofgren to re-designate the Law Library as the “National Law Library”, and the bill passed the House.  After the bill was referred to the Senate Committee on Rules and Administration, at  the suggestion of Sen. Robert Bennett (R-UT) the Law Library and the American Bar Association’s Standing Committee on the Law Library of Congress worked together on compromise language that deletes the separate line item and re-works the public-private partnership in support of the Law Library.  The bill is still pending before the Senate Committee.

“Open Government” Directive and Plan:  Office of Management and Budget Memorandum
On Dec. 8, 2009, OMB Director Peter Orszag released a Memorandum directing executive agencies to take specific actions to implement the principles of transparency, public participation, and collaboration in government. The memorandum establishes a framework setting tasks and deadlines for: publishing government information online; improving the quality of government information, particularly relating to federal spending; creating and institutionalizing a culture of and enabling policies for Open Government; and publishing an agency Open Government Plan (See URL: <http://www.openthegovernment.org/otg/OGD.pdf [PDF] >).

By the end of January, executive agencies were required to publish a number of “high value” data sets on Data.gov, a new Web site dedicated to providing public access to high value, machine readable datasets generated by the Executive Branch. Among other things, Data.gov offers data through a "raw" data catalog, providing an instant download of machine readable, platform-independent datasets.  The site also provides hyperlinks which may lead to agency tools or agency web pages that allow public users to mine federal datasets.

Public Online Information Act: H.R. 4858
H.R. 4858, introduced by Rep. Steve Israel (D-NY), creates a 19-member Public Online Information Advisory Committee empowered to issue nonbinding government-wide guidelines on making public information available on the Internet. Six members would be Congressional appointees, but the Committee is intended to comprise not more than 6 government employees.  The Executive Branch would be required to make its information publicly available, and the bill expresses the sense of Congress that publicly available information held by the legislative and judicial branches should be available on the Internet.

The bill also states the sense of Congress that GPO should make all of its publications permanently available on the Internet in multiple formats that best meet the needs of the public. In doing so, the Government Printing Office is strongly encouraged to consider the recommendations of the Public Online Information Advisory Committee and the E-Government Administrator in the Office of Management and Budget.

The bill was introduced on March 16, 2010 and referred to the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. On May 26, the bill was referred to the Subcommittee on Information Policy, Census, and National Archives.

Public Printer Appointed
On April 19, 2010, President Obama nominated William J. Boarman, of Maryland, to be Public Printer, to replace Robert Tapella.  On May 25, the Committee on Rules and Administration held a confirmation hearing for Mr. Boarman, who worked at the Government Printing Office in the 1970’s.  Since leaving GPO he has worked for printing-related unions, and serves as President of the Printing, Publishing, and Media Workers Sector of the Communication Workers of America.  He is also the Senior Vice President of the CWA.

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OFFICE OF SECURITY AND EMERGENCY PREPAREDNESS (OSEP)

The Office of Security and Emergency Preparedness continued developing the Library's security and emergency programs, with a focus on enhancing the emergency preparedness program, updating Continuity of Operations (COOP) plans, reviewing the Strategic Plan for Safeguarding the Collections' working documents, and conducting additional Site Assistance Visits.

The Office of Emergency Preparedness (OEP) within OSEP continued its focus updating the Library's COOP Plans, which included pre-positioning equipment and supplies at the Library's newly designated relocation site, where senior management will assemble in the event the Library's facilities on Capitol Hill are rendered unsafe.  For staff required to work from home during a COOP event, emergency preparedness staff continued their coordination with Information Technology Services to expand remote-access capabilities to ensure the continuation of support to Congress and the national essential functions.  Additionally, OEP recently completed testing of its Everbridge Aware emergency notification alert system, designed to dramatically improve the way emergency information is communicated to staff.  When fully implemented in early June, the alert system will allow users to receive critical time-sensitive information through devices of their choosing, including desk phones, mobile phones, home phones, pagers, emails, and text messages.  Alert messages will be generated by the U.S. Capitol Police or by the Office of Security and Emergency Preparedness.

The Protective Services Office (PSO) in OSEP continued collaborating with members of the Collections Security Oversight Committee (CSOC), now focused on a mid-year review of the Strategic Plan for Safeguarding the Collections' 2010 working documents.  Chaired by a senior librarian, collections management specialist, and conservation specialist, respectively, the CSOC's Policy and Standards, Operations, and Security Awareness subcommittees are reviewing the status of actions whose synergy continues to enhance controls that safeguard collections both on Capitol Hill and at the Library's annexes.  Collaboration also continued in conducting the Site Assistance Visits to all Library divisions over a two-year period.  A physical security specialist and one of several volunteer librarians conduct the visits, using a checklist of items assessing the divisions' effectiveness in securing the collections.

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NATIONAL BOOK FESTIVAL

The 2010 National Book Festival will be held on Sept. 25, 2010 on the National Mall between Third and Seventh Streets. To promote the festival, which this year celebrates “A Decade of Words and Wonder,” the poster will again be available for distribution at the Library of Congress exhibit booth at ALA Annual Conference.

On May 6, 2010, David M. Rubenstein, co-founder and managing director of The Carlyle Group, announced his donation of $5 million ($1 million per year for the next five years) to support the Library of Congress’s National Book Festival  With assurance of longer-term funding, the Library will now be able to expand the one-day festival into a fully integrated program that emphasizes books, reading, and the library as a place of discovery and learning. Librarian of Congress James H. Billington and Mr. Rubenstein also announced the creation of the National Book Festival Board, of which the two men will be co-directors, which will advise, promote and support the Festival and assist with fundraising.  They emphasized the important historic and ongoing role of the National Book Festival’s sponsors and supporters, which have included Target, The Washington Post, The Amend Group, the James Madison Council, AT&T, PBS, the Institute of Museum and Library Services, the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Junior League among many others.

Some of the notable authors appearing at the 2010 National Book Festival will include Fiction & Mystery Pavilion authors Isabel Allende, Diana Gabaldon, Elizabeth George, Scott Spencer and Scott Turow; Poetry & Prose Pavilion authors Jonathan Franzen, Gail Godwin, Orhan Pamuk (Nobel Prize winner) and Jane Smiley; History & Biography Pavilion authors Jules Feiffer, David Remnick and Gordon Wood; and Contemporary Issues Pavilion authors Lidia Matticchio Bastianich, Michelle Norris, Craig Robinson (brother of First Lady Michelle Obama) and Harold Varmus. The Children’s and the Teens’ & Children’s Pavilions remain strong with a roster of beloved authors for these audiences. All of the previous festival Web sites have been combined into a single Web site (see URL: <http://www.loc.gov/bookfest/>) that is being updated throughout the summer with “day-of” interviews with authors from previous festivals as well as prior festival attendees.

Inauguration of Roberta Stevens as ALA President
Roberta Stevens will be inaugurated as ALA’s President on June 29, 7:00 pm, in the Grand Ballroom of the Renaissance Hotel. She is the sixth ALA President in the Library’s history. Her inaugural program, which will feature author, Washington Post Writer at Large and editor of Book World Marie Arana; Brad Meltzer; Coretta Scott King Award medalist Sharon Draper; and Pura Belpre Award winner Carmen Agra Deedy, will mark the official launch of one of three presidential initiatives, “Our Authors, Our Advocates.” This initiative focuses on using well-known and passionate writers to speak out on the key roles libraries and library staff play in the educational, social and educational fabric of our nation. Work on two other presidential initiatives, “Frontline Fundraising” and the “Why I Need My Library Contest” is underway with their teams meeting at the annual conference.

Since the 2010 Midwinter Meeting in Boston, Mass., President-elect Stevens has been the keynote speaker at the Mexican Library Association Conference and for National Library Week in Bulgaria. During her visit to Bulgaria, she was introduced to their Parliament and met with Parliament’s President, Parliamentary members and numerous government officials. She was also the presenter for the webinar on “The State of America’s Libraries, 2010” report that highlighted the perfect storm occurring in libraries throughout the nation: a simultaneous increase in usage and decline in financial support.

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LIBRARY SERVICES

Personnel Changes
Sandra Lawson was appointed Deputy Associate Librarian for Library Services/ Operations on Jan. 24. Charles Stanhope, senior advisor to the Associate Librarian for Library Services, retired on May 31.

Library of Congress Working Group on the Future of Bibliographic Control
The Library continues to pursue several projects in response to the recommendations of the LC Working Group on the Future of Bibliographic Control in its report On the Record.  Library Services is working with the National Library of Medicine and National Agricultural Library to test the proposed cataloging standard, Resource Description and Access, for feasibility, compatibility with existing metadata, cost-effectiveness, and user satisfaction before decisions are made regarding implementation of the new standard.

With the co-publishers’ recent announcement that RDA Online will be released in June 2010, the testing is expected to begin with a 3-month learning period over the summer, with actual creation of records in the test to run from October through December.  The three national libraries will host two open meetings, for vendors and for the general community, at the Washington Convention Center on Sunday, June 27, in conjunction with the ALA Annual Conference.  The vendors’ meeting will be from  8:00-9:00 am.  The general-interest meeting will be from 10:30 am to 12:00 pm.  The U.S. National Libraries RDA Test Steering Committee is co-chaired by Christopher Cole (National Agricultural Library), Dianne McCutcheon (National Library of Medicine), and Beacher Wiggins (Library of Congress).

As the next phase of its investigation into the creation and distribution of bibliographic data in U.S. and Canadian libraries, Library Services contracted with R2 Consulting LLC of Contoocook, N.H. to research and describe the current marketplace for cataloging records in the MARC format, with primary focus on the economics of current practices, including existing incentives and barriers to both contribution and availability.  The resulting Study of the North American MARC Records Marketplace was completed in October 2009 and is available at URL:
<http://www.loc.gov/bibliographic-future/news/MARC_Record_Marketplace_2009-10.pdf [PDF]>.  Ruth Fischer will be the keynote speaker at the Program for Cooperative Cataloging Participants Discussion Group on Sunday, June 27, Washington Convention Center Room 144 A-C, 4:00-5:30 pm.

At the same time, the Associate Librarian for Library Services charged an internal task force, the OTR Implementation Working Group, to identify Working Group recommendations that the Library of Congress should pursue over the next four years.  The report of the implementation working group, chaired by Bruce Knarr and Regina Romano Reynolds, is available at URL: <http://www.loc.gov/bibliographic-future/news/OTR_rep_response_final_091509.pdf [PDF]>.

On the Record, Section 1.1, Eliminate Redundancies, made several recommendations for using externally available bibliographic data and for further automating the Cataloging in Publication (CIP) process.  The Library has followed up by piloting a method to generate MARC 21 records from publishers’ ONIX data, as described under Acquisitions and Bibliographic Access Directorate in this document.  The ABA Directorate will have a key role in implementing many other aspects of the Working Group’s vision and is currently assessing resource needs and timetables for accomplishing other projects related to the report.

Associate Librarian for Library Services Deanna Marcum convened the Working Group in November 2006 to address how the Library of Congress and the library community should address the popularity of the Internet, advances in search-engine technology, and the influx of electronic information resources. The Working Group's final report and recommendations, published in January 2008 as On the Record, are available at URL <http://www.loc.gov/bibliographic-future/>. Also available on the Web site is Dr. Marcum’s response, dated June 1, 2008, to the Working Group.

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ACQUISITIONS AND BIBLIOGRAPHIC ACCESS DIRECTORATE (ABA)

Automated MARC 21 Records from ONIX
The US and Publisher Liaison Division continued to enhance its ONIX/MARC converter program.   Four catalogers were assigned to the pilot project.  We plan to test the converter program in the RDA environment. New developments with the ONIX/MARC converter will be discussed at the Cataloging in Publication Advisory Group meeting on Saturday, June 26th from 10:30 am-12:00 pm in the Grand Hyatt Hotel, Independence F Room. David Williamson, Karl Debus-López, and Regina Romano Reynolds will give a presentation on the converter at an OCLC Publishers’ Forum on June 29th, 2010. As of May 25, 2010, the catalogers have added 1,719 records from nine suppliers, representing approximately 100 imprints, to the Library of Congress Online Catalog through the ONIX/MARC converter process.  The ONIX database has a pool of about 17,000 pre-publication bibliographic records that we currently search as a source for cataloging data.

Bibliographic Enrichment Activities Team (BEAT) – see Automated MARC 21 Records from ONIX (above) and see under COLLECTIONS AND SERVICES DIRECTORATE/Humanities and Social Sciences Division (HSS)

Cataloging Distribution Service – see under PARTNERSHIPS AND OUTREACH PROGRAMS DIRECTORATE/BUSINESS ENTERPRISES

Cataloging in Publication (CIP) – see also Automated MARC 21 Records from ONIX (above)

Karl Debus-López, chief of the US General Division and acting chief of the US and Publisher Liaison Division, is currently responsible for the Cataloging in Publication program.

Implementation of automated CIP claiming.  In February 2010, the US and Publisher Liaison Division implemented automated Cataloging in Publication claiming. This allowed the Division to claim more than 32,000 books that should have been sent by the publishers to the Library of Congress. The Division saw an immediate increase of CIP receipts. By April a temporary backlog of high priority CIP books was processed by the Library’s selection officers. Implementation of automated CIP claiming will ensure that the Library receives books for which we provided the publisher with pre-publication data.  The additional items will enrich the Library’s collections. Claims will be processed on a monthly basis.

Dewey Section assists with Decimal Classification Translations
The U.S. General Division Dewey Section staff continued to assist OCLC staff on the development of several translations of the Decimal Classification.  They moved forward on the Arabic, Swedish, Norwegian, and Spanish translations. 

Cataloging Policy – see Policy and Standards

Cooperative Cataloging Programs/Cooperative and Instructional Programs Division
The Cooperative and Instructional Programs Division provides the secretariat for the Program for Cooperative Cataloging (PCC) and its component programs, BIBCO (monograph bibliographic record contributions), CONSER (cooperative serials cataloging), NACO (name authority cooperative program) and SACO (subject and classification authority program). The current chair of the PCC is Magda El-Sherbini, Ohio State University; chair-elect is John Riemer, University of California at Los Angeles.

The PCC Participants Discussion Group Meeting will be Sunday, June 27, 2010 from 4:00-5:30 pm, in the Washington Convention Center, 144A-C.  The guest speaker will be Ruth Fischer, Partner, R2 Consulting, LLC. She is the co-author of "A Study of the North American MARC Records Marketplace", a report commissioned by the Library of Congress.

The BIBCO and CONSER Operations Committees met in Washington D.C. May 6-7, 2010. Highlights of the joint meeting included an overview of new PCC Guidelines for Creating Bibliographic Records in Multiple Character Sets. The groups also made a decision to pursue a proposal to examine the continued need for ISBD punctuation in bibliographic records.

BIBCO members discussed further refinements to the BIBCO Standard Record (BSR) for textual monographs and the development of BSR for additional formats.  CONSER members discussed a proposal to cooperatively catalog journals in the Directory of Open Access Journals.

By the midyear of fiscal year 2010 (October 1, 2009 – March 30, 2010) PCC members contributed 114,586 new name authority records and revised 32,690 name authority records.  They created 5,995 new series authority records and revised 1,743.  New LCSH records totaled 1,950 with revisions to 235 subject authority records.  CONSER members produced 8,066 authentications for new CONSER records and 14,651 maintenance transactions. BIBCO members created 39,051 new bibliographic records.

NUCMC (National Union Catalog of Manuscript Collections).  New respositories served by this cooperative archival cataloging program included Kennebec Valley Community College Archive (Fairfield, Me.), Natick Historical Society (Natick, Mass.), Nevada State Museum (Las Vegas), and Town of Belgrade, Me.  The NUCMC staff in COIN produced 1,939 OCLC records describing collections in fifty-two repositories located in Arkansas, California, Connecticut, District of Columbia, Florida, Idaho, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Montana, Nevada, New Jersey, Ohio, South Carolina, Tennessee, Vermont, Virginia, Washington (State), Wisconsin, and Wyoming.  Included in the collections described were papers relating to twenty-four Members of Congress.
In April the program began an outreach initiative aimed at increasing program participation by Historically Black Colleges and Universities. An article highlighting the NUCMC program’s services was written by the program coordinator and appeared in vol. 48, issues 2-3 (2010) of Cataloging & Classification Quarterly.

In conjunction with the upcoming commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the Civil War, NUCMC staff are developing plans to highlight unknown related materials in repositories.

Training. ALA in Washington this year allows COIN staff to conduct several workshops for PCC members also attending ALA. NACO trainers will offer a specially developed two-day workshop on corporate bodies with 20 attendees from multiple institutions. CONSER specialists will offer the SCCTP Advanced Serials Cataloging Workshop, SCCTP Integrating Resources Cataloging Workshop, and the SCCTP Serials Holdings Workshop. 

COIN is expanding its training methods. The traditional five-day NACO workshop has been conducted in one day modules over the course of a month at one new member institution. SACO training has been conducted live over the Internet.  Throughout April 2010, the CONSER Serials Cooperative Cataloging Training Program (SCCTP) sponsored a four part live-online presentation of the SCCTP Integrating Resources Cataloging Workshop.

International Exchange Service
In order to sustain the free flow of national government information, the Library of Congress (LC) has undertaken a project to transform the U.S. International Exchange Service (IES) program. The transformation effort expects to embrace the analog and digital publishing environment; to achieve a flexibility sufficient to meet individual country needs in terms of the format of the content delivered to them; to recommend or identify tools to ingest, archive, preserve, and provide access to digital content received by the Library under the IES; and to meet the Library's continuing collection development needs. As part of the information gathering process, the Library issued a survey to all of its 95 partners in October 2009.  Forty-nine partners submitted responses.  The survey responses revealed that the majority of partners have a preference for receiving U.S. publications in print or online digital format.  There is markedly little preference for receiving publications in microform or physical digital formats.  Ten of the 49 respondents reported that their libraries are ready to download and archive U.S. publications.  However, the rights issues for all parties to download and archive foreign official publications are very complex indeed.  A majority of the respondents is interested in having U.S. Government Printing Office (GPO) MARC21 bibliographic data (see URL: <http://www.loc.gov/acq/IESSurveyResults.pdf [PDF]>). Judith Mansfield will present survey findings and describe next steps at the Federal and Armed Forces Librarians Round Table (FAFLERT) meeting on Monday, June 28, 10:00 a.m.

ISSN (International Standard Serial Number)
The ISSN is a unique, standardized number that identifies a serial title worldwide, regardless of language or place of publication.  The Library of Congress US and Publisher Liaison Division houses the ISSN Center for the U.S., which is part of the international ISSN Network. The Library devotes approximately 13 full-time-equivalent staff to managing the U.S. ISSN program, creating ISSN catalog records, and coordinating with OCLC, Inc., and standards organizations on issues related to the ISSN.

ISSN Assignments to Integrating Resources. The U.S. ISSN Center is participating in an ISSN Network test of guidelines for determining which online integrating resources (e.g., databases, web sites) are eligible for ISSN. The guidelines were drawn up by a working group that included Regina Romano Reynolds, ISSN Coordinator and Linda Geisler, Head of the ISSN Publisher Liaison Section. CONSER libraries, LC acquisitions staff, and selected publishers will be invited to submit ISSN requests. The test period will run until Sept. 15, 2010.  The U.S. results will be presented at the 35th Meeting of Directors of ISSN Centres to be held in Boston Spa, U.K., during the first week of October 2010.

ISSN Network Informal Testing of Resource Description and Access. The ISSN Network is organizing an informal test of RDA coordinated by François-Xavier Pelegrin, Head of the Bibliographic Section at the ISSN International Centre and Regina Romano Reynolds, ISSN Coordinator and member of the U.S RDA Test Coordinating Committee. Network testers will create records following RDA and the rules in the ISSN Manual and will provide input for the ISSN Network comments that will be submitted to the RDA Testing Coordinating Committee. Test results will also be communicated to directors of ISSN centers.

OCLC ISSN-L Project. The ISSN-L or Linked International Standard Serial Number is a mechanism to enable collocation of the medium-specific ISSN assigned to different medium versions of a serial. Between January and mid-April 2010, OCLC added ISSN-L from the tables made available on the ISSN International Centre web site to approximately one million WorldCat records.   This project represented the first pass through the WorldCat database.  A follow-up project is planned for summer 2010 to add ISSN-L to records added to WorldCat since the initial group of records was identified and updated.  Problem records were set aside for further examination that will be performed in consultation with the U.S. ISSN Center within the U.S. and Publisher Liaison Division.  It is hoped that this project will increase the visibility and usefulness of the ISSN-L.  The ISSN Forum on Saturday, June 26th from 1:30-3:30 in the Constitution Room of the Madison Hotel will update the participants on developments with ISSN-L and the U.S. ISSN Center in general.

Law Library Support
Reclass of LAW 7 titles. Work on the retrospective conversion project to assign K schedule classification to previously unclassified legal documents continued within the Law Section of the U.S. Publisher and Liaison Division. As of the end of April, 10,271 items had been reclassed this fiscal year.

Cataloging of digitized Haitian legal treatises. The Law Section is assisting the Law Library by making sure Haitian legal treatises are placed under bibliographic control prior to their digitization. This project is particularly important given the  devastating earthquake in Haiti in January 2010.

Mongolian Materials
The Russia Section of the Germanic & Slavic Division, motivated by a recent gift of almost 400 items from the Republic of Buryatia (an autonomous region of the Russian Federation), has begun a special project to process and, in some cases, reassign materials in the Mongolic languages.  In July 2009 the section began a project to process a considerable backlog of Mongolian materials.  With the help of a native Mongolian speaker, working on contract, the section has created  initial bibliographic control records for most previously uncontrolled material. It is now beginning the second phase of the project, which will involve subject analysis and assignment of LC Classification to the items in the backlog.  Materials in Buriat and Kalmyk, languages related to Mongolian, became part of the project almost by accident.  LC had been pursuing an offer of a gift of Buriat materials since 2008.  Their arrival in April 2010 coincided with the expanding project to process Mongolian material.  Materials in Mongolian, Buriat, and Kalmyk had been divided between two custodial divisions at LC, the Asian Division and the African and Middle Eastern Division.  Since the materials are closely related, specialists met to determine the best course of action for bringing them together.  As a result, material in these languages that is currently in the African & Middle Eastern Division will be moved to the Asian Division.  The Germanic & Slavic Division will assist in the reassignment of the materials and in some cases, enhance the cataloging, particularly for serial publications, many of which were never fully cataloged.  The availability of copy cataloging in OCLC should facilitate this aspect of the project.  In the end, approximately 3,000 items will be processed and moved to permanent locations in the Asian Division.  The work on the largest portion of this material, Mongolian, involves making decisions on the treatment of Mongolian personal names--an issue which was raised as part of initial work on the Mongolian backlog.  The Policy & Standards Division is coordinating the resolution of the name heading issues with the library community in ALA.

Policy and Standards
LC documentation and training materials for the RDA Test.  Documentation, policy decisions, training materials, etc., developed by the Library of Congress for the U.S. RDA (Resource Description and Access) Test, have been posted to URL:  http://www.loc.gov/catdir/cpso/RDAtest/rdatest.html. 

This includes documentation about the U.S. RDA National Test Plan, Reconsidering the Cataloging Treatment of Reproductions, etc.  All interested parties, whether participating in the RDA Test or not, are welcome to use and modify these files for their local situations.  Note that these files represent decisions just for the RDA Test, some of the decisions may be changed as a result of feedback from the Test or rescinded, should the decision be not to implement RDA.  Many of the documents are working drafts.  As some decisions are modified due to other decisions, updated versions will be posted.  Information about the U.S. RDA Test itself is available at http://www.loc.gov/bibliographic-future/rda/.

Geographic coordinates in LC Name Authority Records for jurisdictions (cf. On the Record recommendation).  The Library of Congress completed a cooperative project with OCLC to receive and distribute revised name authority records for jurisdictions that will add geographic coordinates in 034 fields (Coded Cartographic Mathematical Data).  The coordinate data was extracted by the OCLC Office of Research from the 670 field and online geographic databases as part of FAST (Faceted Application of Subject Terminology).  This project followed successful efforts by OCLC to enhance authority records with geographic data including 043 fields (Geographic Area Code) and 781 fields (Subdivision Linking Entry--Geographical Subdivision).  LCCNs of sample records that illustrate the coordinate additions are:  n  00004724,  n  00005017, and  n  00001407.  OCLC enhanced approximately 77,000 name authority records in this project.  The records flowed through the normal NACO contribution and distribution streams.  Any questions regarding the data content of these records can be directed to:  Policy and Standards Division, email: policy@loc.gov.

Authorities & Vocabularies Service update (cf. On the Record recommendation).  The vision for the Authorities & Vocabularies service (see URL: <http://id.loc.gov/>), which went live in April 2009, is focused on the automatic generation of metadata for digital documents, digital tables of contents, and digital summaries. The service will provide code lists, subject headings, and other terminologies, which can be used to automatically provide codes, suggest subject headings and alternate terminology from various lists, and enrich searching.  The Authorities & Vocabularies service is free and open to the public for searching, downloading of, and linking to any of the data contained in the service.

Currently, the Authorities & Vocabularies service contains the Library of Congress Subject Headings, its first vocabulary.  The subject headings are expressed using the Simple Knowledge Organization System (SKOS) format in which each concept is assigned a unique URI.  Library of Congress Subject Headings concepts within the Authorities & Vocabularies service include links to associated French concepts from the RAMEAU service.  LC is exploring with the National Library of Spain and the National Library of Chile providing LCSH/SKOS in Spanish and with the Université de Laval for providing RVM (Répertoire de vedettes-matière) for the French Canadian concepts.  Additionally, the service recently added terms from the Thesaurus for Graphic Materials, the MARC Code List for Relators, Preservation Events, Cryptographic Hash Functions, and Preservation Level Role.

The LCSH/SKOS terminology section of the Authorities & Vocabularies service has experienced the following developments over the past year:  a) Enhanced use statistics to evaluate the effectiveness of the service; b) Weekly updates; c) Access to deleted terminology; d) A scope statement explicitly describing the contents of the product.  Priorities for the immediate future include: 1) Enhanced human search functions, including the non-preferred term search; 2) Experiments to discover feasibility of a "social tagging" function in which users could suggest alternate terminology; 3) Experiments in developing a "subject suggester" function; 4) Re-design of the search results screen to display the "visualization"; 5) Expanded use of eye-readable labels for terms and on browse lists.   Longer-term goals include adding more vocabularies, such as MARC Geographic Area Codes and MARC Language Codes.

Automatic metadata generation: HIVE Project and Stanford University student projects (cf. On the Record recommendation).  In addition to its own LCSH/SKOS service, the Library of Congress continues to support other research and experimentation into automatic metadata generation.  LC staff serve as advisors to the HIVE (Helping Interdisciplinary Vocabulary Engineering) Project, which is conducted through the University of North Carolina’s School of Information and Library Science, to assist content creators and information professionals with subject cataloging.  The source vocabularies are in SKOS (Simple Knowledge Organization System) format and include LCSH, the AGROVOC Thesaurus, the National Biological Information Infrastructure Thesaurus (NBII), and the Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names (TGN).

The summer intern programs organized through the Library of Congress’ Office of Strategic Initiatives for the Stanford University Institute for Computational and Mathematical Engineering post-doctoral students continue to explore automatic assignment of content-rich titles to digital resources, as well as related explorations into tagging digital resources with geographic terms.

Pre- vs. Post-Coordination in LCSH.  PSD has completed a review of the status of the initiatives and projects outlined in the 2007 report on pre- versus post-coordination of LCSH.  The status review, entitled “The Policy and Standards Division’s Progress on the Recommendations made in ‘Library of Congress Subject Headings: Pre- vs. Post-Coordination and Related Issues’” was approved by the Acquisitions and Bibliographic Access Directorate (ABA) managers in May and is available to the public through LC’s web site at URL: <http://www.loc.gov/catdir/cpso/pre_vs_postupdate.pdf [PDF]>. 

Genre/form update.  The Policy and Standards Division is continuing to develop Genre/form headings.  The thesaurus is now entitled, Library of Congress Genre/Form Terms for Library and Archival Materials (LCGFT).  A separate MARC source code “lcgft” has been assigned to distinguish headings in LCGFT from LCSH headings. Additionally, LCCNs with a distinctive prefix will be used as record control numbers.  The authority records will be revised to reflect these changes within the next few months.  

The moving image and sound recording headings have moved out of the development stage and are now being maintained.  In 2010 there are four active projects to develop new terminologies: cartography, law, music, and religion.  This follows a long-term phased plan approved by the Acquisitions and Bibliographic Access Management Team. For  Cartography, approximately 65 cartographic genre/form headings were approved in mid-May and the subdivisions used for maps will be revised in late summer, with LC implementation to occur soon thereafter.  A firm date for LC implementation headings and revised form subdivisions will be announced when it is available.  For Law,. the American Association of Law Libraries continues to work with PSD to revise its report, “Genre/Form Terms for Law Materials.”  Online proposals for the headings will be created in mid-2010, with formal approval to follow. For Music,. PSD is collaborating closely with the Music Library Association to deconstruct existing topical headings into their constituent genres/forms, carriers, and mediums of performance, so that those elements can be separately coded and searched. For Religion,. the American Theological Libraries Association (ATLA) is partnering with PSD to develop genre/form headings for religion.  Janis Young, LC’s genre/form coordinator, moderated a round table presentation on genre/form headings at the ATLA conference in June 2010.
Further information on LC’s genre/form projects is available on PSD’s web site at URL: <http://www.loc.gov/catdir/cpso/genreformgeneral.html>.

LCSH Validation Records.  As of June 2010, there are more than 45,000 subject validation records.  These records were generated from LCSH subject heading strings used in bibliographic records, for which no authority records had previously been created.  The objective of this project is to enable more machine-validation of subject headings assigned in bibliographic records.

Subject headings for Cooking and Cookbooks.  The subject heading revisions for the change from Cookery to Cooking (etc.) as outlined in the paper, Revision of headings for cooking and cookbooks: Library of Congress decisions (see URL: <http://www.loc.gov/catdir/cpso/cooking3.pdf [PDF]>) are on the Library of Congress Subject Headings Weekly List 10-22. The revision of the instruction sheet Cooking and Cookbooks (H 1475) will be in 2010 Update Number 2 to the Subject Headings Manual, which will be distributed in the fall. An advance copy will be posted on the Cataloging and Acquisitions Web site once it is ready.  More than 1,300 subject authority records with the heading Cookery or other headings that include the term "cookery" will be changed to Cooking or similar headings such as Cooking (Butter), Cooking for the sick, Aztec cooking, Cooking, American--Southwestern style, etc. The references on approximately 500 headings were changed.  Projects will be undertaken to update bibliographic records with the old forms of headings during the next year. Subject headings in individual bibliographic records will be changed on a case-by-case basis as the records are updated for any reason.

Korean romanization Bibliographic File Maintenance plan and documents.  Three documents that give the details of the Library’s plan for making changes to authority and bibliographic files to bring them into conformance with the recently revised Korean Romanization and word division guidelines are available at URL: <http://www.loc.gov/catdir/cpso/koreanbfm.html>

VIAF (cf. On the Record recommendation). Expansion and improvements to the VIAF <see URL: http://viaf.org/ > in 2010 have continued apace.  VIAF expands access via a single service to the major name authority files of national and regional libraries and institutions worldwide without regard to cataloging rules, formats, languages, or scripts.  The VIAF membership recently has expanded to include Library and Archives Canada (LAC), the Getty Research Institute, and the NUKAT Center of Poland, a union catalog of Polish academic and research libraries.  Testing continues on requests to join from the National Institute of Informatics (NII) of Japan, the National Library of Slovenia, and the National Library of Hungary.  Starting in May 2010, VIAF matching expanded beyond personal names to include corporate names, which by extension will include conferences and geographic names. 

Program for Cooperative Cataloging – see Cooperative Cataloging Programs

USGEN/USPL Review Task Force
There have been continued discussions by Library of Congress management about the possible reorganization of the U.S. General (USGEN) and U.S. and Publisher Liaison (USPL) Divisions within the Acquisitions and Bibliographic Access Directorate.  Two models have been proposed that would allow the divisions to better support the selection and processing of titles received through the Cataloging in Publication Program and Copyright Office.  The ISSN, Dewey Decimal Classification, and Children’s Annotated Card programs, which are managed within these Divisions, would also receive better support in the proposed models.  During the transition period to a new model, Karl Debus-López will remain chief of USGEN and acting chief of USPL.

ABA Production

Bibliographic Records Completed	FY10 (Oct/May)	FY09	FY08
Full/Core original	122,022	171,124	208,321
Collection-level cataloging	1,995	3,618	3,895
Copy cataloging	37,723	56,308	71,790
Minimal level cataloging	6,677	12,834	29,307
Total records completed	168,417	243,884	313,313
Total volumes cataloged	NA	313,182	350,631
Authority Work	FY10 (Oct/May)	FY09	FY08
New name authority records	NA	111,727	91,016
New Library of Congress Subject Headings	NA	22,344	35,748*
New LC Classification Numbers	NA	2,800	1,818
Total authority records created	NA	109,686	136,871

*Includes subject-subdivision strings to support automated validation.

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American Folklife Center/Veterans History Project (AFC/VHP)

The American Foklife Center has been represented this spring in several important international dialogues.  Director Peggy Bulger participated in meetings with the Inter-Agency group for UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage section.  On May 2-8  Peggy Bulger attended the WIPO (World Intellectual Property Organization) meetings in Geneva, Switzerland, as part of the US Delegation to the IGC on Genetic Resources, Traditional Knowledge and Folklore; and later attended a meeting at the White House Conference Center on the US position toward the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

Four new members of the American Folklife Center Board of Trustees were appointed in April-May 2010 by the President Pro Tempore of the Senate: Ms. Patricia Atkinson, Nevada Arts Council; Ms. Joanna Hess, Indigenous Language Institute, Santa Fe, N.M.; Ms. Jean M. Dorton, Paintsville, Ky., and Ms. Margaret Dodson, Santa Fe, N.M.
Peggy Bulger and members of the Library's Office of Strategic Initiatives spoke at the annual meeting of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence concerning the Library's acquisition of the Twitter Archive, more than 50 million tweets (very brief electronic messages) per day from people around the world.  As announced on April 15, 2010, the Library will receive all public tweets-which number in the billions-from the 2006 inception of the service to the present.  In addition, AFC launched a Facebook page at URL: <http://www.facebook.com/americanfolklifecenter/ >.

The Civil Rights History Project is a joint project of AFC and the National Museum of African American History and Culture (NMAAHC) to survey oral history collections of veterans of the Civil Rights Movement, and to conduct interviews to document participants. AFC recently hosted a training session for members of the Civil Rights History Project survey team.  In April, AFC staff taught a field school course in cultural documentation held at the Center for the Study of Southern Culture at the University of Mississippi in Oxford, Mississippi. AFC staff participate in the Federal Agencies Digitization Guidelines Initiative Audiovisual Working Group on development of standards for digital moving image wrappers and formats and development of software for embedding standardized metadata in audio and still images files.

Recent AFC acquisitions include the Henry Sapoznik Collection on Yiddish radio broadcasting; oral histories of Chesapeake Bay watermen; and recorded interviews by Senator Bill Bradley from his Sirius-XM Radio Show, “American Voices with Senator Bill Bradley.” AFC received 4,000 additional StoryCorps interviews in 2010, bringing the collection totals to 34,707 audio interviews and 98,823 photos.  Peggy Bulger’s interview of Associate Librarian for Library Services Deanna Marcum was selected by ALA in it is nation-wide competition.

AFC is hosting a “Borderlines/Borderlands: Culture and the Canada-U.S. International Boundary” symposium June 15-16.

AFC reference staff members provide extensive services to researchers by phone, e-mail, and in person. For more information and webcasts of symposia, concerts, and lectures, see the American Folklife Center Web site at URL:<http://www.loc.gov/folklife/> or call 202-707-5510.

Veterans History Project of the American Folklife Center (VHP)
This congressionally mandated public outreach/collection development project continues to expand in 2010, its tenth year.  In 2009, more than 6,000 additional collections were donated and more are received weekly. Organizations nationwide, including many libraries, have joined the effort to help gather and submit oral histories and supporting items for the VHP collection.  Descriptions of the more than 68,000 collections can be searched at the VHP’s Web site.  More than 8,200 selected narratives are digitized, of which 20 percent offer transcripts and are viewable at the project’s Web site, along with a series of themed presentations under the title “Experiencing War.”  All collections are served in LC’s American Folklife Center Reading Room.
The Veterans History Project continues to rely on a nationwide network of volunteers and organizations to collect veterans’ interviews.  Libraries are a valued resource in this effort, distributing information, coordinating VHP interviewing events, and making their facilities available to local VHP volunteers.  For more information, see the project Web site at URL: <http://www.loc.gov/vets/>, or phone 202-707-4916.

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COLLECTIONS AND SERVICES DIRECTORATE

Collections Access, Loan, and Management Division (CALM)
The CALM Division continues to refine two major initiatives: Reader Registration System Upgrade and Automated Call Slip. These initiatives allow researchers in the general reading rooms, i.e. Main, Local History and Genealogy, and Science and Business reading rooms, and off-site to request general collection titles online rather than by completing a paper call slip.  Additionally the reorganization of CALM is proceeding as anticipated with the development of separate teams to staff the book service desks in the 3 general collections reading rooms, to focus on book retrieval, and to handle quality assurance and rapid response requests.

Loan Reference and Collections Support Section. The Loan Reference and Collections Support Section expanded services to Congressional patrons by adding Playaway digital audio books to the selection of formats available for loan.  Also this unit started a project to lend E-readers to this same constituency.  Requests for both Congressional loans and lending to other libraries remain steady with some local and academic libraries reporting financial challenges influencing these institutions to rely more heavily on LC as a lender. Requests, both domestic and foreign, vary from 300 to 400 per day.

Digital Reference Section. In addition to answering more than 8500 reference queries about the Library's digital collections, the Digital Reference Section continued to add guides to the two series of Web guides that provide topical access to the Library's millions of digitized items. The series of such guides about the U.S. presidents is nearly complete and the list of state and territory resource guides continues to expand. These guides are accessible at URL: <http://www.loc.gov/rr/program/bib/bibguide.html>. With Poet Laureate, Kay Ryan, the section hosted her video conference with community colleges that discussed her creative process. A greatly expanded portal for poetry resources and the poets laureate is accessible at URL: <http://www.loc.gov/rr/program/bib/lcpoetry/>. To answer the variety of queries from individuals without ready access to print resources and subscription databases in the field of library and information science, an enlarged web guide compiled from open source and full-text resources available on the Web was created at URL: <http://www.loc.gov/rr/program/bib/libsci/>.

Presentations, whether on-site or via the Web, continue to provide a venue for the digital reference specialists to reach an audience outside the D.C. area. Web conferences via OPAL (Online Programming for All Libraries) and directly from the Library’s site continue with new subject matter added on a regular basis. The DRS offers “Introducing loc.gov” every second Wednesday of the month directly from the LC Web site at URL: <http://www.loc.gov/rr/program/orientation.html>. Registration for the latter Web conference is limited to 40 seats; thus, prior contract from participants is necessary. Several Library units, such as the Local History and Genealogy Reading Room and the Copyright Office, Information Section, continue to participate in these sessions in collaboration with the DRS.

Ft. Meade Offsite Storage Facility
The Library began to move special format collections into Modules 3 and 4 and the four Cold Storage Rooms at Ft. Meade.  Modules 1 and 2 are now completely full, and house more than 3 million books and bound periodicals.  The process of transferring special format collections from Capitol Hill and the Landover Center Annex to Ft. Meade is expected to extend over a two year period at the end of which approximately 32 million pieces in 237,000 trackable containers will have been transferred.  Collections that are scheduled for transfer to Ft. Meade include: 10 million manuscripts; 400,000 reels of microfilm masters; 4 million microfiche; 4 million photographs; and 542 thousand maps.

Geography and Map Division
In early 2009, the Library of Congress received a Cataloging Hidden Special Collections and Archives grant from the Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR) to support a project that will catalog 125,000 sheet maps of Africa. The catalog records being produced under the $240,240 grant include geographic coordinates for each map that permit geographic searching of the catalog records. The enhanced catalog data will make it possible to view the coverage area of individual sheet maps using geographical browsers such as Google Earth. The Cataloging Hidden Special Collections and Archives grant program is made possible by funding from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. The project began with the cataloging of 1,800 sets of maps from the 19th century to the present.  An unexpected challenge arose from the discovery that about 22 percent of the maps lacked coordinate information; the cataloging team has to research or determine coordinates through indirect methods. Prior to the commencement of the project, about 30 percent of the maps had no cataloging data. By June 4, 2010, a total of 1,846 bibliographic records had been completed, providing catalog access to 64,319 map sheets.

Humanities and Social Sciences Division (HSS)
Only a Driver’s License (photo identification) is required to register to use Library’s Reading Rooms!

Outreach: Connecting Users with LC’s Collections. The Humanities and Social Sciences Division and the Office of Educational Outreach began conducting orientation sessions for Washington area high school librarians following the Library of Congress implementation of a policy revision that lowered the required minimum age of researchers from 18 to 16.  The orientations are designed to inform the librarians on how they can best prepare high school students before they come to the Library of Congress.  Additionally a full day session that emphasized learning research skills, an introduction to the Library of Congress’s collections, the use of its Web site, and those of the World Digital Library was conducted for 51 students, librarians, and the humanities faculty from a Virginia magnet high school.

HSS initiated a cooperative program that was implemented in February 2010 between the Library of Congress and an external scholarly community, involving cooperative interaction of two LC Directorates: Public Services and Collections, and Acquisition and Bibliographic Access. HSS staff proposed as a follow up to discussions at the 2009 annual meeting of the Forum for Classics, Libraries, and Scholarly, Communication (FCLSC), an affiliate of the American Philological Association, the membership of which is comprised chiefly of classics librarians at major research libraries. As individual priorities allow, FCLSC members submit to LC links for full text editions, matched to LC bibliographic records. These matches are submitted to the ABA cataloging automation specialist who adds the links to the appropriate bibliographic record.

HSS staff provided an orientation to the Esperanto history and language materials in the Library’s collections for attendees at the Esperanto-USA 58th National Conference in Washington, D.C. As a result of this visit, more than 100 Esperanto language books were donated to the Library’s collections from an organizer of the conference.
Local History & Genealogy Reading Room staff participated as an exhibitor in the National Archive’s 6th Annual Genealogy Fair, “The World of Genealogy,” on April 14-15, 2010 at the National Archives Building, Washington, D.C.  NARA staff estimated that approximately 2,200 people attended the fair including the general public, the press, prominent genealogists, researchers, and professional genealogical societies and organizations.

Special Initiatives. HSS subject recommending officers (collection development specialists) nominated more than 300 web sites related to their subject specialty for web archiving to support the Library’s Single Site Web Archiving pilot.

Collection Development and Acquisitions
Microform Custodial Collections. After the receipt of 77,642 items in fiscal year 2009, the Microform Reading Room custodial collection grew to 8,188,119 items.

Machine-Readable Custodial Collections. During fiscal year 2009, the Machine-Readable custodial collections received 3,428 items, of which 2,285 were monographs and serials with disks and 1,143 were computer file CD-ROMs.  The MRC collection at the end of 2009 totaled 83,025 items: 40,580 Books and Serials with disks; 34,532 CD-ROMs; 7,690 Software packages, and 223 video disks.  3,697 books with disks were transferred to the Library’s offsite storage facility in Ft. Meade, Md.

Non-purchase items by gift. During fiscal 2009, the Local History & Genealogy Reading Room received 239 gift books and periodicals.

Key acquisitions. 17th and 18th Century Burney Newspapers; 18th Century Collections Online II; Academic Search Complete; ALA’s Guide to Reference; American Periodicals for the Center for Research Libraries; ARBA Online; JSTOR, Complements V and VIII; Periodicals Archive Online; State Papers Online, the Government of Britain 1509-1714.

Music Division
Gershwin Prize. Sir Paul McCartney was awarded the third annual Gershwin Prize for Popular Song by President Obama on June 2. On the evening of June 1, Sir Paul performed in a concert in the Library’s Coolidge Auditorium that brought together numerous musical celebrities to celebrate his career as a Beatle, solo performer, and composer. He was introduced by Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and Librarian of Congress James H. Billington.

National Audio-Visual Center/Packard Campus
The Library opened a 200-seat theater in the state-of-the-art Packard Campus of the National Audio-Visual Conservation Center on Mount Pony, near Culpeper, Va., on Sept. 4, 2008.  The theater is one of only five in the U.S. equipped to show original classic film prints on nitrate film stock as they would have been screened in theaters prior to 1950.  The Mount Pony theater also features a custom-made organ that can rise from a pit in the stage. The theater is located on the ground floor of the Packard Campus of the National Audio-Visual Conservation Center, 19053 Mount Pony Rd., Culpeper, Va.

All Packard Campus programs are free and open to the public. For reservation information, call (540) 827-1079 extension 79994 or (202) 707-9994 during business hours beginning one week before any given screening. For further information on the theater and film series, visit URL: <http://www.loc.gov/avconservation/theater/>.

Approximately 75 early American movies, chosen for their historical and cultural importance, are in the process of being returned to the U.S. from the New Zealand Film Archive of the National Library of New Zealand under the auspices of the National Film Preservation Foundation, the charitable affiliate of the Library of Congress National Film Preservation Board. A late silent feature (Upstream) directed by John Ford, a 1914 short comedy (Won in a Cupboard) directed by Mabel Normand, a period drama starring Clara Bow, and a group of early one-reel westerns are among a trove of long-lost American films recently found in the New Zealand Film Archive. Sony, the corporation that currently owns the Columbia Studios library, has assumed the costs for preserving Mary of the Movies, a 1923 comedy that is now the earliest Columbia feature known to survive. And 20th Century Fox, a descendant of the studio that made Upstream, has taken responsibility for preservation of that title. The preserved films will be made public through archival screenings.

Prints and Photographs Division (P&P)
The Prints and Photographs Division offers  many services at URL: <http://www.loc.gov/rr/print/>. For ongoing information about newly available collections and recent and upcoming activities, see "What's New" at URL: <http://www.loc.gov/rr/print/whatsnew.html>.

Prints & Photographs Online Catalog (PPOC). Easy-to-use features for searching, browsing, and sharing are now available. The visually inviting design and improved indexing resulted from a rapid rescue project to replace 15-year old software. To access the new PPOC, go to URL: <http://www.loc.gov/pictures/>

Flickr Commons Pilot Project. New sets feature “Great Comments,” “Treasures,” and “The West” at URL: <http://www.flickr.com/photos/library_of_congress/sets/ >.  The Flickr project background information is at URL: <http://www.loc.gov/rr/print/flickr_pilot_faq.html>.

Collections Recently Processed and Made Available Online:Carol M. Highsmith’s America.  Starting with 1,000 photographs showing contemporary life in the U.S., a growing number of born-digital photographs are available. View the slideshow sampler at URL: <http://www.loc.gov/rr/print/list/slidehigh/>.

Online Reference Aid: World War II Sketches by Victor A. Lundy. A visual diary with 158 pencil sketches brings to life the wartime experience of noted architect Victor A. Lundy, who served in the U.S. 26th Infantry Division during World War II. View online at URL: <http://www.loc.gov/rr/print/coll/628_lundy.html>.

Looking at Pictures: An Invitation to the Prints and Photographs Collections. Barbara Orbach Natanson, Head of the Prints & Photographs Reading Room, provides an overview of P&P holdings and tips for exploring the collections (6 minutes) at URL: <http://www.loc.gov/today/cyberlc/feature_wdesc.php?rec=4874>.

New Acquisition: Silent Cities Project. Master photographer Camilo José Vergara created his “Silent Cities Photograph Collection” in the mid 1970s-1980s. A sampler of 30 images is online, selected from the 800 slides encompassing 300 cemeteries throughout 21 states in North America and several European countries. The related book by Kenneth Jackson and Vergara is Silent Cities: The Evolution of the American Cemetery. (New York: Princeton Architectural Press, c1989).

Serial and Government Publications Division (SER)
Service Activities. In the past the usefulness of newspapers as sources of historic study was often neglected as a result of difficulties in locating desired material within them.  But digitized products such as the free Chronicling America offer both convenient access to electronic versions of newspapers and full-text indexing to often difficult to find material contained in them.  Building on the success of Chronicling America, the Serial & Government Publications Division now offers more than thirty Topics in Chronicling America (see URL: <http://www.loc.gov/rr/news/topics/topics.html>) pages, representing widely covered historic subjects in the American press.  Subjects are as variegated as baseball’s Bloomer Girls, Ellis Island, Building of the Titanic, and Nikola Tesla. The topics offer students, teachers, genealogists, and scholars an introductory access point to Chronicling America’s digitized pages, but also are complimentary to Library of Congress newspaper holdings that are not digitized.

In addition to offering access to collections through newspaper digitization and leased electronic resources, the Serial & Government Publications Division continues to improve onsite user needs by now providing five ST-200 digital scanners that allow patrons to download images from its collection of newspaper microfilm to their flash drives or laptops.  The Division is also the first library in the U.S. to offer patrons use of the Book2Net digital scanner to scan select images of the Library’s print newspapers, periodicals, government publications and other special collections onto flash drives.

Collection Activities. The division continued a project begun in late 2009 to create publicly available holdings statements in the LC integrated library system (ILS) for all U.S. newspaper microfilm held in the division, converting a manual card file dating back to the division’s first newspaper filming efforts of the mid-twentieth century.  We expect to complete this effort in late 2010. 

The division began an item-level inventory of its copy 2 comic book collection (approximately 40,000 issues). This is the second part of the division’s inventory project of the comic book collection. Part One was completed in 2009 in which summary holding statements for all deacidified comic book issues were created via the Library’s ILS.

The division looks forward to relocating several collections to the Ft. Meade, Md., collection storage facility and began planning for the relocation of a portion of the bound newspaper collection and the Federal depository library archival microfiche collection.  We expect to begin the transfer of these collections to Ft. Meade during the summer of 2010.

National Digital Newspaper Program (NDNP – Chronicling America). The National Digital Newspaper Program (NDNP), a partnership between the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) and the Library of Congress (LC), is a long-term effort to develop an Internet-based, searchable resource for U.S. newspaper bibliographic information and selected digitized historic content through the Chronicling America Web site at URL: http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/. This site is hosted by the Library of Congress and made freely available to the general public. This rich digital resource will eventually include content contributed by all U.S. states and territories.

Chronicling America currently provides access to more than 2 million newspaper pages, digitized by 19 states and the Library of Congress. These historic newspapers include more than 280 titles published between 1874 and 1922 in Arizona, California, the District of Columbia, Florida, Hawaii, Illinois, Kansas, Kentucky, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, New York, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Texas, Utah, Virginia, and Washington. The site also includes an extensive Newspaper Directory of US newspaper titles published between 1690 and the present (approximately 140,000 bibliographic records) as well as associated library holdings information, and linked to digitized pages, when available. Features of the site include full-text search with visual interface to search results, a downloadable "See All" list of available digitized page content, as well as more than 180 contextual essays regarding the historical significance of each digitized newspaper. To encourage a wide range of potential uses, Chronicling America provides content through open protocols and an API that enable external use of the data.. Chronicling America also provides a weekly notification service, via RSS (Real Simple Syndication) feed or Email subscription (see URL: <http://www.loc.gov/rss/ndnp/ndnp.xml>).  The site is updated every 3 months with new content received from program awardees and LC collections. By the end of 2011, the site will include more than 4 million pages, published between 1860 and 1922 from 22 states and the District of Columbia.

Additional information about the program is available from the NDNP Web site (see URL: <http://www.loc.gov/ndnp/>) describing the program, current awardees, selection guidelines, technical conversion specifications for historic newspapers, and sustainable development plans. In addition, the site provides access to the program and technical guidelines for the annual NEH program competition currently underway. In June, NEH announced new 2010 awardees in New Mexico, Tennessee and Vermont, converting content published between 1836 and 1922.

Veterans History Project see American Folklife Center/Veterans History Project

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PARTNERSHIPS AND OUTREACH PROGRAMS DIRECTORATE

Business Enterprises (see also LIBRARY OF CONGRESS EXHIBIT BOOTH)
The Office of Business Enterprises was created to merge and manage three of Library Services’ fee-based services: Cataloging Distribution Service, The Library Shop, and Duplication Services. All three business units that make up the Office of Business Enterprises (BE) are represented for the first time at the LC booth at ALA Annual Conference in Wahsington.  In addition to activities at the booth, Business Enterprises will keep the Library Shop open late in conjunction with the Main Reading Room open house on Firday, June 25; will offer free demonstrations and training for Catalogers Desktop and Classification Web on the Library campus; and will offer a 20 percent discount coupon at the booth for online shopping at URL: <http://www.loc.gov/shop/>.

The Library Shop. The Library Shop features both Library of Congress-related items and other items of interest to Library visitors—both online and in the Jefferson Building.  In addition to the array of LC branded merchandise, such as mugs, t-shirts and tote bags, The Library Shop will feature a number of items highlighting collections throughout the Library: from the American Folklife Center,  the Alan Lomax in Haiti boxed CD set, a collection of 10 CDs and 2 books chronicling Lomax’s 1936 Haitian recording expedition; from the Interpretive Program Office’s new exhibit on Carl Jung’s Red Book, the very popular facsimile edition of The Red Book; and from the Publishing Office, the paperback reprint of the 1992 edition of Respectfully Quoted, a wonderful collection of quotes from speakers addressing Congress in the 20th century. Visit the Library Shop online at URL: <http://www.loc.gov/shop/> and visit the shop in the Jefferson Building, ground floor, just inside the main entrance.  Special Shop hours during the ALA Annual Conference will be Friday, 9:30 a.m. – 7:00 p.m.; Monday-Thursday: 9:30 a.m.-5:00 p.m.

Duplication Services.  Duplication Services provides expanded access to the collections of the Library of Congress through a wide variety of high quality reproduction services. These services are designed to meet the needs of scholars, publishers, libraries, institutions, researchers, and the general public for photocopies, photographs, microfilm, or digital copies of materials in the Library of Congress. See URL: <http://www.loc.gov/preserv/pds/>.

Order Digital Scans of Original Negatives and Color Transparencies for $25!  Digital scans are a great way to have a digital copy for your research, projects, and enjoyment. For information, please visit URL: <http://www.loc.gov/preserv/pds/digiscan.html>.

Cataloging Distribution Service
The Cataloging Distribution Service packages, publishes, and distributes the Library’s cataloging records and cataloging-related publications, tools, and resources for the catalogers within the Library and for libraries around the world.

Cataloger’s Desktop. This web-based subscription service provides cataloging and metadata documentation. With more than 280 resources and Spanish-, French-, and German-language interfaces, Desktop incorporates the most up-to-date searching and navigation and is updated quarterly. Extensive, free online learning aids and practical tips are available, including webinars in English and Spanish, training files, PowerPoint presentations and “at-a-glance” how-to handouts. Visit URL: <http://www.loc.gov/cds/desktop/> for the latest news or for a free 30-day trial. In addition to demos at the LC booth, free Desktop demonstrations/training during ALA will be held at the Library on the following schedule: June 25 and June 28 at 1:30PM– 2:45 PM in the Pickford Theater, Madison Building.

Classification Web. CDS’s best selling web-based subscription service features LC classification schedules and tables that are updated daily. Records display non-latin script captions where applicable. For a free 30-day trial subscription visit URL: <http://www.loc.gov/cds/classweb/application.html>.  Product demonstrations can be seen throughout the day at the booth and at scheduled LC booth theater presentations (check Cognotes for theater times). Free Class Web demonstrations/training during ALA will be held at the Library on the following schedule: June 25, 3:00 PM–4:15 PM in the West Dining Room; June 28, 1:30 PM-2:45 PM in Dining Room A.

New LC Classification Schedules now available are: P-PA: Philology and Linguistics (General), Greek Language and Literature, Latin Language and Literature (2010 edition) and PL-PM: Languages of Eastern Asia, Africa, Oceania; Hyperborean, Indian, and Artificial Languages (2010 edition).

Free PDF Versions of Selected Publications. All back issues of Cataloging Service Bulletin (Nos. 1-125) are available at URL: <http://www.loc.gov/cds/freepdf.html>. Also available at the same site, the latest issues of the following publications as they are published: updates to Library of Congress Rule Interpretations, updates to Subject Headings Manual, updates to CONSER Cataloging Manual, updates to CONSER Cataloging Manual, updates to Descriptive Cataloging Manual, and updates to MARC 21 format documentation.

Library of Congress Subject Headings, 32nd edition (2010). The new edition features a sixth volume at no extra cost: Supplementary Vocabularies, which includes free-floating subdivisions, genre/form headings, and children’s subject headings. Supplementary Vocabularies is also sold as a stand-alone item, which may interest school and special librarians.

Also available now for subscription or purchase: Free-Floating Subdivisions: An Alphabetical Index, 22nd edition; Subject Headings Manual, Update No. 1 (2010); Library of Congress Rule Interpretations, 2010 Updates.

Center for the Book
Young Readers Center. As part of the Library’s increased interest in sharing its resources with young people, the Center for the Book now oversees and operates the Young Readers Center (YRC) in the Thomas Jefferson Building.  The YRC opened in October 2009 with an event with Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz and Rep. Robert Aderholt, who brought their children. The special guest author was M.T. Anderson. The YRC plays a leading role in the Library’s promotion of books, reading, literacy and learning to a K-12 audience. Young people, their parents, care-givers, teachers and librarians participate in the YRC’s programs and activities. An expansion in April 2010 nearly doubled the YRC’s space.

National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature. In January 2010, noted young people’s author Katherine Paterson succeeded Jon Scieszka as the National Ambassador for Young People's Literature, a project co-sponsored by the Center for the Book and the Children's Book Council, one of the center’s national reading promotion partners. Paterson has always been an extraordinary advocate for the importance of reading in young people’s lives, and she chose “Read for Your Life!” as her platform theme. Paterson is also one of the authors of “The Exquisite Corpse Adventure,” an episodic story available exclusively on the Center for the Book Web site at URL: <http://www.read.gov/>. Paterson will conclude the story by reading her episode at the National Book Festival on September 25.

Letters About Literature. The Center once again co-sponsored with Target the Letters About Literature contest for children in grades 4 though 12, encouraging them to write a letter to an author (living or dead) explaining how that writer’s work affected them. Winners and their schools receive cash awards at the state and national levels. Approximately 70,000 letters were received for 2009-2010, significantly more than the 54,000 letters entered in the 2008-2009 contest. For more information, go to URL: <http://www.lettersaboutliterature.org/ >.

Read.gov Web Site. The Web site at URL: <http://www.read.gov/>, which is overseen by the Center for the Book, has been a huge success and continues to increase its usage. In late September 2009, at the time of the 2009 National Book Festival, the literacy.gov Web site was combined with a redesigned version of the Center for the Book’s Web site; it became Read.gov and the “Exquisite Corpse Adventure” was introduced. Monthly use totals immediately soared, actually tripling between the end of September and the end of October 2009.  In 2009, for the new combined Web site, there were 521,709 page views and 353,068 visits. Statistics for the first quarter of 2010 show that usage is headed even higher: The three-month total is: 365,846 page views and 246,909 visits.

Other Activities. The Center for the Book is coordinating the authors program for the National Book Festival, and most of the approximately 70 authors and illustrators have already been selected. A news release was issued by the Library on May 25 at URL: http://www.loc.gov/today/pr/2010/10-127.html.

Federal Library and Information Center Commttee (FLICC)/FEDLINK
Blane K. Dessy has been named executive director of the Federal Library and Information Center Committee (FLICC) and the Federal Library and Information Network (FEDLINK) at the Library of Congress, effective June 20, 2010. Dessy is currently the director of the U.S. Department of Justice Library Staff, a position he has held since 2000. From 1994 to 2000, Dessy served as the first director of the newly established National Library of Education in the U.S. Department of Education.  He is an adjunct instructor in Library Management and at the Federal Libraries Institute at the Catholic University of America, School of Library and Information Science.

FLICC fosters excellence in federal library and information services through interagency cooperation. Created in 1965 and headquartered at the Library of Congress, FLICC also makes recommendations on federal library and information policies, programs and procedures to federal agencies and to others concerned with libraries and information centers. FLICC provides guidance and direction to FEDLINK, which serves federal libraries and information centers as their purchasing, training and resource-sharing consortium.

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PRESERVATION DIRECTORATE

The Preservation Directorate is responsible for ensuring long-term access to collections in original or reformatted forms, through its divisions for Binding and Collections Care (BCCD), Conservation (CD), Preservation Reformatting (PRD) and Preservation Research and Testing (PRTD), and its program for Mass Deacidification.  These core programs mitigate risks inherent to collections or from surrounding environments, through assessments, monitoring and remediation.  The Library is vigilant in safeguarding its collections - its premier assets - from loss due to the inherently unstable nature of collection materials and to harmful, external environmental factors, such as inappropriate handling or display.  In fiscal 2009, more than 6,763,960 books, serials, prints, photographs and other items were treated by binding, conservation, mass deacidification, and reformatting.  More than 374,330 manuscripts, maps, globes and other items were housed in protective enclosures, folders or boxes.  More than 65,400 items were labeled, and more than 807,850 were surveyed.

ALA’s once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to capture inspirational StoryCorps interviews about library careers led to the proposal by Preservation staff that the Library’s Associate Librarian for Library Services, Deanna Marcum, be interviewed by Peggy Bulger, Director for the American Folk Life Center (AFC).  In its nation-wide competition, ALA chose Dr. Marcum for the StoryCorps interview, which will be archived by the AFC.  

Preservation Week
ALA is spearheading a new National Collections Preservation Week , and the Library of Congress participated in the inaugural week (May 9-15, 2010).  The Library’s Preservation Directorate (PD) was instrumental in developing this new Preservation Week outreach and education initiative, and offered multiple activities in its support.

The generous assignment by the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) of a staff liaison to the Library further increased this support.  PD staff and the IMLS liason helped advance the initiative in numerous ways, particularly: by chairing the ALA task team developing Preservation Week; developing the inaugural campaign focus on personal, family, and community collections as shared cultural heritage to raise awareness of preservation’s importance and the role of libraries and related institutions in providing good preservation information; developing project partnerships with other organizations; authoring a Library exhibit on preserving collections and helping develop and provide associated children’s events with the Library’s Young Readers Center; collaborating with the Library’s Office of Strategic Initiatives National Digital Information Infrastructure and Preservation Program and the National Audiovisual Conservation Center to create Personal Archiving Day at the Library of Congress; and appearing at other public events.  In association with Preservation Week 2010, there were 65 events across the country offered by 40 libraries and archives in 19 states, the District of Columbia, and American Samoa.  These included exhibits, clinics and open houses, staff training, lectures and Webinars, and a preservation film festival. 

Emergency Preparedness for Libraries
Several initiatives addressed emergency preparedness for libraries, two workshops with FLICC and a webpage update in recognition of annual efforts to mark MayDay (May 1) with advice on how to protect collections against disaster.

On Feb. 23, 2010, Safety Net IV: FLICC Disaster Preparedness National Update, held at the Library of Congress and sponsored through FLICC, featured updates on national and international initiatives on disaster preparedness in cultural institutions (see URL: <http://www.loc.gov/preserv/symposia/safetynet4.html>).

For May 1, 2010, to commemorate MayDay Emergency Preparedness intiatives, the PD, in consort with IMLS, developed a “Preservation Planning Tool: Table Top Planning Scenarios, Level of Collections Emergency.” These narrative situations complement a potential level of emergency chart as tool for validating a collections emergency response plan against the many combinations of factors an emergency event might include. Because full-scale emergency response rehearsals are impractical for most institutions, these realistic scenarios are intended to be the basis for “table top” or “talk through” exercises to cross-check assumptions and response strategies (see URL: <http://www.loc.gov/preserv/emergprep/scenariosII.pdf [PDF]>).

On June 24, 2010, Safety Net V: Can We Relax Yet? Assessing Risks to Library Collections and Operations, a day-long workshop co-sponsored by the National Agricultural Library, FLICC, the Library of Congress Preservation Directorate, and LYRASIS was designed to present a practical approach to risk assessment, held at NAL (see URL: <http://www.loc.gov/flicc/meeting_announcements/2010/ma201018.pdf [PDF]>).

Webpage Updates on Activities
Conservation Division staff described their work to plan and prepare globes, drawings, prints, bound volumes, objects and archives and manuscript collections for moving to Ft. Meade in a new Web site entitled “Stabilizing Special Collections for High-Density Storage. The seven web pages describing and illustrating the stabilizing of special collections were taken from an oversize poster developed for educational display and in honor of Archives Month, 2009. Please see URL: <http://www.loc.gov/preserv/storage/index.html>.

Space Updates
Three updates on Preservation Directorate spaces were published online.  “The New Optical Lab Brings LOC into 21st Century” noted that the recently opened Optical Properties Laboratory contains a hyperspectral imaging system that’s revealing fascinating details of historical heritage, an environmental scanning electron microscope that can show real-time damage to AV items from changing environments,  equipment for optical disc quality testing, and a Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy system to detect chemical markers for sticky-shed (see URL: <http://blogs.loc.gov/loc/2010/02/new-optical-lab-brings-loc-into-21st-century/>).  The Optical Lab also now houses the IRENE prototypes for capturing sound from damaged grooved recordings. The work of the Op Lab and the even more recently opened Chemistry and Physical Properties Labs is described online in “The Science-Based Fight Against 'Inherent Vice'” (see URL: <http://www.ifla.org/files/pac/ipn/50-may-2010.pdf [PDF]> ).  Finally, the Conservation Division’s new collections recovery room, a model set-up for preservation training, drills and activities in collections salvage and recovery work related to the Library's Continuity of Operations Plan (COOP) is illustrated and described online (http://www.loc.gov/preserv/recoveryrm/index.html).

Mass Deacidification Program Update
In the first half of fiscal 2010 (October 2009-March 2010), the Directorate mass deacidified 156,531 books through contracted commercial deacidification at Preservation Technologies, L.P.’s ‘Bookkeeper’ facility in Pennsylvania and 586,500 manuscript sheets with equipment installed in the Madison Building.  The total number of items treated by the Mass Deacidification Program was 743,031. Special projects this year have focused on prospective (newly-acquired) monographs and serials inspected and determined to be printed on acidic paper processing in Preservation or in the ABA cataloging divisions.  Other collections include Congressional Hearings and Reports, legal publications and reference materials from the Law Library; historical files of the NAACP from the Manuscripts Division; and retrospective language and other monographs and/or serials from the Asian, African and Middle Eastern divisions and the Collections Access, Loan, and Management Division.

Other News
The PD will be hosting more than a dozen interns this year in the divisions for Conservation (CD), Binding and Collections Care (BCCD), and Preservation Research and Testing (PRTD).

Two publications since January 2010 are:

• Van der Reyden, D. “The Science-Based Fight Against 'Inherent Vice.'” International Preservation News 50 (2010): 5-10. [PDF: 2.2 MB / 44 p. (entire issue)] (see URL: <http://www.ifla.org/files/pac/ipn/50-may-2010.pdf [PDF] >).
• Drewes, J., [et al.] Digital Book Printing for Dummies. Special edition. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley Publishing, 2010.

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TECHNOLOGY POLICY DIRECTORATE

The Technology Policy Directorate consists of the Automation Planning and Liaison Office (APLO), the Network Development and MARC Standards Office (NDMSO), and the Integrated Library System Program Office (ILSPO).  The three offices work closely together and with the staff of the Information Technology Services Directorate in the Office of Strategic Initiatives.

Integrated Library System Program Office (ILSPO)
The LC Online Catalog is the primary access point for users of the Library’s collections and it is one of the most popular sites on the LC Web site.  As demand for access to the LC Online Catalog has increased the ILS Program Office has continued towards its goal of unlimited access to this popular site.  In fiscal year 2009 the Library increased access to the LC Online Catalog (see URL: <http://catalog.loc.gov/>) by a 40 percent increase and to LC Authorities (see URL: <http://authorities.loc.gov/>) by 57 percent.  In fiscal year 2009 there were 142,338,949 total OPAC searches, an increase of almost eleven percent over fiscal year 2008.  Access to Copyright catalog (cocatalog.loc.gov) also increased over this period.  LC recently increased the number of simultaneous sessions again in order to eliminate any denials of service.

The Library is planning to upgrade the LC ILS to Voyager 7.2.0 in November 2010 and does not anticipate any significant disruption in service to users.  Any planned outages will be announced on the OPAC sites prior to the upgrade.

LC EAD (Encoded Archival Description) Archival Finding Aids. In 2010, LS Collections and Services divisions created more than 270 new EAD archival finding aids, bringing the total number of LC EAD finding aids to 947.  Users can access nearly 31 million archival items in LC's collections through these documents, an increase of nearly 7 million archival items in the past year.

A new discovery application for Library finding aids is in onsite beta test, replacing the Library's two InQuery-based search systems with a single native XML platform (currently eXist). This application is METS-based, incorporating EADs using the EAD XML schema and MARCXML descriptive metadata. Unique structMap identifiers are assigned to several levels of finding aid series and subseries, facilitating the logical subdivision of large XML documents for retrieval and display. JQuery is used to present Container List tables of contents, with displays supplemented by page-level navigation through each finding aid Container List.

To support coordinated searching between finding aids and authorized headings in the LC Online Catalog, EAD “controlaccess” terms are now updated weekly from the Catalog=s collection level records associated with each finding aid. Finding aid keyword and browse searches are built using XQuery, with index terms in each finding aid linking users to "all finding aid" browse lists and to parallel entries in the Catalog. Keyword searching within each finding aid is also supported. Usability of finding aid browse lists and displays has benefitted from more standardized data practices adopted by Library catalogers and archivists--improvements which resulted in revisions to all LC collection-level records for finding aids and to elements in every LC EAD document. PDF versions of LC finding aids also continue to be prominently indexed by Google and Yahoo, providing increased visibility to LC's archival collections.

HTML Metatags. Effective use of trusted, clearly defined HTML meta tags can improve search engine optimization and the citation services of Web 2.0 applications. The Library has, therefore, initiated phased pilot efforts to add a consistent set of HTML meta tags to the web pages of LC digital content discovery applications. Coordinated by the LC Metadata for Digital Content group, these meta tags will be documented at the group's Web site: (see URL: <http://www.loc.gov/standards/mdc/>).

Descriptive HTML tags are hidden to most users in the <head> element of each web page and do not affect what users actually see.  In LC discovery applications, these tags will support services such as the "cite this page" functionality for RSS feeds and blogs, web-based citation managers, OpenURL, and cross-application search refinements. As consistently applied, trusted metadata for digital content, HTML meta tags are also potentially useful for structured search engine crawling. The first Library application to incorporate these tags on digital content displays is the Prints and Photographs Online Catalog (see URL: <http://www.loc.gov/pictures/>). The Library will add HTML meta tags later this year to Chronicling America (see URL: <http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/>) and to the Library's new finding aid (EAD) search application.

LC Persistent Identifiers. To persistently identify and manage LC-generated e-resources, Library staff registered nearly 100,000 handles in 2010.  As of June 2010, the Library's handle server contained 2,638,600 handles. Over the past year, LC handles were assigned, for example, to materials digitized in a number of LC cooperative projects, to World Digital Library items, to U.S. legislation searchable in THOMAS, and to digital books created by the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped.

LCCN Permalink (see URL: <http://lccn.loc.gov/>), a web service that allows users to create permanent URL links to records in the Library's Online Catalog (see URL: <http://catalog.loc.gov/>), continues to be popular.  Nearly 10,000 daily requests enable researchers to reference materials from the Library's collection in their blogs, reference guides, web pages, emails, bibliographies, databases, and more.  LCCN Permalink is completely standards-based, leveraging widely used XML technologies, Z39.50/SRU, and metadata schemas.

Network Development and MARC Standards Office (NDMSO)
Standards Projects. The PREMIS Editorial Committee began planning for a tutorial and an “implementation fair” during the International Conference on Preservation of Digital Objects (iPres 2010) to take place in Vienna, Austria, in September 2010.  Open source tools to support the implementation of PREMIS using the Metadata Encoding and Transmission Standard (METS) were made available from the PREMIS Web site (see URL: <http://www.loc.gov/premis/>). They were developed by the Florida Center for Library Automation under contract to the Library of Congress.

The MARC Formats were updated ahead of the annual schedule in order to complete publication of the changes that pertained to RDA cataloging instructions in time for implementation for RDA testing.  Update #11 was published in February along with a summary of the RDA-related changes on the MARC site (see URL: <http://www.loc.gov/marc/RDAinMARC29.html>).

The MODS Editorial Board completed the MODS 3.4 schema and the Office published it for review through May 2010.  The changes are summarized in the following document: http://www.loc.gov/standards/mods/mods-outlineChanges-3-4.html.  A major revision of the MODS Guidelines was completed by the Office and published.  It merges the general MODS with those that had been developed in the DLF Aquifer project, which focused on shareable MODS records (see URL: <http://www.loc.gov/standards/mods/userguide/>).

Vocabulary Project id.loc.gov. This project is chaired by NDMSO. For a full description, see under Authorities and Vocabularies under ACQUISITIONS AND BIBLIOGRAPHIC ACCESS DIRECTORATE/Policy and Standards.

Metadata for Digital Content. This project has the goal to recommend for LC a common set of metadata elements that will support discovery needs of users for digital media based on use cases recently developed by the Library.  It involves analyzing existing descriptive metadata and recommending how descriptive metadata might be created for future digital objects to improve access for users.  Based on the MODS schema, the group developed a master metadata element list and then documented metadata in existing digital library initiatives by developing profiles based on the master list that were posted on the web at URL: <http://www.loc.gov/standards/mdc/>.  Additional profiles are being developed, including one on geospatial datasets in the Geography and Map Division’s collections. In addition the group has developed a draft set of HTML meta tags (DC and MODS) to use in some of the Library’s web pages with the goal of improving the ability to cite LC’s resources. This work will lead to better consistency for metadata creation throughout the institution and will point to areas where metadata remediation might be beneficial.

XML Data Store Project. Work progressed on implementation of an XML Data Store whose goal is to provide "seamless access" across all of the types of metadata that describe LC collections.  After testing with a pilot in early 2009, a MarkLogic Server, which is a native XML database that enables the building and deployment of next-generation applications, was purchased and installed in the fall of 2009, and analysis took place on the initial applications to be loaded.  The initial implementation is focusing on the OPAC data, the Library's Encoded Archival Descriptions (EADs), and several digital collections.  Besides "one box" searching the system will have special geographical and faceting capabilities.  In May a series of demonstrations were held inside LC with a Beta version of the system expected in September.

Digital Portal Projects. The Performing Arts Encyclopedia (PAE), Veterans History, and other portal projects enable the investigation of new approaches to digital site creation and delivery to end users.  Recent releases have included selected music manuscripts from the Samuel Barber Collection made available to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the composer's birth as well as significant updates to existing collections in the PAE.  Several large projects will be launching over the summer, including a collection of musical iconography from the Dayton C. Miller Collection and updates to Song of America and American Choral Music sites.  The Veteran’s History Project added new content on Submariners and the Korean War. (see URL: <http://www.loc.gov/vets/>)

Earlier this year, NDMSO staff added the Library's new "sharing tool" to the entire PAE site.  This tool now allows users to easily share content from the PAE on their blogs or favorite "social media" sites (e.g., Facebook, Twitter, Digg, etc.), subscribe to Music Division RSS feeds, download TIFFs and XML-encoded metadata, and more (see URL: <http://www.loc.gov/performingarts/>)

NDMSO staff continue to assist MBRS staff in their effort to put more than 10,000 audio recordings from classic 78s online.  These recordings are coming from stock sets owned now by Sony Corp.  As part of the project, this content will go into the Performing Arts Encyclopedia (PAE) but will additionally be served through a dedicated “jukebox” interface with the ability to stream the audio content. OSI is currently testing the new player with added functionality. 

SRU/OASIS Standards Project. The draft documents for standardizing SRU 2.0 and CQL as web services were completed and will go out for a 2 month public review in July.  One component will be an OpenSearch document that specifies how to do OpenSearch within the context of SRU.

Metaproxy Installation. An improved and augmented protocol interface to LC's Voyager databases, Metaproxy, is being soft-launched in June 2010.  This interface accepts SRU and Z39.50 protocol searches and conditions them for submittal to the limited Z39.50 implementation on the Library's Voyager system.  It then takes the MARC records retrieved from Voyager and converts them to the format specified in the original search, MARC 21, MARCXML, or MODS.  The software also manages error messaging about the request in a manner that is helpful to the searcher system.

Additional Voyager files will be Z39.50 and SRU accessible through Metaproxy including the Handbook of Latin American Studies and the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped Online Catalog.  The new Metaproxy will also enable Z39.50 and SRU protocol access to name and subject authorities from a database mounted outside of Voyager (as Voyager cannot process Z39.50 and SRU protocol searches of authority records).  Name and subject authorities have been copied to a Zebra database where they are also kept up-to-date weekly.  Metaproxy and the Zebra database software are open source products from IndexData.  Metaproxy replaces the current Indexdata Yaz protocol interface to Voyager that has been very valuable in enabling Z39.50 and SRU for the last 6 years. 

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OFFICE OF STRATEGIC INITIATIVES

OSI Internship Programs
OSI hosts numerous internship programs bringing in talent drawn nationwide to support mission critical activities. Through the Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities (HACU) National Internship Program alone, OSI has hosted a total of 45 interns and co-ops since the program’s inception at the Library. OSI continues to expand its internships in partnership with major academic institutions, including the planned launch of a fellowship in advanced digital technologies.

Digital Preservation Outreach and Education (DPOE) Initiative
The DPOE initiative is dedicated to establishing and sustaining a national outreach and education program to encourage individuals and organizations to actively preserve their digital content, building on a collaborative network of instructors, contributors, and institutional partners. DPOE has brought together leadership representing libraries, universities and other cultural heritage organizations to develop a comprehensive calendar consolidating currently available digital preservation education opportunities, and to develop additional curricula implemented through train-the-trainer regional nodes and other delivery options. DPOE will also create a funding model to support these efforts based on public-private partnerships.

Federal Agencies Digitization Guidelines Initiative
The Federal Agencies Digitization Guidelines Initiative is a collaborative effort by a group of federal government agencies to define common guidelines, methods, and practices to digitize historical content in a sustainable manner.  The Initiative has undertaken three notable activities since January.  Still Image Working Group Advisory Board member Don Williams prepared an overview of imaging science for library professionals.  Williams's slide presentation has been published at URL: <http://www.digitizationguidelines.gov/stillimages/presentations.html>.  The Still Image Working Group published a draft version Technical Guidelines for Digitizing Cultural Heritage Materials: Creation of Raster Image Master Files.  These guidelines draw heavily on the National Archives and Records Administration’s 2004 Technical Guidelines.  The new document has been updated to reflect changes that have occurred in the digitization field during the last five years (see URL: <http://www.digitizationguidelines.gov/stillimages/documents/Technical.html>).  The Audio-Visual Working Group has developed the software application BWF MetaEdit (Broadcast WAVE File Metadata Editor), a tool for embedding, editing, and extracting metadata in audio files.  The Working Group plans to place BWF MetaEdit on SourceForge as an open source tool for the archival community, with release hoped for in summer of this year.

Educational Outreach
Educational Outreach has continued to broaden its Teaching with Primary Sources Program (TPS) for educators.  Several new nationally-reviewed curricular pieces were added to the customizable online PD database (see URL: <http://www.loc.gov/teachers/professionaldevelopment/tpsdirect/pdplanbuilder/>).  Additionally, four self-paced interactive professional development modules have been made freely available to any educator looking for online professional development.  These modules, each of which is approximately one hour’s worth of seat time, can be found at http://www.loc.gov/teachers/professionaldevelopment/selfdirected/.  The Library holds more than 100 presentations and trainings annually for educators wishing to learn strategies for incorporating primary sources into their teaching.  The Teaching with Primary Sources Consortium has welcomed new partners from the United Federation of Teachers in New York, University of California-Davis, and SUNLINK in Florida, bringing the total membership in the TPS consortium to 24 institutions.  An additional 80 regional grants to educational organizations has extended the reach of the TPS partner program to 34 states.  Further information about the TPS partner program can be found at URL: <http://www.loc.gov/teachers/tps/>.  A wide variety of new classroom materials, including primary source sets, lesson plans, and interactive activities has been added to the Library’s Web site for Teachers at URL: <http://www.loc.gov/teachers/>.

National Digital Information Infrastructure and Preservation Program (NDIIPP) Developments
The National Digital Information Infrastructure and Preservation Program has seen a number of developments over the last year.  The program has helped to bring focus on long-term access to three broad categories of content: digital news, public policy on the web, and geospatial data.  Expert groups convened at the Library to provide suggestions for framing a national strategy for each category.  NDIIPP is considering this input in launching new projects.  An example is program support for a web-based geospatial data preservation best practices clearinghouse, CIESIN, described below.
Work progressed on rolling out the National Digital Stewardship Alliance, which is intended to build on the success of the NDIIPP partnership network.  The NDSA will provide an opportunity for many different institutions and networks with a stake in digital preservation to work together in support of tools, services and best practices.  NDIIPP staff will serve as the executive secretariat of the new organization and will facilitate its development.

The NDIIPP Communications and Outreach Team has launched new initiatives for the program Web site, digitalpreservation.gov.  A Digital Preservation Video Series offers productions that provide information about issues and solutions.  The videos are included on the Library of Congress iTunes U site.  Also on the site are a number of audio podcasts featuring interviews with several individuals who are influential in the world of digital stewardship.  The Personal Archiving section of the Web site has been substantially revised and expanded with an eye to provide practical information.  NDIIPP staff presented this information in conjunction with other Library units as part of  “Personal Archiving Day at the Library of Congress,” which was open to the public.  The team also launched a Facebook page for NDIIPP.

Library of Congress and Columbia University Agree to Develop Geospatial Data Preservation Clearinghouse. Digital maps, satellite images and other forms of geospatial data are critically important for responding to disasters, protecting the environment and a host of other matters.  But much of this information is in danger of being lost, because of evolving technology and other threats.  The Library of Congress and Columbia University announced an agreement on May 28, 2010 to create a web-based clearinghouse of information about best practices for preserving significant geospatial data.  The Library’s National Digital Information Infrastructure and Preservation Program (NDIIPP) will fund the Center for International Earth Science Information Network (CIESIN) at Columbia’s Earth Institute to develop the clearinghouse.  CIESIN will launch a beta version of the clearinghouse later this year.

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Information Technology Services Directorate (ITS)
Technology Assessment Group. The Technology Assessment Group is responsible for performing in-depth studies in information technology’s constantly growing and changing hardware and software architecture, programming, and analysis tools and practices. The group recommends to the Director new technology which offers users efficient and effective access to information in a variety of disparate forms and formats.  In the last year, TAG has set up internal test installations of the new Windows 7 and Office 2010 software releases. TAG has also begun a project to evaluate and test possible internal LC uses of the iPhone system.  The Accessible Technology Demonstration Center provided Americans with Disabilities Act reasonable accommodations to more than twenty LC staff members and also to some reading room patrons.

Information Technology Security Group (ITSG). ITSG performs IT Security Risk Assessment which provide for the strategic review of IT security risks and implementation of appropriate responses to reduce those discovered risks. ITSG has established the Security Operations Center (SOC) which provides for proactive and reactive activities designed to protect the Library from computer based attackers. We have put in place an IT Security Governance program in order to provide information concerning IT Security assurance to Library management and to assist them in making decisions concerning risk. We support the Secure Development of IT Systems by developing and suggesting secure IT design alternatives and by being active participant in solving security issues on project teams. ITSG is responsible for IT Security Awareness and Training for Library of Congress personnel, targeted at their duties and responsibilities.

The Enterprise Systems Engineering Group (ESE). ESE Group is responsible for systems programming, telecommunications engineering, enterprise and departmental server management, storage management, and capacity planning. In particular, ESE has primary responsibility for engineering the underlying computer systems on which the Library's software systems depend.  ESE is currently working on several initiatives. One of these initiatives is the Cyclical Investments in Technical Infrastructure (fiscal years 2010 to 2014-MDEP or Management Decision Package) to invest in the Library infrastructure to build resilient flexible and scalable system configurations that can continue into the future. The required reinvestment consists of building modular systems, with cost-efficient and energy-efficient components that can be configured as needed to meet increasing user requirements for resources maximized for specific services, such as content delivery and content management.  Recently, ESE successfully implemented an Active Directory Authentication that allow the Congressional Geospatial Data System, which will be hosted in the LIB domain, to bind to the LIB domain AD server and the CRS domain AD server so the application can authenticate with the Library services Geography and Maps division Geospatial application. This is the first time this kind of infrastructure for sharing data in both directions has been configured and implemented.  ESE is also supporting The Office of Copyright eCO system upgrade, and the library’s electronic mail migration from GroupWise to Microsoft Exchange to name a few.

Technical Facilities and Services Group. The Technical Facilities and Services Group manage the infrastructure, and provide user services, for the Library’s Voice and data networks in the Library’s main buildings on Capitol Hill and at remote computer facilities including the Alternate Computer Facility and the NAVCC facility in Culpeper, Va.  The group is working on initiatives to upgrade the data infrastructure in spaces of the Library of Congress where older technology is being used and is also working on upgrading the voice switch to bring the current voice technology and revision levels up-to-date to enhance survivability.

Multimedia Group. The Multimedia Group has responsibility for digital creation and reformatting support to the Library's service units. Specific services of the Multimedia Group include: high resolution still image scanning; digital format conversion; video capture, digitization and editing; and presentation integration. The group maintains equipment, software, and facilities necessary to the performance of these tasks. The group offers complete production cycle services, and assists service unit personnel in the development of local capabilities. The manager and staff in this group work to satisfy customer requirements, to provide outstanding customer service, and to represent customer interests within ITS. Since Jan. 1, 2010 the Multimedia Group has videotaped 175 programs for the Library's web site, including lectures, symposiums, concerts, book talks and poetry readings. Some of the analog collections that the Group is digitizing include the Papers of Abraham Lincoln from the Manuscripts Division, original classical music manuscripts from the Music Division, Houdini Scrapbooks from the Rare Book Division, and World Treasures selected from the Asian Division.

End User Computing Group (EUC). The EUC Group is responsible for providing ITS customers with support for the acquisition, logistics, installation, maintenance and repair services related to end-user workstation equipment and software.  In particular, EUC has primary responsibility for providing the equipment, software and services that constitute the workstation systems used locally within the Library’s service and support units.  This includes the ITS Helpdesk, the Workstation Configuration Change (WCC) Working Group, limited audio/visual support as well as video conferencing support.  Last year, EUC provided support for more than 5,000 workstations and more than 300 teleworkers.  It managed the Help Desk which received more than 10,000 calls and processed more than 10,000 Remedy tickets.  Since January 2010, EUC has supported the ALA Conference in Boston, MA and has rolled out Microsoft Outlook to more than 3,000 workstations. Also, it is currently working on the LC COOP (Continuity of Operations Plan) Project.

Research & Development (R&D). There are five R&D groups within ITS, designed to provide direct support to each of the Service Units and enabling infrastructures.  More than 225 Library-wide supported business enterprise applications are continually improved, upgraded, and maintained.  This group’s role is to satisfy customer requirements, to provide outstanding customer service, and to represent customer interests within ITS. Within R&D, the Database Administration Group provides recommendations and performs related tasks, as assigned, for planning, management, and administration of major data base management systems, as well as for coordinating that work with the work of other ITS organizations where there may be consequences for any other organization, system, or customer. This group works to deliver, maintain, and enhance data base expertise and support within ITS, and throughout the Library.

R&D has supported Library Services including developing Customer Account Management and Financial Management Systems for the Federal Library and Information Center Committee (FLICC), developing an Exhibit Environmental Monitoring System, and migration of the Library’s Encoded Archival Descriptions (EAD) to the eXist native XML database, to name just a few.  Requirements for LIS 1.0 enhancements have been gathered and are being bundled into releases.  The first of these, internally referred to as "2010.1" is on schedule for a June 8th deployment.  This release includes high impact, low level of effort, low risk changes to improve the BSS search experience.  Work will immediately begin on the next releases, which will include additional queued enhancements to searching functionality, as well as an LIS implementation of the WebServices sharing tool.

The R&D groups deployed a new release of THOMAS on Jan. 5, 2010.  The most heralded features in the release were an increased timeout interval, a Top Five Bills of the week list and implementation of the WebServices sharing tool on BSS and Bill Text displays The OpinionLab feedback metrics reflect increased satisfaction with THOMAS:  in December 2009 the average (on a scale of 1 to 5) was 3.04; in April the average was 3.53.  Work has progressed on schedule for another THOMAS release, due June 1, 2010.

The R&D groups launched a new Prints & Photographs Online Catalog (PPOC) on March 23, 2010.  In addition to completely rebuilding the application with a new search engine and new application framework, an inviting new interface was also provided.  The new URLs for individual items are now persistent and thus more easily crawlable by external search engines. The result is a beautiful, highly visual presentation of some of the Library of Congress’ amazing content (see URL: <http://www.loc.gov/pictures/>).  Another significant achievement was the completion of an Enhanced Usability Pilot at the end of April.  The goal of this effort was to demonstrate that with the improvement of metadata, the user experience can be enhanced.  So a subset of the Library’s American Memory collections were “remediated” in three areas; place, date, and topic.  The resulting application built using this new data showcased maps, timelines and improved faceted searching.

Database Administration Group. Since January 2010, the Database Administration Group (DBAG) has completed major deployments such as Geospatial System application and database upgrade to 11g, Copyright CORDS application upgrade to Oracle 11g, and Payroll Analysis Module Budget Formulation (PAM F) implementation. In addition, DBAG provides oversight over an enterprise project for collecting requirements for the Library’s Digital Repository to be completed this year.

Repository Development Center
Over the past year, the Repository Development Center celebrated a number of important milestones.  The RDC ingested our two-millionth item for the National Digital Newspaper Program, and made our Content Transfer Services available to a Library-wide user- and partner-base (including new programs and retrospective work on existing collections).  RDC also led the publisher engagement for finalizing the Library's electronic copyright demand and kicked off our own software development efforts to support this initiative.  RDC continued to support a wide variety of programs across the Library with our tools and services, which include all phases of the digital content life-cycle and a huge variety of digitized and born-digital content, including: web archives, digitized copyright records, NDIIPP partner content, digitized newspaper pages, and inventorying of existing digital collections.

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