OCLC customer support. MLC/OCLC members will now contact OCLC Customer Support for all questions related to support for OCLC products and services.  To contact OCLC Customer Support, please email support@oclc.org or call 1-800-848-5800.

OCLC Service Hours. OCLC support professionals are available 14 hours a day, Monday – Friday, 7 a.m. – 9 p.m. Eastern Time, to assist you with your needs. They will provide answers about OCLC products and services, to help your library maximize the value of your OCLC membership.

OCLC billing. MLC will offer billing assistance to your library for OCLC products and services. To contact MLC for billing assistance, call Janet LaCross at 1-800-530-9019 extension 116, or  email lacrossj@mlcnet.org.

OCLC sales. To order OCLC Cataloging subscriptions and other OCLC products and services, see OCLC’s Orders web page, To request a quote or other sales information, contact OCLC at us@oclc.org.

OCLC news. MLC is teaming up with INCOLSA and OCLC to keep you informed about the latest OCLC news. With the introduction of OCLC’s new service model, INCOLSA will provide information about new and enhanced OCLC products and services via regular updates on the MLC website, the Communique blog, and mlcinfo mailing list.

For further information, see MLC’s OCLC Services web page.

As the press release said, OCLC has adopted a new service model for support, training, marketing, and billing. The directors of the Regional Networks were informed of the changes at a meeting with OCLC staff on September 9. We were given documents that outline three areas for MLC and the other Regional Networks to continue working with OCLC: billing, marketing, and training/implementation. We were not given any options for other services that we currently provide, such as phone and email support for cataloging and ILL.

There are some details for OCLC to work out in the new program so we are not sure of the complete impact on you. However, we do know that beginning July 1, 2009 you will not contact MLC with your cataloging and ILL support questions, and we know that you will no longer contract with MLC for your OCLC cataloging and ILL services. Instead you will have a direct arrangement with OCLC.

Within the next couple of weeks, we need to tell OCLC whether we are interested in being their billing, marketing, and training agent. By early 2009, we will have an agreement with OCLC about how we will work together under the new model.

We want you to be fully informed about the extent of the changes that will come with the new program. We will use our normal communication channels – this blog, our website, the Communique blog, and News@MLC – to send regular updates. As always, we welcome your comments and questions.

MLC member librarians heard an earlier update on RDA at our Technical Services Conference in April this year.  We’ll post further update information as available.

To attend this training, your institution needs to become a participating member of NACO. For information on applying to become a NACO member, contact Heather Thomas at thomash@mlcnet.org.

For further information and to register online, go to MLC’s Registration page.

We at MLC are excited to announce that RDA expert, Chris Oliver of McGill University, will be a presenter on RDA at MLC’s Technical Services Conference in Lansing on April 15, 2008. Chris is the author of “Changing to RDA.”

To see the complete conference agenda and to register online, see Technical Services Conference on MLC’s workshop registration page.

OCLC has a new look and a new tag line. Click here for the full press release from OCLC.

Karen Calhoun is the author of the Library of Congress report, The Changing Nature of the Catalog and its Integration with Other Discovery Tools. Tim Spalding is the Founder and Developer of Library Thing.

We’re currently working on putting together the rest of the conference speaker line-up. Is there a speaker or topic you’d especially like to see? If you have suggestions for tech services breakout sessions, please contact Evette Atkin (atkine@mlcnet.org or ext. 152) or Heather Thomas (thomash@mlcnet.org or ext. 133).

Thanks!

“I know this will not come as a shock to many who have paid attention to the changing library landscape!  However, McMaster has been slow to change!  Original catalogers will be moving to “tiered reference”.  Copy cataloging will cease.  We hope to do this as soon as possible and are offering separation incentives to staff.”

It’s a bold move to outsource cataloging entirely.  Are any Michigan libraries are going this route as well?  What are the implications?
Jeff’s blog post also outlines seven new positions at his library, including Digital Strategies Librarian.

Members of the OCLC Online Computer Library Center’s Editorial Policy Committee, which oversees the Dewey Decimal System library classification system, were no closer Monday to assigning a definitive call number to the recently published Jim Belushi book Real Men Don’t Apologize.

“With all due respect to the author, we remain unsure how to categorize this particular work,” said committee chair Leslie Buncombe, who, despite repeated readings, still wasn’t sure if Real Men… was “an actual book.”

“What is it? Autobiography? Self-help? We can’t even tell if it’s fiction or nonfiction,” Added Buncombe: “Too bad it can’t be shelved by its ISBN number. Maybe it’s Fantasy Biography? I don’t even think there’s a code for that.” If no decision is reached within the week, librarians may be forced to shelve it in the “phantom zone” between Jenny McCarthy’s book of marriage tips and novels in which a cat helps solve a mystery.

I think folks will like the new Communique format. You can now read articles on the blog as soon as MLC receives them, and you’ll no longer need to wait until the end of the month for OCLC updates.

For further information on the MLC Communique Blog and how to set up RSS Feeds, check out our news item on MLC News & Announcements.