On Wed, 12 Apr 2006, Marcello Perathoner wrote:
Andrew Sly wrote:
I'm not sure that I would agree that people producing the text should try to make the author name they are submitting "exactly the same" as what already appears in the PG catalog.
Why not? It seems the logical thing to do. If they don't, somebody on the catalog team will have to edit the author name later.
Well, if we're going to have any reasonable kind of catalog, every record has to be checked manually anyway.
In my experience having someone who is not used to the dealing with the catalog trying to make cataloging descions can only lead to more confusion.
Nobody asked to make decisions. Only to copy the author name exactly as in the catalog, of course after making sure that it is indeed the same author.
I'm afraid it's not quite that simple. Anyone who types out some author or title, which is then copied into the PG header, which is then automatically copied into the catalog, is making cataloging descisions whether they know it or not. I've seen a few cases where it seems that information could be getting garbled as it passes through the hands of different people involved in getting a text into PG. For an example from today, here is part of an email I sent just ten minutes ago: Ok, I'm a little confused here. As near as I can make out, this is an account by Henry Charles Mahoney of his time as a German prisoner-of-war. His papers were then edited into book form or, as the text says, "Chronicled by" Frederick Talbot. When this text was submitted, Frederick Arthur Ambrose Talbot was listed as creator, and Henry Charles Mahoney as Editor. Would there be any objection if I switched those around? Date: Sun, 9 Apr 2006 11:52:47 -0700 Subject: [posted] Posted (#18134, Talbot) ! To: posted@lists.pglaf.org Message-ID: <20060409185247.GA7225@pglaf.org> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Sixteen Months in Four German Prisons,by Frederick Arthur Ambrose Talbot 18134 [Editor: Henry Charles Mahoney] [Subtitle: Wesel, Sennelager, Klingelputz, Ruhleben] [Link: http://www.gutenberg.org/1/8/1/3/18134 ] [Files: 18134.txt; 18134-8.txt; 18134-h.htm; ] [Clearance: 20051019064205talbot]