[SAC-FAST] broader questions

[Arlene Taylor]

So given your concerns, Stephen, what would you like to see the committee 
do besides report that the FAST headings are "too articulated, too 
complicated, and there are too many of them"?  Should we all try to apply 
them to some resources?  If so, I still have a problem with comparing 
results of applying controlled vocabulary to items for which we do not 
first have agreement as to what they are "about."  I have several years of 
"aboutness sentences" from my subject analysis classes (the classes were 
assigned items for which to provide LCSH, DDC, and LCC, and their first 
chore was to agree as a class on what the items were about - sometimes 
almost coming to blows in this process).  Here are examples from this 
year:

This website is about the nature of the solar system and the history of 
its exploration, with considerable information about individual planets, 
and includes photographs, multimedia, statistical information, databases 
and other resources.

This book is about women jazz instrumentalists of the 20th century, 
including biographical information on each musician listed, as well as a 
bibliography of additional printed material, Web sites, and recordings.


Stephen, if I were to compile a set of such sentences, would you see any 
value in having committee members try to assign FAST terminology to them?

--Arlene

On Wed, 22 Jun 2005, Stephen Hearn wrote:

> The broader questions I have about FAST at this point are:  What are we 
> evaluating? A subject descriptor system? A conversion algorithm? The quality 
> of a set of catalog records? Hopefully not the last one, but we do seem to be 
> vacillating between the first two.
>
> My understanding is that the conversion is meant to build the FAST vocabulary 
> with minimal human effort, and then the vocabulary would be presented to 
> untrained metadata builders for use as a set of controlled descriptors (for 
> want of a better term). In that case, it's really not that important whether 
> the converted records are well described by their FAST headings. One would 
> not apply FAST headings in a real context by first applying LCSH strings and 
> then converting them to FAST. The question is, how effectively can untrained 
> users of FAST select appropriate FAST terms to describe an object? Are all 
> the terms they need available, and can they readily be found? It is in this 
> context that I worry about inconsistencies in the way FAST is constructed 
> (many inherited from LCSH, or resulting from practice and coding changes), 
> and about how it would be presented for searching.
>
> I looked at the experimental interface OCLC has put up for searching FAST (at 
> http://fast.oclc.org ). When I tried a keyword search on "rome" I got 581 
> results. Scanning the list was baffling until I realized that they're sorted 
> first by tag value--emperors and other persons first, then museums and other 
> bodies in a new alphabet ... The Roman Empire finally turns up in the 151s 
> under "E" for "Eastern Hemisphere..." This is not a friendly interface for 
> the naive user.
>
> I also tried a browse search on "education" as a "Full Fast heading." The 
> result was a display promising 329 hits for "education" and individual hits 
> for headings beginning "education ..." (e.g., "education and crime"). 
> Browsing the 329 hits proved a daunting prospect, given uncertainty as to 
> whether some one of them might prove to be a "best fit." I tried an 
> alternative--an advanced search on "education" and "aids" as "topical 
> keywords" and got 91 hits with more required browsing (I want audio-visual 
> aids for veterinary education; I find "Education--Audio-visual aids," but 
> maybe one of these more specifically formulated headings is better. "Adult 
> education--Audio-visual aids"; "Vocational education--..."; will I find one 
> for veterinary education? Again, not an easy task.
>
> So, looking at FAST headings as a potential user, my main complaint would be 
> that they're too articulated, to complicated, and there are too many of them. 
> However well the converted headings work as alternate descriptors on the 
> catalog records we looked at, I still have serious doubts about the usability 
> of FAST as a file of authorized headings for the untrained metadata creator, 
> and likewise, for the untutored searcher. I'm sure that further improvement 
> of the searching interface will help; but can it overcome the basic problems 
> of over-articulation and complexity? At this point, FAST is more like an 
> alternate system of pre-coordinated subject strings (but lacking LCSH's 
> voluminous documentation) than it is like a set of simple descriptors.
>
> Stephen
>
>
> ****************************************************
> Stephen Hearn
> Authority Control Coord./Database Mgmt. Section Head
> Technical Services Dept.
> University of Minnesota
> 160 Wilson Library               Voice: 612-625-2328
> 309 19th Avenue South              Fax: 612-625-3428
> Minneapolis, MN 55455      E-mail: s-hear at tc.umn.edu 
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