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New WorldCat Selection service to help libraries streamline workflows for selection, ordering of new materials

OCLC and Cornell University develop new service
for release later this year

OCLC is working with Cornell University Library to develop a new WorldCat Selection service that will help libraries save time and money by streamlining the selection and ordering process for new library materials and delivering the corresponding WorldCat records.

The WorldCat Selection service will allow selectors of new library materials to view records from multiple materials vendors in one central, comprehensive system. Libraries will be able to get WorldCat records for newly purchased materials into their integrated library system early in the technical services process. And the libraries’ holding symbols will be automatically set on the WorldCat records for the materials.

WorldCat Selection is being developed in partnership with Cornell University Library and is based on software known as the Integrated Tool for Selection and Ordering at Cornell University Library (ITSO CUL). The service is scheduled to launch in the second half of 2006.

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Social networking sites grow 47 percent, year over year, reaching 45 percent of Web users

Successful sites drive high visitor retention rates

Nielsen//NetRatings, a global leader in Internet media and market research,
has announced that April’s top 10 social networking sites collectively grew 47 percent year over year, increasing from an unduplicated unique audience of 46.8 million last year to 68.8 million in April 2006, reaching 45 percent of active Web users.

MySpace, which has attracted significant media attention of late, topped the list with 38.4 million unique visitors and a remarkable year-over-year growth rate of 367 percent. Blogger took the No. 2 spot, garnering 18.5 million unique visitors and growing 80 percent year over year, followed by Classmates Online with 12.9 million unique visitors and a 10 percent year-over-year increase. Newcomer YouTube and the more established MSN Groups rounded out the top five, with 12.5 million and 10.6 million unique visitors, respectively.

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Turning valuable faculty collections into digital teaching and research tools

Over the past three years, Williams College (Williamstown, Massachusetts, USA) has digitized 25 special collections and brought more than 30,000 images online for local and global scholarship using CONTENTdm® Digital Collection Management Software.

The collections, often the lifelong commitment of Williams college faculty to their disciplines, were largely inaccessible until the Instructional Technology group led a campus-wide effort to digitize and index the objects. Now, anyone with a search engine and Web browser can discover these new digital tools.

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OCLC welcomes these new member libraries

Jordanian Center of Excellence for Public University Library Services
Location: Irbid, Jordan
OCLC Symbol: JOPUL
OCLC Network: OCLC Middle East and India

Juneau School District
Location: Juneau, Alaska, USA
OCLC Symbol: AKJSD
OCLC Network: OCLC Western Service Center

Oak Hill High School
Location: Converse, Indiana, USA
OCLC Symbol: INOHH
OCLC Network: INCOLSA

Membership guidelines

WorldCat update

WorldCat is the world’s most comprehensive bibliographic database. Updated at a rate of nearly one new record every 10 seconds, WorldCat contains more than 69 million bibliographic records and 1 billion holdings contributed by more than 9,000 libraries around the world. The Open WorldCat program makes the items in library collections—physical and digital, popular or special—discoverable by people searching the Internet.

See the latest WorldCat record

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