Union Listing, like every other area of librarianship, is being affected by
technology and the changing expectations of end-users. In an effort to
solicit the opinions of librarians working with Union List information, OCLC
held a structured discussion on the Future of Union Listing at the OCLC
Union List User Group Meeting, at ALA in San Francisco.  Based on the
discussion it was obvious that this was a topic of great interest to the
attendees.

To obtain comments from other interested people, who were unable to attend
the meeting at ALA, I am conducting an informal survey on the topic.  If you
would like to participate please answer the following questions and return
you answers to me at myrtle_myers@oclc.org.  I will post a summary of the
results to the list.

Please do not respond to the list.

Thank you.

Myrtle Myers
OCLC Senior Product Support Specialist
myrtle_myers@oclc.org

1. How is Union Listing being used in your library today? Who is the primary
user of the data you input? Has the primary user of the data changed in the
last five years?

2. What changes have you seen take place in the use of Union Listing over
the last five years? What is the best change to union listing that you have
seen? What is the worst? What has driven those changes?

3. How do you see union listing changing in the future? What do you see as
the best change that could happen to union listing? What is the worst
change? What do you think will drive that change?  What will your library
need to do to meet those changes?

4. Will the increase in electronic journals and full text change union
listing?  In what way?

5. Will access to the Internet change union listing?  Will it change your
needs for offline products?

6. What changes do you feel OCLC will need to make to help you meet the
challenges of union listing in the future?

7. If OCLC could do one thing to make your UL life better, what would it be?

Please send responses to:
myrtle_myers@oclc.org