I just discussed FAST headings with the catalog librarians of the HELIN Consortium yesterday. I've always maintained that we should only keep topical and genre headings in the catalog that are supported by authority records. When I searched OCLC last week, I didn't find any FAST authority records, though the 655 fields in the bibliographic records have authority record numbers in subfield 0: 655 7 Literary collections.|2fast|0(OCoLC)fst01423811 Our general feeling is that they are redundant and too simplistic to be much help to catalog users. We agreed to do more research on the intention of libraries regarding FAST headings. If a major source of cataloging (e.g. Library of Congress) decided to use FAST in lieu of LCSH, we would not want to remove them. --Martha Martha Rice Sanders Knowledge Management Librarian HELIN Library Consortium msanders@etal.uri.edu 401-874-4951 http://www.helininc.org/ ----- Original Message ----- From: "Nate Cothran" <nate@bslw.com> To: "Backstage Library Works Authority Contol Listserv" <bslwac@mailman.xmission.com> Sent: Tuesday, January 14, 2014 3:38:19 PM Subject: Re: [BSLWAC] fast headings? Hi Jeanette, This is a great question. So far, we have had just 3 inquiries from clients regarding the FAST headings. All 3 clients have chosen a different path with these headings: ignore, remove, or accept & deliver. Since it appears you would like us to ignore FAST headings when they appear in your records, it will be interesting to see how this does affect your reports. For now, due to the low number of responses, I think most of our clients are choosing to ignore the FAST headings that may appear in their catalog from OCLC. Thanks, Nate You be the star. We'll stay backstage. Backstage Library Works Nate Cothran | Vice President, Automation Services Backstage Library Works | Provo, Utah & Bethlehem, Pennsylvania 801.342.5697 | nate@bslw.com | bslw.com | ac.bslw.com/mars From: bslwac-bounces@mailman.xmission.com [mailto:bslwac-bounces@mailman.xmission.com] On Behalf Of Jeanette Navia Sent: Tuesday, January 14, 2014 12:55 PM To: Backstage Library Works Authority Contol Listserv Subject: [BSLWAC] fast headings? We have not sent our authorities out for control since OCLC started adding "fast" headings to their records. Our library has decided that we currently are NOT deleting these headings. We think they may come in handy sometime down the road. However, a lot of new authority records have been created for these heading fragments, and I fear our Backstage reports are going to be filled with these headings. What are other libraries doing about these? Thanks! Jeanette Navia ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Jeanette Navia Technical Services Professional Williamsburg Regional Library 7770 Croaker Road Williamsburg, VA 23188-7064 (757)259-7742 www.wrl.org (757)259-7798 (fax) jnavia@wrl.org ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ _______________________________________________ BSLWAC mailing list BSLWAC@mailman.xmission.com http://mailman.xmission.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/bslwac

I believe the authority database for FAST headings is at http://fast.oclc.org/searchfast/  I'm not sure why they are not also in the regular authority file in OCLC.  More information about FAST headings is at http://www.oclc.org/research/activities/fast.html At this point, our library wants to keep the headings, and we've (since I wrote my original mail to this list) asked Backstage to match them against their FAST database and deliver authority records for them. We aren't thrilled that these headings are displayed in the bib records in our catalog (Horizon's HIP), but we can't find a way to suppress their display (yet). I review all authorities added every day in our catalog (just a glance over, usually) and these headings are creating more work for me, but I think in the long run, our decision to keep them is correct. Maybe in the future, our ILS could use them as intended. Jeanette Navia Williamsburg Regional Library Quoting msanders@etal.uri.edu:

I just discussed FAST headings with the catalog librarians of the HELIN Consortium yesterday. I've always maintained that we should only keep topical and genre headings in the catalog that are supported by authority records. When I searched OCLC last week, I didn't find any FAST authority records, though the 655 fields in the bibliographic records have authority record numbers in subfield 0:

Jeanette Navia
Technical Services Professional
Williamsburg Regional Library
7770 Croaker Road
Williamsburg, VA 23188-7064
(757)259-7742          www.wrl.org
(757)259-7798 (fax)    jnavia@wrl.org