spied at sourceforge

[Daniel Chudnov <daniel.chudnov@yale.edu>]

on the "DVD Database Project" (sorry for the lousy formatting):

  "Basically every (approved) user can enter his DVDs he owns and he
                          is willing to lend out to other people. The user
can also browse trough
                          all already existing DVDs from other users, to
see if they are available
                          to be lent out or if they have already been lent
out. If he finds one he
                          likes, he can then send an email to the owner
and ask him for that
                          DVD. It;s an easy and efficient way to keep
track of other peoples
                          collection."


see http://sourceforge.net/forum/forum.php?forum_id=22009 for more,
including their definition of a "Closed User Group Library System".  their
sourceforge home is at:

  http://sourceforge.net/projects/dvddbp/




All this is to say:  Docster, MARCster, what-have-you, everybody's
thinking about this stuff.  There are two ways of reacting: 1) fear or 2)
enlightenment.  The enlightened approach would be to see that _because_
there are so many hackers out there grooving on these concepts right now
it should be _easy_ for us librarian types to cobble these bits together.
We just have to jump in on the right projects and give what we know.

  -dc