PRESENTING

In describing selected Internet resources, NetFirst(tm) has adapted a conventional record format. While the format does provide sufficient information to enable users to evaluate the relevance of a specific resource, specific subject coverage is secondary, and conceptual relationships between other resources are only indicated by assigned subject headings.
While this presentation method has served generations of librarians and users, we believe that the full potential of the browser medium in which the record is displayed is not fully utilized to better serve the user and the librarian. Instead of making use of the inherent nature and character of hypermedia, in NetFirst(tm), users are presented with the HTML equivalent of a late-twentieth-century catalog card (Fig. P-3): 

Title              KITCS Home Page
Publisher          Department of Mathematics, University of Kansas
Point of Contact   html@poincare.math.ukans.edu
Summary            Provides an overview of the Kansas Institute for
                   Theoretical and Computational Sciences (KITCS). 
                   Includes: people at the KITCS, the KITCS bulletin 
		   board and preprints, research done at the KITCS, 
		   and the KITCS gallery.
Access Method      http:
Location           http://poincare.math.ukans.edu
Corporate Name     University of Kansas
Subject Heading    Mathematics, Kansas
Subject Heading    Mathematics, Kansas, Data processing
Dewey Class        510.072
Domain             edu
Fig. P-3

OCLC's adoption of an enhanced labeled record as its public display format as part of its effort to establish an enhanced level of bibliographical control for WWW and other Internet resources is not unexpected. Indeed, in the history of the development of display formats for records in first generation OPACs, 'cardlike' displays were a common format used, as 'librarians [found] catalog cards familiar'(Crawford, 1986: 43) and 'cardlike displays present[ed] a familiar context for patrons accustomed to card catalogs, who ... [would] otherwise be nervous about online catalogs (Crawford, 1986: 44) Likewise, the adoption of the current labeled and MARC display formats common in most online systems today, are also to be expected and for similar reasons.
Crawford, Walt. 1986. Bibliographic Displays in Online Catalogs. White Plains, New York: Knowledge Industry Publications, Inc.
MATRIX