Role and value of authority control in a bibliographic network.

This paper discusses the importance of authority control in a cooperative effort where bibliographic records are exchanged. Though the author finds authority control to be labor intensive and therefore expensive, the advantages of authority control in terms of standardizing access points are considerable. The different levels in a network environment at which authority control can be applied are studied and the author indicates how authority files differ in the degree of integration with the online catalog. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]