Metadata Standards Working Group recognizes that libraries holding magnetic materials may wish to have the proper coding in an item record to alleviate possible damage to the materials. Although there are few materials requiring this coding, and most of these are non-circulating, MSWG recommends adding this coding to the item record when appropriate. It should be noted, however, that legacy records may or may not have been correctly coded, and thus all staff, including student workers, should still be trained to work with these materials as appropriate. This recommendation has no effect on whether or how these items circulate.
Please note: there is no need to choose "no" for non-magnetic media. This field should only be coded for magnetic media.
For those catalogers working with non-print media, the following is a quick look at which materials are and are not magnetic.
Magnetic media
- Videotapes (VHS, Beta, etc.)
- Cassette tapes
- Reel-to-reel (or Open reel) tapes (audio and some film; to be safe, err on the side of magnetic if unsure)
- Digital audio tapes (DATs)
- Magnetic hard drives
- Magnetic computer disks
Non-magnetic media
- Compact discs
- DVDs
- CD-ROMs
- LPs
- 45s
- Laser discs
- etc.