For librarians, it is a serious problem which compromises their service to patrons and imposes an unacceptably large burden on catalog maintenance. The general solution to this problem is the development of Uniform Resource Names, or URNs. OCLC is an active participant and supporter of this process. The persistence requirement of URN schemes is not a technological issue so much as an outcome of the social structures that evolve to meet a common community need. OCLC's origin is deeply rooted in precisely this shared commitment to providing reliable, long-term access to information.
Standardization is necessarily slow and deliberate.
The concerns and problems of the library community may not be fully appreciated or adequately addressed by these groups in a timely manner. Libraries can and should provide leadership in the solution of these problems. To aid in the development and acceptance of URN technology, OCLC has deployed a naming and resolution service for general Internet resources. PURLs increase the probability of correct resolution and thereby reduce the burden and expense of catalog maintenance. However, instead of pointing directly to the location of an Internet resource, a PURL points to an intermediate resolution service.