Great Minds...

As if in response to my post on name authorities, OCLC has come up with a version of the Virtual International Authority File (acronym VIAF). Type in "Fitzgerald, Michael" and you'll see that each name has associated with it what they are calling a "sample title." The titles are unattractive, being normalized forms, but still give you some idea of what each author has written, and you might be able to sort the Michael Fitzgerald who writes on XSL from the one who has written the guide to better business letters. At this point, that authority control has already determined that these are different people is incredibly valuable, where the value was much harder to see when all you had were names and dates.