The Search by Title option in PowerPAC searches the full title field in the MARC record (tag 245, including subfield c). This often includes the name of the author, or in the case of films, the studio.

For some search terms, this can pose a significant findability barrier: for example, when looking for a Steven King biography, your Title search for "Stephen King" will include all titles by Stephen King; similarly, when looking for a DVD with "Metro" in the name, the Title Search for "Metro" will include all titles by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

The title displayed in the search results list in PowerPAC is configurable, and libraries may choose not to include subfield c in the displayed title. This adds to customer confusion, as the term they Title-searched for doesn't even appear visibly in the titles of the search results returned.

Bottom line: the average person is not going to choose "Search by Title" if they want to search by author, so subfield c just gets in the way.

If there was a way for libraries to configure which subfields were included in a Title search, they could set it to match the config for how titles display in PowerPAC result lists, and create a clearer, more intuitive, and more successful search experience.