At NINES-sponsored meeting about collaborating across federated sites, sustainability has emerged early on as a major concern even from groups that are just getting going, as they find that some of their scholarly projects, once the initial funding runs out, are being forced to shift from open access to paid models in order to keep going.
People have also been talking about the high overhead (not just in terms of equipment, utilities, and space but also of drafting MOUs etc.) of hosting other projects. Institutional libraries are being characterized here as the best long-term hosting options for digital projects.
Certainly universities libraries are where a lot of long-running digital scholarship (e.g. Perseus, Brown) is hosted and are moving, and it seems a natural extension of the academic library's role as curator of academic publications.
What are the advantages of library hosting of academic projects, on both sides? What are the disadvantages? Does it work best for projects that are essentially done and need to be archived? How well does it work for projects that are still in devlopment?
4 comments:
It works when the library is brought in as a partner from the get-go. It doesn't work when projects are dumped on the library's doorstep at the end of the grant; many decisions have already been made that affect the project's technological sustainability, and my professional experience is that humanities scholars left to their own devices often make poor technology decisions without even knowing they're doing it.
I love digital preservation work; little is more important to me than doing it well. I can't do it well if I am not a full partner in the project.
Hi all,
I just wanted to mention that I really think that librairies have an important role to plan in the context of sustaining digital humanities. All those transformations going on should be the occasion to open a discussion on the role played by the librairies.
A really good report which reflected the reasons for Academic presses and libraries collaborating (and it applies to others with similar digital needs) is the Ithaka report 'University Publishing in a Digital Age'. http://www.ithaka.org/ithaka-s-r/strategyold/Ithaka%20University%20Publishing%20Report.pdf . It summarizes what each group brings to the process, the publishers being the experts on reviewing and publishing content, libraries providing expertise on digital storage and resources as well. In the research context this can also be a very exciting and productive relationship. Dorothea notes the importance of bringing the librarians in from the getgo and that certainly enhances the potential for success. The International Polar Year, perhaps outside this context although cultural resources are included, includes librarians among the partners on the sustainability part of the process.
This is what I sent Susan earlier today. Perhaps related to this topic...
In recent years libraries and archives as well as museums and other memory institutions have turned their attention not only to collecting print and electronic materials for use by researchers, but to working with those researchers, and with the cultural communities to preserve content for the future. In particular, libraries have worked to preserve materials which may not be part of their own collections. For example, Canada Research Chair Dr. Cynthia Patton’s research with the Downtown East Side of Vancouver involved the creation of a repository of materials for DTES partners’ use and it is housed in Simon Fraser University Library’s online site. This work has been done in collaboration with interested researchers and members of the cultural communities and in collaboration with other institutions. For example in a collaboration between Alan Twigg and the library, the BC Bookworld’s Author Database and past issues are available also at SFU Library’s site. Software tools and policies standards and practices have let to increasingly successful projects. A good example of such a project is described in Trehub and Wilson. One reality which has emerged is the very large cost of this preservation, particularly if longevity beyond a few years and existing formats is envisioned. In order to provide a robust regime of preservations, organizations may form a cooperative and use the LOCKSS software to preserve multiple copies in different locations on different servers. While there are numerous examples internationally, and, for example, nations such as the United States have government sponsored joint projects such as the Library of Congress’ National Digital Information Infrastructure and Preservation Program (NDIIP) to coordinate these initiatives (though inadequate funding is a constant issue), within Canada there has been little any government sponsored activity specifically directed toward preservation and access on a national scale, two notable exceptions being the Canadian Heritage Information Network (CHIN) Virtual Museum of Canada which harvests content from some Canadian Museums, and the Canadian Archival Information Network (CAIN) which performs a similar function for archives . Organizations such as the Canadian Association of Research Libraries, with its Institutional Repository Harvester, and Canadiana.org have established projects which go some way in aiding the preservation and access of cultural content.
Given the experience in digital preservation in a number of different contexts and countries, it is perhaps timely to begin to think about (for example) comparative studies of the effectiveness of approaches undertaken in various circumstances (countries, institutions, collaborations etc.) as opposed to the existing essentially descriptive literature. The need for a national coordinated digital preservation effort, in effect research and cultural infrastructure, is acute.
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