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Getting the Most out of Your Institutional Repository: A Report on the NISO Forum Held in December 2007
Contributed by: The final 2007 sold-out NISO forum, Getting the Most out of Your Institutional Repository: Gathering Content and Building Use, saw vendors, librarians, and consultants meet at the National Agricultural Library in Beltsville, MD, to discuss institutional repositories almost seven years after they were first developed for use to promote open access, reroute scholarly publishing, and to preserve institutional output. Herbert van de Sompel, team leader of the digital prototyping team at Los Alamos National Library (LANL), gave a stirring talk charting a new direction for adding repository content in a machine-generated way with the draft standard, Open Archives Initiative-Object Reuse and Exchange (OAI-ORE). Using a combination of Atom feeds and semantic web-derived resource maps, OAI-ORE aims to unite the disparate elements contained in scholarly articles into one unit. Van de Sompel drew approval when he demonstrated a URL that automatically fetched the citation information from OAI-ORE to autogenerate a citation in a wiki. "There is no Zotero used here...although I do use Zotero," he said. Dorothea Salo, digital repository librarian at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, who oversees the Minds@UW repository for several campuses, gave the most (intentionally) controversial presentation entitled "What You're Up Against" on the strategic failures of current repositories. Salo said her budget's been cut in half in 2008, and "the software's useless, and publishers have us outgunned with our own faculty...If I sound frustrated, that's because I am. It's time for us to admit the mistake and move on." Salo praised the SWORD initiative, which uses web services and Atom to automatically deposit content, and said a future direction could come from connecting libraries to cyberinfrastructure and research computing initiatives. Roger Schonfeld, director of research at Ithaka, showed statistics drawn from two surveys of 1,400 four-year colleges about "Distilling a Strategic Direction for Institutional Repositories." Schonfeld, author of JSTOR: A History, surprised the audience by demonstrating that repositories contain more images and archival materials than journal articles. He also exhibited discipline surveys, with economics joining the hard sciences as the field most likely to see a transformative change in its research habits due to RePEC, the pre-print repository. Peter Murray, OhioLink's assistant director for new service development, described its selection methodology, which captures items as diverse as birdsongs. Trisha Davis gave an excellent breakdown of how copyright checking of repository items works for Ohio State University, and Terry Owen of the University of Maryland demonstrated its Electronic Theses and Dissertations modifications to DSpace that support embargos in response to faculty and graduate student concerns of one year, six years, and unlimited time periods. Greg Zick, OCLC vice president of digital collection services, reviewed the history and recent literature on repositories, including Phil Davis' D-Lib Magazine article, the CLIR report, and the ARL Spec Kit, which revealed a very low return on investment per deposited item. "With the mean annual cost of $113,000, and less than 4,000 items deposited...we need to accept the fact that the model isn't working," Zick said. John Erickson, principal scientist at HP Labs and NISO board member, charted a new direction for DSpace 2.0, saying it would come from personalization and recommender systems. With 270 registered live sites internationally, "DSpace development is ongoing, active, and vibrant." With Michele Kimpton joining as new executive director (formerly of Internet Archive) to chart a new direction, Erickson said the foundation would provide guidance and support to the DSpace community, including a technical and strategic roadmap for platform, infrastructure and governance, and partnerships for sustainability. With a new Chief Technology Officer (CTO) to be hired, Erickson said the position's challenges include upgrading the platorm's scalability from handling 100,000 to 10 million items, improving interoperability with repository, web services, and Web 2.0 applications, adding modularity by making development of extensions possible, and allowing customized work flows via a versioning data model. Saying the recent surveys reveal a real threat to health of repositories, and "Participation in an IR today represents extra effort for the busy scholar that adds little value...to research, scholarship, and collaboration. Erickson charted the DSpace's future through personalization that automatically relates current activities and interests to other artifacts, web resources, and people with related interests. Citing the recent book, Programming Collective Intelligence, Erickson said recommendations are only the beginning, since personalization means "socialization, and the future of IRs will be defined by how well they integrate with scholarly networks and workflows." All the presentations from this event are available on the NISO website. The direct link is <http://www.niso.org/news/ events_workshops/ir07/agenda.html>. Science Assets of the Digital Age at Risk
Contributed by: Like many other sectors in society, science has become completely dependent on digital information. This dependence comes with a number of major risks because of the many unresolved challenges with regard to long-term preservation and access to this information. Something urgently needs to be done to prevent data from being lost into oblivion. We need to address a very serious problem in maintaining accessibility to the work of scientists and what they have done in past generations. This requires collaborative efforts of key stakeholders in the research enterprise. In November 2007, the Alliance for Permanent Access organized a conference in Brussels that brought together policy-makers from the European Commission and national governments, world-renowned research organizations, and digital preservation experts. They discussed how the preservation of digital science publications and data can be embedded into scientific practice across Europe. They also addressed the pressing need to establish a viable and sustainable European infrastructure for access to the records of science. Major European stakeholders in science and scientific information have joined to establish the Alliance for Permanent Access to the Records of Science (http://www.alliancepermanentaccess.eu). The founding members of the Alliance are CERN, the European Space Agency, the European Science Foundation, the Science and Technology Facilities Council from the UK, the Max Planck Gesellschaft in Germany, the British Library, the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek, the Koninklijke Bibliotheek, the International Association of Scientific, Technical and Medical Publishers, and the UK Joint Information Systems Committee. The Alliance aims to become the driving force behind efforts to find an effective long-term solution to the digital preservation problem. Its vision is to enable the diverse scientific communities to create information repositories that will form their part of the European infrastructure. At the same time, the Alliance will work with the science communities to agree a set of common standards, in order to make their repositories interoperable. The repositories will also benefit from a number of common resources such R&D activities and a framework offering technical tools. In addition the Alliance will focus on developing funding models and economic analyses to assess the cost of sharing and accessing data, and identify ways in which these costs can be integrated into all funding mechanisms for science. At the November conference the Alliance expressed the ambition to be a strategic partner of the European Commission and national governments, to discuss and help develop and implement their policies in the area of preservation and long-term access. Linus Pauling and the International Peace Movement: A Documentary History
Contributed by: Linus and Ava Helen Pauling's multi-decade crusade for peace is chronicled in a major new website created by the Oregon State University Libraries Special Collections. The fourth in a series of documentary histories detailing specific aspects of the Paulings' lives and careers, Linus Pauling and the International Peace Movement is available at <http://osulibrary.oregonstate.edu/specialcollections/coll/pauling/peace/index. html>. Project Description A fifty-three chapter narrative written by Pauling biographer Thomas Hager forms the heart of the website. Politically inactive prior to World War II, the Paulings were profoundly shaken by the explosion of atomic bombs over Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, in August 1945. Shortly after the war's end, Linus Pauling channeled his misgivings into an ambitious series of public talks that became increasingly radical in tone as the years progressed. The Paulings were also influential members of a number of early peace groups including the Emergency Committee of Atomic Scientists (co-chaired by Albert Einstein and Leó Szilárd); the Independent Citizen's Committee for the Arts, Sciences, and Professions; and the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom. Linus Pauling was among the first public figures to warn of the dangers of nuclear fallout from atomic weapons tests. This stance ran decidedly counter to mainstream McCarthy Era opinion, and Pauling paid a price for his iconoclasm. Frequently accused of communist ties, his passport was, for a time, revoked; certain grant funds were withheld; and, on at least three occasions, he was called before both state and federal investigative committees to defend his beliefs and activities. Undaunted, in 1957 the Paulings began an international petition drive, gathering the signatures of 9,000+ scientists demanding a worldwide moratorium on above-ground nuclear testing. This petition was submitted to the United Nations in 1958 and in October 1963, following an atmospheric test ban treaty agreed to by the United States and the Soviet Union, Linus Pauling received the Nobel Prize for Peace. The Pauling peace narrative is illustrated and amplified by some 500 digitized archival documents, and more than 90 minutes of audio and video. In addition, the complete details of the Paulings' personal and professional activities for the years 1950 and 1951 are exhaustively chronicled in a rapidly expanding calendar project titled "Linus Pauling Day-by-Day." Technical Details The website introductory components, narrative, document indices and Day-by-Day text were encoded in XML files. Each digital object presented on the website was also described in its own XML record using the MODS and METS metadata formats. These XML files were then referenced by several XSLT stylesheets that built all of the HTML pages for the website. Every aspect of the website's appearance and functionality is controlled by the XSLT stylesheets and complemented by CSS rules. Under the direction of Information Technology Consultant Ryan Wick, multiple authors contributed to the creation of code and content for this project. The authors' work was shared, stored, evaluated and revised using the Trac open source project management tool. In the NewsExcerpts from Recent Press Releases and AnnouncementsThe Library's Evolving Role in Graduate Education - ARL Releases Article PreprintJanuary 14, 2008 - "Over 100 librarians, administrators, faculty, and others concerned about graduate education participated in the October 2007 forum "Enhancing Graduate Education: A Fresh Look at Library Engagement." Sponsored by the Association of Research Libraries (ARL) and the Coalition for Networked Information (CNI), the event promoted engagement in conceptualizing the library's evolving role in graduate education, and it encouraged academic libraries to consider new ways of partnering with the broader graduate-studies community. To extend the reach of this important discussion, ARL has published a report on the forum by Diane Goldenberg-Hart, CNI Communications Coordinator." "Goldenberg-Hart captures the overall theme of the forum when she notes, 'The library's capacity to meet the challenge of continuously changing research priorities and needs will...support and shape the nature of scholarship through the 21st century.'" "See the ARL Web site for a preprint version of the report, Diane Goldenberg-Hart, "Enhancing Graduate Education: A Fresh Look at Library Engagement," ARL: A Bimonthly Report, no. 256 (February 2008): 1-8, <http://www.arl.org/bm~doc/arl-br-256-grad.pdf>. The final version will be in print and on the Web in late January. The forum proceedings are also available on the ARL Web site at <http://www.arl.org/resources/pubs/fallforumproceedings/forum07proceedings.shtml>" NISO and UKSG Partner to Tackle Inefficiencies in OpenURL Supply ChainJanuary 13, 2008 - "The National Information Standards Organization (NISO) and UK Serials Group (UKSG) have launched the Knowledge Base And Related Tools (KBART) working group. The group will comprise representatives from publishers, libraries, link resolver and ERM vendors, subscription agents and other parties involved in the creation of, provision of data to, and implementation of knowledge bases. These key components of the OpenURL supply chain play a critical role in the delivery of the appropriate copy to end-users of content in a networked environment." "The establishment of the group follows last year's publication of the UKSG-sponsored research report, Link Resolvers and the Serials Supply Chain. The report identified inefficiencies in the supply and manipulation of journal article data that impact the efficacy and potential of OpenURL linking. The KBART working group will progress the report's recommendations; its mandate has been extended beyond the serials supply chain to consider best practice for supply of data pertaining to e-resources in general." For more information, please see the full press release, which should be available shortly at the NISO web site <http://www.niso.org>. University of Washington to Examine the Benefits of Free Access to Computers in Public LibrariesJanuary 11, 2008 - "The Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) announced that it will enter into a cooperative agreement with the University of Washington to conduct a national study on the social, economic, personal, and professional value of free access to computers at public libraries." "The University of Washington Information School, working with the Urban Institute, a non-partisan economic and social policy research organization, will examine the impact of free access to computers and the Internet on the well-being of individuals, families, and communities. The IMLS project will be carried out with support from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation." "Public libraries, with support from the government and private foundations, have provided free access to the Internet and computers since the 1990s. Libraries have also provided access to digital resources, databases, networked and virtual services, training, technical assistance, and technology-trained staff. However, little research has been done on the relationship between free access to computers and the benefits to individuals, families and communities. Working with libraries, users, and communities, and an expert committee of library leaders, researchers, and public policy organizations, the research team will develop methods of measuring the benefits of free computer access. These indicators may help guide decision-making and be used to generate public support for public access computing." For more information, please see the full press release at <http://www.imls.gov/news/2008/011108.shtm>. Portfolios: JISC infoNet launches new resourcesJanuary 11, 2008 - "JISC infoNet has launched a suite of linked resources designed to support institutions running projects to support their educational mission." "As the maturity of project management grows within the sector, it increasingly talks about Project, Programme and Portfolio Management (or 'P3M' for short). Each aspect fulfils a different function and requires a different skill set. But effective management of all three is essential if organisations are to run projects that help them achieve their missions and contribute to organisational growth. The set of linked 'infoKits' looks at each element of P3M in turn and suggests some tools and techniques to help you succeed." "Gill Ferrell, Director of JISC infoNet said: 'The new suite of resources builds on existing good practice whilst recognising a shift in the type of projects people are undertaking. Developments such as service-oriented approaches and the use of social and collaborative technologies are changing the nature of the 'traditional' IT project lifecycle. We're seeing projects that are shorter and more incremental, that re-use components from other projects and that exist in an environment of continuous change. Many of the 'heavyweight' project methodologies have not yet caught up with these new ideas and ways of working...." For more information, please see the full press release at <http://www.jisc.ac.uk/news/stories/2008/01/infonet.aspx>. Revised Policy on Enhancing Public Access to Archived Publications Resulting from NIH-Funded ResearchJanuary 11, 2007 - "In accordance with Division G, Title II, Section 218 of PL 110-161 (Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2008), the NIH voluntary Public Access Policy (NOT-OD-05-022) is now mandatory. The law states:" "The Director of the National Institutes of Health shall require that all investigators funded by the NIH submit or have submitted for them to the National Library of Medicine's PubMed Central an electronic version of their final, peer-reviewed manuscripts upon acceptance for publication, to be made publicly available no later than 12 months after the official date of publication: Provided, That the NIH shall implement the public access policy in a manner consistent with copyright law." For more information, please see <http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/notice-files/NOT-OD-08-033.html>. German Research Foundation (DFG) funds license for entire Nature archiveJanuary 11, 2008 - "All universities and publicly funded research institutions in Germany will now have access to the complete Nature archive from 1869-2007. Goettingen University Library (SUB), the German National Library of Science and Technology (TIB), and Nature Publishing Group (NPG) today announce a national deal for all publicly funded research institutions, government and higher education institutions in Germany." "The national license is financed by the German Research Foundation (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, DFG) as part of their national licensing project. The license agreement also covers the Nature research journal archive collection up to and including 2007." "From May 2008, about 2.5 million researchers and students across Germany will have online access to the entire Nature archive back to Volume 1, Number 1. The Nature archive contains more than 400,000 articles from over 6,500 issues, the first 80 years of which (1869-1949) went live on the 7 January 2008. In addition, the national deal includes access to the archives of Nature Biotechnology, Nature Genetics, Nature Medicine and Nature Structural & Molecular Biology up to and including 2007." For more information, please contact Grace Baynes, Corporate PR Planner, Nature Publishing Group, <g.baynes@nature.com>. NISO to Develop Standard Identification for InstitutionsJanuary 10, 2008 - "Members of the National Information Standards Organization (NISO) have voted to approve the creation of a working group to explore issues surrounding institutional identification. This working group will be charged with proposing an identifier that will uniquely identify institutions and that will describe relationships between entities within institutions. This new NISO group will also consider what minimum set of data is required for unique identification as well as what other data may be used to support the business models of respective organizations, while also taking into account privacy and security issues." "The NISO working group will build on the work of the Journal Supply Chain Efficiency Improvement Pilot (JSCEIP), an industry-wide pilot project that aimed to discover whether the creation of a standard, commonly used identifier for institutions would be beneficial to all parties involved in the journal supply chain. The project sees participants working closely together to integrate interoperability around a standard identifier codified with standard descriptive metadata." "NISO is currently soliciting parties in the community interested in engaging with this working group. People interested in participating in or monitoring the development process should contact the NISO office. The NISO Business Information Topic Committee, chaired by Patricia Brennan, Product Manager at Thomson Scientific, will appoint members of the working group and oversee the work of the committee." For more information, please see the full press release at <http://www.niso.org/news/releases/pr-instid-1-08.html>. ACRL explores the future of academic librariesJanuary 8, 2008 - "The 2007 environmental scan by the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) explores the current atmosphere in the world of academic and research libraries along with trends that will define the future of academic and research librarianship and the research environment. The report is available online at <http://www.acrl.org/ala/acrl/acrlpubs/whitepapers/Environmental_Scan_2.pdf>" "The document builds on earlier ACRL reports, including "Top Issues Facing Academic Libraries" (http://www.ala.org/ala/acrl/acrlpubs/crlnews/backissues2002/novmonth/topissuesfacing.cfm), issued in 2002, and the 2003 environmental scan. The 2007 environmental scan is organized around the ACRL's top-10 assumptions about the future of academic and research libraries and librarians (http://www.ala.org/ala/acrl/acrlpubs/crlnews/backissues2007/april07/tenassumptions.cfm), first released in March 2007." For more information, please see the full press release at <http://www.ala.org/Template.cfm?Section=News&template=/ContentManagement/ Digital Preservation Program Adds New Partners To Preserve State Government Digital InformationDigital Preservation Network Grows to More Than 100 with New Partners January 7, 2008 - "Twenty-one states, working in four multistate demonstration projects, are today joining the Library of Congress's National Digital Information Infrastructure and Preservation Program (NDIIPP) in an initiative to catalyze collaborative efforts to preserve important state government information in digital form." "States face formidable challenges in caring for digital records with long-term legal and historical value. A series of Library-sponsored workshops held in 2005 and involving all states revealed that the large majority of states lack the resources to ensure that the information they produce in digital form only, such as legislative records, court case files and executive agency records, is preserved for long-term access. The workshops made clear that much state government digital information – including content useful to Congress and other policymakers – is at risk of loss if it is not now saved." "'The records of state government are of keen interest to Congress as well as to the states themselves, and it is critical that we work with state archives and libraries in their efforts to ensure that this information remains available and accessible,' said Librarian of Congress James H. Billington. 'I am committed to having the Library play a leadership role in encouraging the preservation of these important resources.'" "These partnerships expand the NDIIPP network to include state government agencies. In August, the network added partners from the private sector in an initiative called Preserving Creative America. With these new partners, the NDIIPP network now comprises well over 100 members, including government agencies, educational institutions, research laboratories and commercial entities." For more information, please see the full press release at <http://www.loc.gov/today/pr/2008/08-004.html>. ARL Workforce Data Indicate Possible "Youth Movement" on HorizonJanuary 4, 2008 - "In a recent study of demographic data on the university library members of the Association of Research Libraries (ARL), Stanley J. Wilder, Associate Dean, River Campus Libraries, University of Rochester, posits that US ARL libraries are likely to experience a professional 'youth movement' in the next few years, much as their Canadian peers have experienced recently." "In earlier analyses, Wilder has predicted that retirements from the ranks of US ARL professionals will peak in 2010-15. In this new study, he poses the question of how disruptive these retirements might be. The data give Wilder cause for optimism – he suggests that 'the transition to a younger population may occur in a smooth orderly way that involves no profession-wide shortages or crises. The transition may, on the contrary, prompt a youth movement that could afford ARL libraries the opportunity to retool in ways that might otherwise have been impossible.'" "Wilder cites the example of Canadian ARL libraries, whose professional employees appear to be five years ahead of US ARL libraries on the age curve. Canadian ARL libraries are already experiencing rapidly growing percentages of younger professionals joining their ranks as older professionals retire – the percentage of the Canadian ARL population under the age of 35 nearly doubled between 2000 and 2005...." "...Wilder suggests that US ARL libraries may see a similar doubling of new hires and new professionals in 2010, since there is a 'healthy supply of library professionals' upon which to draw...." For more information, please see see the full press release at <http://app.e2ma.net/app/view:CampaignPublic/id:11423.879205685/ Survey Challenges Belief that the Internet Reduces Library UseJanuary 2, 2008 - "Although the Internet is increasingly important as a source of information for a majority of Americans, most adults still use libraries, according to a new survey by the Pew Internet & American Life Project and the University of Illinois. The survey, Information Searches That Solve Problems: How People Use the Internet, Government Agencies, and Libraries When They Need Help, was funded by the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), the primary source of federal funding for U.S. museums and libraries." "The survey of 2,796 Americans looked at overall library use and library use for solving problems related to subjects such as health care, education, taxes, and job searches, etc." "A key challenge for libraries is to make sure that those who consider the library as a potential problem-solving resource recognize that libraries offer not only Internet access but a host of other assets such as trained staff and reference materials, the survey suggests." For more information, please see the full press release at <http://www.imls.gov/news/2008/010208.shtm>. Authoritative LITA guide to enhancing library Web site usability now availableDecember 26, 2007 - "Ask college students where they begin their research, and nine out of 10 will tell you they use the Internet: Google, Yahoo!, or Wikipedia. Perhaps two in 100 will tell you they use the library. Despite the abundance and accuracy of information available on library Web sites, students often discover quickly that they involve confusing terms and syntax. One poor experience, and the library will lose yet another user to more familiar, intuitive information portals." "In Making Library Web Sites Usable, a LITA guide to be published by Neal Schuman on Feb. 11, authors Tom Lehman and Terry Nikkel show library webmasters, usability teams and library administrators how to turn confusing, unappealing Web sites into the kind of friendly, efficient information gateways that students will choose." For more information, please see <http://www.ala.org/Template.cfm?Section=News&template=/ContentManagement/ 'Information Professional of the Year' calls for Web 2.0 policy debateDecember 21, 2007 - "Brian Kelly of UKOLN's UK Web Focus has been named IWR's 'Informational Professional of the Year'. Well known in the UK and abroad for his work in highlighting the benefits of Web 2.0 – or social and interactive web technologies – he accepted his Information World Review award at the recent Online conference at Olympia in London, and in an interview for JISC, called for a wide-ranging debate on the policy issues to which the new technologies are giving rise." "The award is a recognition, Kelly believes, not only of his commitment to spreading the word about Web 2.0 and its benefits to education and research (he gave 34 presentations during the year and published widely), but also to a very practical commitment to demonstrating its effectiveness...." "...Kelly believes that the benefits of Web 2.0 tools such as blogs and wiki – that they can allow students to be active creators of content rather than passive consumers and that social networking services can support the social and collaborative aspects of learning – are largely accepted now, as is the strategic importance of Web 2.0 for the higher and further education communities....He goes further than most, however, when he claims that the 'openness' upon which Web 2.0 services are based is a fundamental aspect of the very openness that underpins education and research." For more information, please see the full press release at <http://www.jisc.ac.uk/news/stories/2007/12/kelly.aspx>. Now Available: Beta One Release of Content Model-driven Fedora 3.0December 21, 2007 - "The 12th release of the popular Fedora software is now available for testing. The first beta version of Fedora 3.0 featuring a Content Model Architecture (CMA), an integrated structure for persisting and delivering the essential characteristics of digital objects in Fedora, is available at <http://www.fedora-commons.org/>. The Fedora CMA plays a central role in the Fedora architecture, in many ways forming the over-arching conceptual framework for future development of Fedora Repositories." "...We encourage the Fedora community to download and experiment with Fedora 3.0 Beta 1. It is particularly important to receive comments while the software is still being developed to help ensure this important update to the Fedora architecture meets the needs of the community. Please contribute your observations and comments to <fedora-commons-developers@lists.sourceforge.net> or <fedora-commons-users@lists.sourceforge.net>. Fedora 2.2.1 will remain available for all production repository instances." For more information, please see the full press release at <http://www.fedora-commons.org/about/news.php#3.0b1>. Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Awards ALA $950,000 to Improve the Public's Access to Essential Internet Resources in America's Public LibrariesDecember 19, 2007 - "The American Library Association's (ALA's) Office for Information Technology Policy (OITP) is launching a major project to increase the benefit that the nation's public libraries obtain from the federal E-rate program. This effort will include data collection and developing and implementing strategies to make it easier for libraries to participate in the program." "The E-rate is the biggest single source of funding for libraries' telecommunications and information services. And while many libraries rely on E-rate to make connectivity affordable, many others have difficulty taking full advantage of this essential program." "The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation grant will support ALA's work to develop and provide training and consulting services for libraries so that more libraries can successfully navigate the cumbersome E-rate application process. ALA will also work to improve the E-rate program in the long-term, for example, by advocating for simplification of E-rate's application and disbursement processes." For more information, please see <http://www.ala.org/ala/pressreleases2007/december2007/gatesgranterate.htm>. IMLS Calls for 2008 National Leadership Grant ApplicationsDecember 18, 2007 - "The Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) is accepting grant applications for the agency's 2008 National Leadership Grant (NLG) program. The deadline for submitting applications is February 1, 2008." "Now in their 10th year, National Leadership Grants have supported the innovative thinking necessary to help libraries and museums meet the changing needs of the American public." "This year's guidelines encourage projects that create partnerships between libraries and museums, integrate new technologies, and highlight the agency's focus on conservation and preservation." "The five funding categories include Advancing Digital Resources, Library and Museum Collaboration, Collaboration Planning Grants, Research Projects and Demonstration Projects." For more information, please see the full press release at <http://www.imls.gov/news/2007/112807.shtm>. ERC (European Research Council) Scientific Council Issues Guidelines for Open AccessDecember 17, 2007 - "The ERC Scientific Council has established the following interim position on open access:" "1. The ERC requires that all peer-reviewed publications from ERC-funded research projects be deposited on publication into an appropriate research repository where available, such as PubMed Central, ArXiv or an institutional repository, and subsequently made Open Access within 6 months of publication." "2. The ERC considers essential that primary data - which in the life sciences for example could comprise data such as nucleotide/protein sequences, macromolecular atomic coordinates and anonymized epidemiological data - are deposited to the relevant databases as soon as possible, preferably immediately after publication and in any case not later than 6 months after the date of publication." For more information, please see <http://erc.europa.eu/pdf/ScC_Guidelines_Open_Access_revised_Dec07_FINAL.pdf>. NISO, IMLS Announce Version 3 of Framework for Good Digital Collections Document Will Be Open for Contributions from CommunityDecember 13, 2007 - "The National Information Standards Organization (NISO) announces the release of version 3 of the Framework of Guidance for Building Good Digital Collections. The third version, the development of which was generously supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), is now available on the NISO website. In addition, a community version of this document is being developed to allow for ongoing contributions from the community of librarians, archivists, curators, and other information professionals. The Framework establishes principles for creating, managing, and preserving digital collections, digital objects, metadata, and projects. It also provides links to relevant standards that support the principles and additional resources." "IMLS, which developed the first version of the Framework in 2000, transferred maintenance – with continuing strong support – to NISO in September 2003. A NISO advisory group issued the second edition in 2004 and a new NISO Working Group was formed in 2006 to create the third edition. The third edition updates and revises the Framework, with the intention to incorporate it into a website for use by library and museum practitioners. This will encourage community participation in the framework, soliciting feedback, annotations, resources, and discussion." "The Working Group, formed to revise the Framework and oversee the community version, includes Priscilla Caplan, Florida College for Library Automation (chair); Grace Agnew, Rutgers; Murtha Baca, Getty Research Institute; Tony Gill, Center for Jewish History; Carl Fleischhauer, Library of Congress; Ingrid Hsieh-Yee, Catholic University of America; Jill Koelling, Northern Arizona University; and Christie Stephenson, American Museum." "The Framework of Guidance is intended for two audiences: cultural heritage organizations planning and implementing initiatives to create digital collections, and funding organizations that want to encourage the development of good digital collections. It has three purposes:
For more information, please see the full press release at <http://www.niso.org/news/releases/pr-Framework-12-07.html>. University of Michigan Announces OAI Harvesting of MBooksDecember 11, 2007, announcement from Kat Hagedorn, Univesity of Michigan: "The University of Michigan Library is pleased to announce that records from our MBooks collection are available for OAI harvesting. The MBooks collection consists of materials digitized by Google in partnership with the University of Michigan." "Only records for MBooks available in the public domain are exposed. We have split these into sets containing public domain items according to U.S. copyright law, and public domain items worldwide. There are currently over 100,000 records available for harvesting. We anticipate having 1 million records available when the entire U-M collection has been digitized by Google." "In conjunction, we have released our open-source OAI toolkit on SourceForge. This toolkit contains both harvester and data provider, both written in Perl." <http://sourceforge.net/projects/umoaitoolkit/> For questions about the project, please contact <dlps-help@umich.edu>. American Psychological Association Seeks Applicants for 2nd Annual APA Excellence in Librarianship AwardDecember 10, 2007 - "The American Psychological Association is seeking nominations for the 2008 APA Excellence in Librarianship Award, to be presented at the Educational & Behavioral Sciences Section (EBSS) Research Forum at the June 2008 American Library Association Annual Meeting in Anaheim, California." "This Award was created to recognize an outstanding contribution to psychology and behavioral sciences librarianship within the past 5 years, and consists of a certificate and $2,500. The inaugural award was presented to Mark Stover, MLS, PhD, Assistant University Librarian for Research Services at San Diego State University Library." "The APA Excellence in Librarianship Award is open to both librarians and allied professionals with at least 5 years of professional experience. It recognizes a contribution to psychology and behavioral sciences librarianship including instructions, project development, publications, research, or service." "The application deadline is April 4, 2008. All materials should be sent to: For more information, please see < http://www.apa.org/librarians/award.html>. Nature Publishing Group to publish genomes using Creative Commons licenceDecember 5, 2007 - "Nature Publishing Group (NPG) announced today that is introducing a Creative Commons licence for original research articles publishing the primary sequence of an organism's genome for the first time in any of the Nature journals." "The Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported licence will enable researchers to freely share and adapt the work, provided the original is attributed and not used for commercial purposes, and that any resulting work is distributed under a similar licence. No publication fees will be applicable, and the articles will be available free of charge. The policy was announced today in Nature, and details are available on NPG's License to publish page: <http://www.nature.com/authors/editorial_policies/license.html> and in a policy statement published on the NPG press room (http://www.nature.com/npg_/press_room). " "Wherever possible, NPG will apply the Creative Commons Attribution-Non- Commercial-Share Alike licence retrospectively to original research articles reporting novel primary genome-wide sequences that have previously been published in Nature journals. Only original research articles publishing the primary sequence of an organism's genome for the first time will be offered to users under the Creative Commons licence. All other articles published by the Nature journals will remain under NPG's existing licensing and copyright agreements." For more information, please see the full press release at <http://www.nature.com/press_releases/creativecommons_pr.pdf>. SLA Announces Survey Results Showing Salary Increases Outpacing InflationDecember 4, 2007 - "The Special Libraries Association (SLA) today announced the results of its annual salary survey. For the first time, the SLA Salary Survey and Workplace Study contains salary information and other data from respondents in Europe, including the UK." "According to the 2007 survey results, the average salary increases for SLA members in the U.S and Canada have outpaced inflation yet again. Based on salaries as of April 2007 for U.S. based respondents, the increase in salaries for 2007 over 2006 was 5.1 percent. This is 1.1 percent higher than the increase from 2005 to 2006. The average salary for U.S. members who answered the survey was US$ 69,446, compared with US$ 67,400 reported in 2006." For more information, please see the full press release at <http://www.sla.org/content/SLA/pressroom/pressrelease/07pr/pr2725.cfm>. Pitt's Libraries and University Press Collaborate on Open Access to Press TitlesNovember 29, 2007 - "The University of Pittsburgh's University Library System (ULS) and University Press have formed a partnership to provide digital editions of press titles as part of the library system's D-Scribe Digital Publishing Program. Thirty-nine books from the Pitt Latin American Series published by the University of Pittsburgh Press are now available online, freely accessible to scholars and students worldwide. Ultimately, most of the Press' titles older than 2 years old will be provided through this open access platform." "For the past decade, the University Library System has been building digital collections on the Web under its D-Scribe Digital Publishing Program, making available a wide array of historical documents, images and texts which can be browsed by collection and are fully searchable. The addition of the University of Pittsburgh Press Digital Editions collection marks the newest in an expanding number of digital collaborations between the University Library System and the University Press." "The D-Scribe Digital Publishing Program includes digitized materials drawn from Pitt collections and those of other libraries and cultural institutions in the region, pre-print repositories in several disciplines, the University's mandatory electronic theses and dissertations program, and electronic journals during the past eight years, sixty separate collections have been digitized and made freely accessible via the World Wide Web. Many of these projects have been carried out with content partners such as Pitt faculty members, other libraries and museums in the area, professional associations, and most recently, with the University of Pittsburgh Press with several professional journals and the new University of Pittsburgh Press Digital Editions. The D-Scribe collections are accessible free-of-charge on the World Wide Web at http://www.library.pitt.edu/dscribe/. " For more information, please contact Dr. Rush Miller, Hillman Librarian and Director of the University of Pittsburgh University Library System (ULS) at <rgmiller@pitt.edu> or 412-648-7787. European Digital Library Foundation welcomed by the CommissionerNovember 28, 2007 - "Yesterday, the European Commission endorsed the work of the European Digital Library Foundation when high level EC officials met members for the formal handover of their statutes. 'Europe's citizens should all be able to enjoy our rich cultural heritage. This Foundation is a significant step towards making that ambition come true,' Commissioner Viviane Reding, responsible for Information Society and Media commented. 'It shows the commitment of Europe's cultural institutions to work together to make their collections available and searchable by the public through a common and multilingual access point online.'" "Foundation members include the key European heritage and information associations. Their statutes commit members to work in partnership to:
"The European digital library is developing its prototype site for launch next year. To coincide with the formal handover to the Commissioner, the Foundation announced the CITY as the first of the site's themes." For more information, please see the full press release at <http://www.europeandigitallibrary.eu/edlnet/public_documents/ University of Maryland Libraries Digital Collection Portal LaunchedNovember 28, 2007, announcement from Susan Schreibman, University of Maryland - "The University of Maryland Libraries is delighted to announce the launch of its digital collections portal at <http://www.lib.umd.edu/digital/>." "This release marks two and a half years of work in the creation of a repository that serves the teaching and research mission of the University of Maryland Libraries. Many of the objects are digital versions from Maryland's Special Collections (such as A Treasury of World's Fairs Art and Architecture) or are new virtual collections (The Jim Henson Works). Other collections (such as Films@UM) support the teaching mission of the Libraries. This release also marks the integration of electronically available finding aids, ArchivesUM, into the repository architecture, creating a framework for digital objects to be dynamically discovered from finding aids." "The repository is based on the Fedora platform, uses Lucene for indexing, and Helix for streaming video. The repository features almost 2500 digital objects, with new objects added monthly. Object types currently delivered include full text (both TEI and EAD), video, and images. Objects can be discovered within a collection context or via a search across multiple collections. Cross-collection discovery is achieved through a common metadata scheme and controlled vocabulary. This metadata scheme also provides for individual collections to have more granular domain-specific metadata." Online Library Gives Readers Access to 1.5 Million BooksNovember 27, 2007 - "The Million Book Project, an international venture led by Carnegie Mellon University in the United States, Zhejiang University in China, the Indian Institute of Science in India and the Library at Alexandria in Egypt, has completed the digitization of more than 1.5 million books, which are now available online." "'Anyone who can get on the Internet now has access to a collection of books the size of a large university library,' said Raj Reddy, professor of computer science and robotics at Carnegie Mellon. 'This project brings us closer to the ideal of the Universal Library: making all published works available to anyone, anytime, in any language. The economic barriers to the distribution of knowledge are falling,' said Reddy, who has spearheaded the Million Book Project." "Though Google, Microsoft and the Internet Archive all have launched major book digitization projects, the Million Book Project represents the world's largest, university-based digital library of freely accessible books. At least half of its books are out of copyright, or were digitized with the permission of the copyright holders, so the complete texts are or eventually will be available free." For more information, please see the full press release at <http://www.cmu.edu/news/archive/2007/November/nov27_ulib.shtml>. BioMed Central Announces New Release of Open Repository, The Leading Platform for Hosting Institutional RepositoriesNovember 27, 2007 - "BioMed Central today announced the latest upgrades to Open Repository, the open access publisher's hosted repository solution. The upgrades include new features from DSpace, the open-source platform for accessing, managing, and preserving scholarly works. Open Repository now offers institutions increased customization options and a new and improved user interface. Also, two prestigious organizations have recently elected to host their repositories on Open Repository: Roehampton University and Medecins Sans Frontieres, demonstrating that Open Repository is the first choice for a wide variety of organizations." "Open Repository version 1.4.9 has several new features that are designed to enhance the customer experience. The release offers an improved user interface, making it easier for customers to browse and submit their material online. Additionally, institutions can convert their Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Text and RTF documents to PDF format. Customers can also set up RSS feeds, and customize lists and search fields, adding value to the already robust platform." For more information, please see the full press release at <http://www.biomedcentral.com/info/about/pr-releases?pr=20071127>. OpenDOAR now includes 1000 repositoriesNovember 21, 2007 - "SHERPA has announced that its OpenDOAR directory, which contains an authoritative list of institutional and subject-based repositories, now boasts 1000 repository entries from across the globe." "With each of the repositories listed by the OpenDOAR service having been visited by project staff, the gathered information is both accurate and precise, and contains a quality-controlled list of repository features." "Open access to information has grown rapidly as researchers and scholars increasingly put their work on the web for free in repositories. OpenDOAR aims to create a bridge between the administrators of those repositories and the service providers which 'harvest' them." For more information, please see the full press release at <http://www.jisc.ac.uk/news/stories/2007/11/sherpa.aspx>. Free database comparison tool launched todayNovember 21, 2007 - "ISC Collections, in partnership with DataSalon Ltd, have launched a free online database comparison tool today, which aims to help libraries make informed decisions about future subscriptions to online resources – the Academic Database Assessment Tool." "With so many products offering a huge diversity and wealth of information, it can be difficult for librarians to know what resources they should be investing in. The Academic Database Assessment Tool provides access to detailed information and title lists for major bibliographic and full text databases. It also delivers key service information for database and eBook content platforms. This enables librarians to quickly compare and contrast key items to assist in the purchase decision process. These include: a list of titles included in each database; search features available; linking methods e.g. full text linking; metadata standards and methods of access provided to these resources e.g. IP access, Athens or Shibboleth." For more information, please see the full press release at <http://www.jisc.ac.uk/news/stories/2007/11/adat.aspx>. SAGE and Hindawi Announce Landmark Open Access AgreementNovember 20, 2007 - "SAGE and the Hindawi Publishing Corporation have today entered into an agreement to jointly launch and publish a suite of fully Open Access (OA) journals." "This is a bold strategic partnership that places SAGE as the largest academic publisher to develop a collection of Gold Open Access journals, marking the company's continued investment in widening access to important scholarly research. SAGE is the world's fifth largest journal publisher, with over 485 journals in the humanities, social sciences, science, technology, and medicine." "The initiative further strengthens Hindawi's leadership in developing a strong portfolio of Open Access journals. Hindawi currently publishes more than 100 Open Access journals covering a wide range of subjects in science, technology, and medicine." For more information, please see the press release at <http://www.sage-hindawi.com/>. IMLS Publishes FY 06 State Library ReportNovember 16, 2007 - "The Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) issued its first library statistics report on state library agencies, on state library agencies in the 50 states and the District of Columbia for state fiscal year (FY) 2006. The State Library Agency Report for FY 2006 includes a wide array of information on topics such as libraries' Internet access, services, collections, staff, and revenue, and is used by state and federal policymakers, researchers, and others." "'The report is an important snapshot of state libraries that ultimately guides decision-makers' efforts to improve libraries' internal functions and outreach to the public,' said Anne-Imelda M. Radice, IMLS Director." "The Census Bureau, under contract to the Department of Education's National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), collected the data from the State Library Agencies (StLA) Survey. From 1994 though 2007, NCES administered the State Library Agency Survey. Effective October 1, 2007, the President's 2008 budget included funds for IMLS to administer both the State Library Agency Survey and the Public Library Survey in order to strengthen federal library policy efforts and enhance the Institute's national research capacity on domestic and international library trends." "The report is available in PDF format at <http://harvester.census.gov/imls/pubs/stla/index.asp>." For more information, please see the full press release at <http://www.imls.gov/news/2007/111607a.shtm>. Library leaders to extend Virtual International Authority FileNovember 14, 2007 - "OCLC, the Bibliothèque nationale de France, the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek and the Library of Congress have signed a memorandum of understanding to extend and enhance the Virtual International Authority File (VIAF), a project which virtually combines multiple name authority files into a single name authority service." "Building on a previous proof-of-concept research project by OCLC, the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek (the German national library) and the Library of Congress, the new agreement adds the Bibliothèque nationale de France (the French national library) as a principal partner in VIAF and will lead to the inclusion of content from name authority files maintained by the Biblioth�que nationale de France." For more information, please see the full press release at <http://www.oclc.org/news/releases/200683.htm>. R. David Lankes named first "OITP Fellow"November 12, 2007 - "The American Library Association's Office for Information Technology Policy (OITP) has named R. David Lankes as its first OITP Fellow through December 2008. With this position, Lankes will lead a collaborative research project with OITP on the evolving landscape of information technology and its implications for the education of the next generation of library and information science (LIS) professionals." "'Professor Lankes is the ideal candidate to serve as the first OITP Fellow,' said Alan Inouye, Director of OITP. 'He is a leading LIS researcher as well as someone with ties to, knowledge of, and interests in the larger library community. Professor Lankes has the ability to cultivate stronger ties – for mutual benefit – between library practitioners and institutions and the LIS research community, and he's also a future-oriented thinker.'" "Lankes' primary work will be to enhance the office's outreach to the scholarly and educational library and information science communities. While he will be working with the office on a wide range of issues, his primary focus will be on further developing the concept of participatory librarianship first set out in the OITP technology brief Participatory Networks: The Library as Conversation." For more information, please see the full press release at <http://www.ala.org/ala/pressreleases2007/november2007/oitpfellowlankes.htm>. Copyright 2008 © Corporation for National Research InitiativesTop |
Contents doi:10.1045/january2008-inbrief |