Digitization: Why YOU Should Be Leading The Charge

DigitizationWHY YOU SHOULD BE LEADING THE CHARGE

Sprout where you’re planted…

Libraries

Universities

Museums

Archives

No matter where you work, there are collections that need

to be digitized, cataloged, and published on the web.

Digitizing, storing, and maintaining online collections are

easier than ever. So, why is this important? And how do

you get started?

Why Care?

The future success of your institution is

dependent on your ability to provide access to

knowledge digitally.

Generations to come will access historical

documents, books, and primary resources in

multiple ways.

Print isn’t dead: it simply shares time with e-

readers, tablets, and phones.

Blackburn window, All Saints Church in York, England.

The Importance of Dissemination

Untapped collections, waiting to be cataloged & scanned, are

someone’s business. If no one is spearheading this venture, why not

make it yours?

As an educator, you have an obligation to provide access to this

untapped knowledge, to disseminate information in widely

accessible formats.

Mobilize your workforce and enthuse your administration:

digitization is where it’s at.

How To

Start: with a clear policy, a scope for your project, and a

manual of procedures and best practices.

Onboarding: Train and refresh staff, make use of

individual strengths, and equally divide the workflow.

Assess: equipment needs, how to store your digital

creations, and what the copyright limitations might be.

Publish on the web; join open source initiatives if possible. Panel detail In York Minster, England.

Policies & Procedures

Easier than ever to both create and abide by, policies and

procedures are essential to maintaining a successful digitization

program at your institution.

Have a scope and standardized methodology in order to stay

organized. How big could this project get?

Meet regularly to update and assess policies, as institutional goals

will evolve.

Training Staff Arm your personnel with knowledge! Empower

them to participate in classes, seminars, and

webinars. Monitor progress and ask lots of

questions. Do they find this learning curve too

challenging? Are they taking on too many

tasks?

Do you have any autodidacts in the group?

Have them assist with teaching new skills.

Most staff will have some experience with digital

projects these days. However, working as a

team, whether its 2 people or 20, is essential to

making the project successful.

Panel portrait of Richard III, Cardiff Castle, England.

Affordable Equipment

Gone are the days of expensive, soon-to-be obsolete

scanners and cameras. Equipment now is smart-compatible

and very affordable, especially if you FUNDRAISE!

Sizeable grants are available through nonprofits like the

Institute of Museum and Library Services

National Endowment for the Humanities

National Science Foundation

National Endowment for the Arts

National Education Association

Storage

Most institutions are daunted by the prospect of storing digitized materials. So often IT departments are overbooked and understaffed, making the

problem all the more frustrating.

Before beginning a digitization program, the issue of storage must be

addressed. Keep in mind that there are extremely inexpensive solutions,

like cloud storage, external hard drives with a built-in back-up, and

compact discs. Not everyone can be the Library of Congress!

Whatever you decide on, it is advised that you have 3 forms of storage,

keeping everything in triplicate. This ensures that you can retrieve digital

data if anything happens to one kind of storage, like format obsolescence

or corruption.

Copyright

This presentation is filled with medieval

stained glass. Why? The imagery isn’t

copyrighted.

Know international copyright laws and

treaties before you digitize and

reproduce online.

Familiarize yourself with the Fair Use

clause for libraries and schools.

Panel detail of west window at Lancaster cathedral, England.

Open Source Initiatives

These are cropping up quickly online, saving libraries, universities,

archives, and museums a lot of money and staff time.

Wikipedia is the leading encyclopedic online resource: why not edit

and contribute authenticated information?

Omeka is the leading web-publishing open source initiative for

libraries and cultural heritage institutions.

Access to Knowledge

“FREE” is the most desirable word in digital publications. Do your patrons know what’s at their

fingertips for free? The open source initiatives below

are incredible because they are free.

Becoming a contributor to these initiatives brings

global recognition and traffic to your online

collections. Research facilities all over the world are

invited to contribute to…

Hathi Trust

Digital Public Library of America

Internet Archive

Panel portrait of Queen Anne, Cardiff Castle, England.

Make a Difference

No matter the size of the digitization program, it will be beneficial.

Students, patrons, scholars, faculty, historians, administrators, and

academics the world over are searching for digital resources every

minute or every day. Why not provide them with electronic

materials that can be accessed anytime, anywhere?

Keep statistics on the frequency with which your online collections

are accessed. Use this information to help justify your institutional

existence. Its harder to erase a place that’s making a difference.

Thank you!

For more insight, contact collections specialist Mēgan Oliver

at [email protected] or www.linkedin.com/in/msmeganoliver.

Ms. Oliver has her Masters in Library Science from the University of South

Florida. She has previously studied and worked with North American antiquities, Colonial archaeology, archival ephemera, and rare books

in the southeastern United States.

Her digital work includes converting print books into e-books, web

publishing and website maintenance, descriptive metadata, storage

best practices, and social media promotion of online collections.