Are Archives the New Libraries?Are Archives the New Libraries?

John MacColl, European DirectorOCLC Research(with a little help from my friends)

Nationaal Archief18 September 2008

I will cover …I will cover …

• Missions and modes: discussion• Recent trends• Boundary shift• Drivers: scale; exposure• Controversial imperatives• Recruiting the users• New methods: quality trade-offs;

repurposing

Of growing interest?Of growing interest?

What do research libraries do?What do research libraries do?

• Collect published materials used in support of teaching and research

• Provide discovery tools for their own and external collections

• Provide delivery of materials via their own circulation service, and resource-sharing collaborative schemes

• Provide specialised collections - ‘Special Collections’ - in support of research, containing rare and unique materials - a mix of published (early and rare editions) and unpublished (manuscript treasures and literary archives)

What do archives do?What do archives do?

• Provide depositories for historically important unpublished materials - papers and records

• Store official records of organisations, including their own parent organisation (eg in universities)

• Store the records of companies in their region or otherwise associated

• Store official records of governments and government agencies

• Store the papers of important scholars• Store the papers of creative writers

and other artists

How do libraries do it?How do libraries do it?

• By organising essentially tractable, post-coordinated and well-defined materials (print and microfilm) in which scholars (from undergraduates through to graduate students and researchers) make new associations which deepen their scholarship and can create new knowledge

• By giving the appearance of comprehensively describing the published materials they collect

• By placing unassociated documents into new collections

• By being explicit

How do archives do it?How do archives do it?

• By storing largely intractable, pre-coordinated and undefined materials, in which researchers can make discoveries and map new knowledge

• By abstracting their deposited materials at a level sufficient to allow researchers to have access

• By mapping the hierarchy of their deposited materials

• By respecting the original historical order and place of documents

• By means of implicit promise

ArchivesLibraries

Low

High

ControlComprehensive description

Hierarchical mapping

Soc Sci/Humanities research

Scholarly development

Original research

Low

High

SpectraSpectra

Archival principles (Respect des fonds)Archival principles (Respect des fonds)

• Provenance

• Respect for original order

Mutual educationMutual education

ArchivesLibraries

Place of historicism

Rapid processing

Exposure methods

Hierarchical description

Whose mission is creeping?Whose mission is creeping?

• Libraries are waking up to the power of their unique assets

• Many of these are in hidden collections

• Archivists are better at revelation

Gravitational pull: University modelGravitational pull: University model

Google (Worldcat?) Library

Archives

Yale University

Mass digitised textual corporaMass digitised textual corpora

• Is Google Books a library or an archive?• Published material, so like a library• Hierarchical structure (title, chapters, sections),

so like an archive• How should librarians present collections within

large-scale corpora?• Respect des fonds?

The Greene-Meissner contributionThe Greene-Meissner contribution

• ‘Cataloguing is a function which is not working’• Forget item level description• “Insanity is when you do things the way you’ve

always done them, but expect a different result” (Einstein and/or Emerson)

• ‘Good enough’ beats perfection• Hail ‘the demise of the completeness

syndrome’ (Ross Atkinson)

ConcentrationA web-scale presenceMobilise data

DiffusionDisclosure of links, data and services

Scale mattersScale matters

Mass digitisation of special collectionsMass digitisation of special collections

Fulfilment?Fulfilment?

Fulfilment!Fulfilment!

Access vs preservation …Access vs preservation …

Access wins!Access wins!

• No one has been throwing away No one has been throwing away originals … so preservation needs are originals … so preservation needs are best served by thembest served by them

• Only by surfacing presently ignored Only by surfacing presently ignored collections can we justify their collections can we justify their preservationpreservation

• Our brave new world shows we Our brave new world shows we cancan go go back and do it againback and do it again

Selection has already been doneSelection has already been done

• Don’t spend time selecting Don’t spend time selecting items to digitiseitems to digitise

• Capture materials as Capture materials as accessionedaccessioned• For important collections, For important collections,

capture it allcapture it all• For others, sample and For others, sample and

allow user interest to guide allow user interest to guide your choicesyour choices

• Capture on demandCapture on demand• Capture ‘signposts’ and Capture ‘signposts’ and

devote more attention devote more attention when/where warrantedwhen/where warranted

Woodcut from Sebastian Brant, “Stultifera…” The ship of fooles… 1570University of Edinburgh Library

Handle once (then iterate)Handle once (then iterate)

• Handle incoming items Handle incoming items once once for both for both description and digitisationdescription and digitisation

• Compromise on image resolution and Compromise on image resolution and metadata as needed to achieve throughput metadata as needed to achieve throughput requirementsrequirements

• Create a single unified processCreate a single unified process• Let usage guide further effortsLet usage guide further efforts

Programmes not projectsProgrammes not projects

• Forget ‘special projects’ — it’s long past Forget ‘special projects’ — it’s long past time to make this a basic part of our time to make this a basic part of our everyday work!everyday work!

• Digital capture must be embedded in our Digital capture must be embedded in our basic procedures, budgeting, etc.basic procedures, budgeting, etc.

• Figure out a way to fund it yourself and Figure out a way to fund it yourself and you’ll figure out a way to do it cheaperyou’ll figure out a way to do it cheaper

Change in Photoduplication PolicyAs of March 17, 2008, the Ransom Center's policy regarding research copies of items from its collections will change. We will no longer furnish photocopies. For all requests received on or after March 17, our default procedure will be to make digital scans of the originals and furnish PDF files (72 dpi) either by email or on CD-ROM. For patrons who are unable to make use of PDFs, printouts will be available in lieu of digital files.

For publication purposes, high-resolution images will still be furnished on the same terms as before.

Harry Ransom Center, UT Austin

Scan on demandScan on demand

Engage your community in descriptionEngage your community in description

• Do not describe everything in painstaking Do not describe everything in painstaking detaildetail

• Start with basic description, then…Start with basic description, then…• ……allow serious researchers to contact you allow serious researchers to contact you

for more detail, and…for more detail, and…• ……engage your user community with adding engage your user community with adding

to the descriptionsto the descriptions

January 16th 2008: LC photographs on FlickrJanuary 16th 2008: LC photographs on Flickr

24 hours later24 hours later

Exposure

Impact: exposureImpact: exposure

Flickr: Top 50LC: Top 6000

Contributio

ns

How to lose control

Go with itGo with it

Feeding back into our workFeeding back into our work

89 records updated

Quality vs quantity: quantity wins!Quality vs quantity: quantity wins!

• The perfect has been the enemy of the The perfect has been the enemy of the possiblepossible

• Achieving excellence can have a substantial Achieving excellence can have a substantial costcost

• Any access is better than none at allAny access is better than none at all• Instead of measuring cataloguer/archivist Instead of measuring cataloguer/archivist

output we should be measuring impact on output we should be measuring impact on usersusers

Discovery happens elsewhereDiscovery happens elsewhere

• People don’t discover our content by coming People don’t discover our content by coming to our lovingly crafted web sites to our lovingly crafted web sites

• We must expose our content to web search We must expose our content to web search engines and hubs like Flickrengines and hubs like Flickr

Then: Users built workflow around

libraries and archivesNow: Libraries and archives must build services around user

workflowDiscovery happens

elsewhere

Discovery happens elsewhereDiscovery happens elsewhere

“It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change.”

——Charles Charles Darwin

Image: Auckland Museum

Image: informationarchitects.jp/web-trend-map-2008-beta/

Be where the users areBe where the users are

Combine approaches

Funding for streamlined processes

Are archives the new libraries?Are archives the new libraries?

• Research libraries are increasingly concerned with hidden collections of unique materials

• Archives are the new edge of research libraries

Conclusion?Conclusion?

Fusion

The EndThe End

John MacCollmaccollj@oclc.orgOCLC Research