REPORT OF THE CUWL COMMITTEE ON STRATEGIC DIRECTIONS FOR DIGITIZING UW LIBRARY COLLECTIONS

 

April 2001

 

INTRODUCTION.

 

The Committee on Strategic Directions for Digitizing UW Collections was created at the Fall 2000 meeting of the Council of University of Wisconsin Libraries (CUWL), and charged to:

 

- Define the purpose, scope and goals of the UW Digital Library (UWDL).

- Explore appropriate governance structure of the UWDL.

- Consider the issue of fee vs. free access to non-UW users.

- Find ways to involve faculty in identifying and providing editorial assistance for projects.

- Suggest possible UW funding sources such as collection development and/or automation funds.

- Investigate the relationship of the UWDL with other digital library efforts in the State.

- Give a preliminary report to CUWL at its February 2001 meeting, and a final report at the April 2001 meeting.

 

BACKGROUND.

 

In considering general strategy for the digitizing of UW library collections, it is useful to step back from our week-to-week preoccupations, and recognize that we are talking about a historic "grand transformation" of enormous proportions which will likely take decades to accomplish.  It is a change which, while it has started in a somewhat piece-meal fashion, in response to immediate pressures of one sort or another, holds the potential of being a crucial pivot in the existence and purpose of libraries.

 

The committee thought about what might constitute a useful taxonomy for describing the shape or purpose (or range, perhaps) of library digitizing activities.  Even at this early point in the digital information era, it is clear that, for managerial purposes, the term "scanning" can connote more than just one phenomenon.  An academic library might, for example, think of scanning as:

 

1.  ad hoc scanning (e.g. of single works, on demand by faculty)

2.  scanning to create an E-reserve operation

3.  scanning to preserve a body of at-risk materials

4.  scanning to create a new, themed, collection (i.e. a new intellectual entity, perhaps containing both library and non-library materials)

5.  scanning to accomplish the transfer of an existing library collection, from beginning to end, to a digital format for use as a database, so as to be able to say to our users, "All of our holdings in X or Y field of study are now digitized and available online."

 

The committee considered #2, the digitizing of Reserve materials, as falling outside its scope of investigation.  Although the need to start scanning materials for E-Reserve has given several UW campuses useful early experience in methods and technique, this activity is not done with the intention of creating a permanent digital library or collection on a defined theme or topic (and therefore it does not invoke questions of scholarly editing, of metadata construction, or of permanent care, maintenance, and guarantees of access, etc.)  Furthermore, it is one form of scanning which probably should and must occur in one's own library, since the result is solely for one's own library, and since it is a rapid turn-around operation.  An Electronic Reserve collection, like its paper-based parent, is essentially a collection of bits assembled for a particular present purpose, and intended then to be dispersed.

 

In accordance with our charge, we focused on the long-term question of how UW libraries should handle the need to transform large bodies of academic content from print, video, sound, etc. to digital, with a coherent corpus of academic information as the result.  An organized repository of many such collections would, by analogy with our present libraries, be a "UW digital library."  We also note that creating a themed collection as in #4 inevitably means selection about what to include, and thus is close to publishing a new work.  We think that this is very likely to be a dominant mode for the foreseeable future of digitizing library collections.  

 

All in all, we wish to emphasize that UW libraries should recognize the historic "grand transformation" that the conversion of large segments of our UW library holdings into digital entities represents, and try to respond on the broadest possible scale.  After discussion, we elected to characterize our area of inquiry as "the University of Wisconsin Digital Collections (hereafter UWDC) initiative."

 

A.  PURPOSE, SCOPE & GOALS.

 

We recommend that CUWL adopt the following statement of Purpose, Scope and Goals.

 

PURPOSE:  the purpose of the University of Wisconsin Digital Collections (hereafter UWDC) initiative is: (a) to provide for the delivery of quality digital resources from our academic libraries to UW faculty, staff and students, citizens of the state, and scholars at large; and (b) to be a collaborative mechanism through which to develop system-wide expertise and best practices, to maximize resources available, and to plan for a future where digital resources will be more dominant in the information mix provided by academic libraries. 

 

SCOPE:  the committee judged the eventual scope of UW Digital Collections to be potentially vast.  No estimate was possible in terms of bits and bytes, but just in terms of documents (pages, images, etc.) we can foresee the day when the items in these digital collections number in the millions.  Prime candidates are materials housed in the various UW libraries' archives, special collections, local history collections, government documents collections, sound and image collections, and general stack materials.

 

Although the original resources for these Digital Collections will mostly be UW Library holdings, other resources could also be included, e.g. faculty-supplied material, or licensed electronic resources.

 

GOALS:  1.  Build quality digital collections including all formats, to support and promote student learning, and excellence in teaching and research across UW System institutions. 

 

2.  Select resources for the digital collections which feature exemplary holdings at UW libraries or faculty-produced intellectual content.  Maintain a close identification between the digitized material and the UW library from which the originals came.

 

3. Create and maintain a technological infrastructure for hosting, archiving and user access, which is cost-effective, sustainable, and scalable. 

 

4.  Develop a centralized production center, to be known as the UW Libraries Digitizing Center, housed at UW Madison GLS (by mutual agreement between GLS and UWSA.)   In addition to actual scanning of materials, this Center should have a key role for UW libraries in training, in assistance with grant proposal writing, and in monitoring new methods and technologies for creating digital collections.  Within three years UW should explore the best options for increasing the scope of this Center, for example by an expanded centralized model, a mobile unit, outsourcing, or regional centers. 

 

5.  Provide a framework for collaboratively managing UWDC projects by

establishing an Advisory Committee with general oversight responsibilities.

   

6.  Define and apply standards for optimal technical inter-operability and ease of use of UWDC by the UW community.

 

7.  Advance scholarly communication through the provision of digital collections.

 

8.  Encourage faculty contribution and collaboration in the development of

digital collections.

 

9.  Provide for the preservation of selected rare and fragile collections

held in the UW libraries, including the archiving and preservation of the digital representations. 

 

10.  Develop expertise and training opportunities in digital imaging

technologies so as to increase skill levels in all UW libraries, as appropriate, for building digital collections.

 

11.  Collaborate with colleagues at other colleges, universities, state

agencies and organizations in the development of digital libraries.

 

   

B.  GOVERNANCE.

 

We recommend the formation of a UW Digital Collections Advisory Committee, which will develop the long-range production plan that will lead to the creation of the University of Wisconsin Digital Collections.  The Committee should be advisory to CUWL and to the UW-System Office of Learning and Information Technology (OLIT) to recommend projects, maintain broad financial oversight, establish policies, foster cooperation (e.g. in the development and implementation of a common digital library architecture) and assist the UW Libraries Digitizing Center in the development, implementation, and monitoring of priorities, standards, and guidelines for the shared resources which will together make up the University of Wisconsin Digital Collections. We recommend that the priorities, standards and guidelines address:

 

collection digitizing priorities

collection quality

funding

technology architecture

search architecture

information architecture (metadata)

presentation (interface)

accessibility

intellectual property rights

sustainability and preservation

training opportunities

 

The Advisory Committee should establish and maintain liaisons and/or memberships with other appropriate Wisconsin digital library initiatives, inform and consult with these groups regularly, and be empowered to appoint task forces as necessary.  At present, leading examples of non-UW groups include the State Historical Society of Wisconsin, the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction's Division of Libraries, Technology and Community Learning .

 

We recommend that the composition of the Advisory Committee be as follows:

 

1 representative of CUWL

1 librarian representing the UW doctoral campuses

1 librarian representing the UW comprehensive campuses and the UW Colleges

1 teaching faculty member representing the UW doctoral campuses

1 teaching faculty member representing the UW comprehensive campuses and the UW Colleges

1 representative of UW System Archives Council (a standing committee of CUWL)

1 representative of UW-System OLIT staff

1 representative of UW-System learning technologies (ITMC, LTDC, etc.)

1 representative of UW museums

1 staff member representing the UW-Libraries Digitizing Center

 

Total: 10 members.

 

We recommend that Advisory Committee members serve three-year terms, and be appointed jointly by CUWL and the UW-System Office of Learning and Information Technology (OLIT).

 

Management of the Madison-based digitizing center will be the responsibility of the UW-Madison GLS.

 

C.  FEE vs. FREE SERVICES TO NON-UW USERS.

 

In considering this element of its charge the committee first attempted to separate two key modes of usage: display-only (i.e. short-term, transient use) and down-loading for later, longer-term use.  These two types of user activity might call for different grades of images of the same content: basic, and high-resolution.   Although we cannot judge whether the UW libraries will find it necessary and cost-effective to have two images created of everything, we believe that in at least a substantial portion of cases, UW libraries will not want a situation where anyone can have the highest quality image free, or can copy all or large segments of a resource without our permission, which may require a fee.

 

Therefore, we recommend that consideration be given to making different grades of images of the same content available.  We recommend that display-only access to the basic grade of images from UW libraries' digitized collections always be provided without fee to any user, in the general public interest.  This puts such access on a par with the free, in-building access to our printed collections that has traditionally been offered to non-UW users.

 

Anytime a major down-load is sought by a user (whether a member of the UW community or not) then the question of purpose arises: is the material wanted for teaching, study, research, or any other bona fide non-profit purpose, or is it someone's intention to use what is essentially a new work, for a profit-making purpose?  For educational or non-profit type requests for downloads which exceed some stated proportion of a whole file or data base, whether the request is from a member of the UW community or not, some simple mechanism for having the user attest to the educational or non-profit purpose, is recommended.  For all such requests, a UW library ought to have the options of (a) agreeing; (b) declining; or (c) agreeing, for a negotiated "royalty" payment.

 

Among the other factors that might lead UW libraries to impose a fee for down-loading digitized content are: to prevent abuse, e.g. if large processing resources are consumed for one client, slowing down the access of any other clients; and to defray some of the development costs so as to help keep digitizing efforts afloat, unless a digitization project is performed under full funding.

 

At present, almost no UW institutions have the ability to handle the full cycle of the e-commerce transaction (e.g. with a so-called credit card server); however, we can indicate on the digitized resources, where users can purchase copies (higher quality and possibly large numbers of images) by contacting the originating UW library.  When users do so, it will still be necessary for UW libraries to operate fair use policies which support educational goals, interpreted broadly for society.

 

We recommend that the early ventures in creating UW libraries' digital collections should use only those original materials which are non-copyrighted or for which copyright release is easily obtainable.  After some years, as the field matures, copyrighted materials should be considered as needed, and each UW library should by then have a procedure for negotiating with the copyright owners of material it wishes to digitize.

 

We also recommend that UW copyright the digital products the libraries create, as a general safeguard for its interests.  By copyrighting the specific digital instance, we have recourse if someone does manage to download and mis-use the materials.  The Advisory Committee should be charged with formulation of a policy for handling copyright of UW Libraries' digital materials; this policy would then need to be adopted by CUWL and UWSA.

 

UW libraries would need to display a copyright notice which makes clear the fair-use permissions for study, review, criticism, etc. of the material.

 

D.  FACULTY ROLE AND CONTRIBUTIONS.

 

We see a strong need and an excellent opportunity for direct involvement of UW faculty as scholarly editors in creating digital collections.  As the UWDC holds as a central mission the provision of quality digital resources for instruction, active faculty contribution is essential, and should rapidly become the norm, as both library staffs and UW faculty gain familiarity with undertaking specific digitizing projects.  We therefore recommend that the participation of teaching faculty in the creation and oversight of its constituent products be actively pursued by the University of Wisconsin Digital Collections initiative.  The UWDC will encourage the contribution of faculty in two ways:

 

1)  The UW Digital Collections Advisory Committee will include two teaching faculty members.

 

2)  The Advisory Committee should indicate the UW libraries' preference for significant teaching faculty involvement (typically, in the role of scholarly editor), for the inclusion of any product in the UW digital collections.

 

Faculty involvement may include, but is not limited to: originating the idea for a specific digital project; conceptualizing the general scope and purpose of the product; collaborating with UW library staff on the selection of materials to digitize, and on the creation of editorial text to accompany digitized material; and later, reviewing the usage of the digital collection and the possible need for any updates.

 

Faculty contributions to the creation of digital products will be most useful if made in a spirit that allows for flexibility in future iterations of the digital assets.  Copyright and other intellectual property rights concerns must be settled to the mutual satisfaction of the Advisory Committee and the affected faculty member(s): however the UW libraries must retain final control over the "published" digital product so that it can be made available to researchers according to UW library guidelines and in the spirit in which the project, as a whole, was conceived.

 

E.  POSSIBLE FUNDING SOURCES & STRATEGIES.

 

There are several potential funding sources for creating and maintaining UW digital library collections, and the level of funding available at any time will determine how quickly UW libraries develop digital library collections.  Possible sources of funding include UW System library automation funds; other UW System funds (for example instructional improvement funds);

UW campus funds (library or institutional): granting agencies (federal and private); and new state funds as a result of UW Board of Regents requests. 

 

We recommend that funding models and recommendations should be part of the planning and priorities developed by the UW Digital Collections Advisory Committee.

 

The major cost areas for digital collection projects can be identified as follows:  first, there are costs associated with acquiring and maintaining a digital collections infrastructure in terms of hardware, software, system back-ups, and networking.  There will also be ongoing infrastructure maintenance and replacement costs.  Another category includes the cost of developing proposals for various digitization projects.  Next, the costs associated with project planning at the Digitizing Center and at the UW campuses should not be overlooked.  And finally, there are the costs related to the actual production of the digital resource (digitization of the collection, metadata tagging, interface design, etc.).

 

We foresee that in most cases, there will be no single funding source available to cover all identified costs of building UW digital library collections; therefore we recommend that the UWDC Advisory Committee be charged to consider potential cost-sharing models between UW System, UW campuses, and outside agencies as appropriate.  For example, UW System may have a financial role in building, supporting, and maintaining the infrastructure while UW campuses may share in the costs associated with the production of various digital resources. 

 

In the initial phases, it will be important for the Advisory Committee and UW Madison library to discuss various levels of infrastructure development and the number of projects that can be supported by some agreed level of infrastructure, to determine how much funding is needed, and then to propose potential funding sources for specific UW digital library collections. 

 

F.   PARTNERSHIPS/RELATIONSHIPS WITH OTHER DIGITIZING EFFORTS.

 

Partnerships with non-UW entities and digitization projects toward the creation of quality digital projects should be encouraged and pursued.   State and local government agencies; non-profit public and private cultural institutions; private colleges and schools; and other organizations, have potentially much to contribute to improve the UWDC.  However, they may not have the expertise or resources available to actually create digital resources.  Furthermore, established (non-UW) digitization projects may benefit through the expansion of available resources (both intellectual and monetary) and higher profile that a partnership with the UWDC could provide.   A prime motivation to seek potential partnerships should be to bring quality material held outside of the UW system into the UWDC.  For a project to be part of the UWDC, however, digital standards previously established by the UWDC must be adhered to, regardless of the originals' provenance.  

Respectfully Submitted,

 

CUWL Committee on Strategic Directions for Digitizing UW Collections:

A. Arneson

L. Docken

A. Evans

N. Pope

J. Ranger (representing UWSAC)

P. Wilkinson

P. Watson-Boone (Chair)