Audit Digital Repositories: DRAMBORA Online Interactive Toolkit Released

The Digital Curation Centre and DigitalPreservationEurope have announced that an updated version of the DRAMBORA Online Interactive Toolkit is now available.

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

Based on practical research and recognizing current approaches and standards, DRAMBORA provides a method for self-assessment for digital curation professionals. It facilitates internal audit by providing repository administrators with a means to assess their capabilities, identify their weaknesses, and recognise their strengths, complementing other emerging work on attributes and criteria for Trustworthy Digital Repositories. DRAMBORA can be utilised by a broad range of digital repositories, digital libraries and digital archives, including those repositories whose mandates do not yet include responsibility for long-term digital preservation.

Dartmouth Appoints Its First Digital Humanities Chair

Dartmouth University has appointed Mary Flanagan as the first endowed chair holder of the Sherman Fairchild Distinguished Professorship in Digital Humanities.

Here's an excerpt from the press release:

Before joining Dartmouth's faculty, Flanagan was a professor of contemporary digital arts, culture and technology at Hunter College in New York City. . . .

Flanagan has published two co-edited books with MIT Press, Reload: rethinking women + cyberculture (2002) and Re:skin (2007) and is the author of the forthcoming book Critical Play. She is also the founder and director of the Tiltfactor Laboratory, which researches and develops computer games and software systems focused on science, math, applied computer programming, literacy and social values.

Flanagan received an MFA in Film and Video Production from the University of Iowa in 1994 and a PhD in Computational Media and Game Design from the University of the Arts, London in 2006. She was named a MacDowell Colony Fellow in 2007, a Fulbright Scholar in 2000 and twice received the City University of New York's Outstanding Scholar award in 2004 and 2007.

JISC Digital Repositories and Archives Inventory Project Catalogs 3,707 Free Digital Collections

With the completion of phase two of the project, the JISC Digital Repositories and Archives Inventory project has cataloged 3,707 free digital collections. The phase two records will be added to the JISC Information Environment Service Registry (IESR), which already contains the phase one records.

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

The brief of the inventory was to identify all the repositories and achives in the UK that are relevant to UK higher education and are free at point of use. For the purposes of this project a very loose definition of repositories and archives was used. The only sites that were excluded were those that restricted access and those with little or no structure.

Phase 1 of the project discovered 1,924 resources and phase 2 discovered 1,783. The records from phase 1 are already in the IESR and records from phase 2 will be added soon.

Phase 2 also enriched the metadata collected about all the resources and contacted resource owners to approve or extend the data collected about their resources. This produced a very positive response with approximately 800 resource owners providing extra information about their collections.

The project has released its final report, JISC Final Report—Digital Repositories and Archives Inventory Project.

Kete 1.1 Released

Kete 1.1 has been released. Kete is a Ruby on Rails application. Source code can be obtained from the Downloads page.

Here'e an excerpt from the 9/1/08 ITSIG announcement:

Kete combines features from Knowledge and Content Management Systems as well as collaboration tools such as wikis, blogs, tags, and online forums to make it easy to add and relate content on a Kete site.

A more complete description can be found on Katipo’s Web site (Katipo provides fee-based support for Kete).

The Kete 1.1 Features and Bug Fixes page lists new features in this version.

Two Strikes and You're Out: Comcast Will Suspend Internet Service If Residential Customers Exceed New Monthly Data Limit Twice

On October 1, 2008, Comcast will implement a new 250 GB monthly Internet use limit for residential customers, and it will suspend Internet service for one year if customers exceed it twice.

Read more about it at: "Comcast Caps Highlight Lack of Broadband Competition," "Comcast to Cap Internet Usage for Customers," and "Comcast to Cap Monthly Consumer Broadband Starting Oct. 1."

Fedora Commons Wiki Re-Launched

The Fedora Commons Wiki has been re-launched using Atlassian’s Confluence enterprise Wiki software.

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

The new Fedora Commons Wiki provides a stable environment for developing Fedora software, documentation and communities. The new wiki features additional personalization and development tools for communication and tracking including a feature long-requested by the community–automated account registration with "Capcha." So it’s easy to join our community while making it difficult for spammers.

Please note that you do not need an account to read the Fedora Commons wiki—it’s open to everyone. You must register at the new wiki, however, if you want to add comments, articles, ask for help, or participate with other members of the community.

Institutional Repositories at Texas University and Health Science Libraries

Below is a list of operational institutional repositories at Texas university and health science academic libraries.

Texas has 35 public universities, 9 public health-related institutions, 39 private universities, and 1 private health-related institution; however, only eight institutional repositories could be identified (one repository, the Houston Academy of Medicine-Texas Medical Center Library, serves multiple health-related institutions).

The list was composed by consulting the following resources and then accessing repository sites to verify their existence: DSpace Repositories—Alphabetical, Fedora Commons Community Registry, Institutions Using the Digital Commons Platform, OpenDOAR, ROAR, and Repository 66.

Institution Repository Software
Baylor University (Baylor University Libraries) BearDocs DSpace
Houston Academy of Medicine-Texas Medical Center Library DigitalCommons@The Texas Medical Center Digital Commons
Rice University (Fondren Library) Rice Digital Scholarship Archive DSpace
Texas A&M University (Texas A&M University Libraries) Texas A&M Repository DSpace
Texas State University (Alkek Library) eCommons@Texas State University Digital Commons
Texas Tech University (Texas Tech University Libraries) eScholarship Repository Digital Commons
University of Texas at Austin (University of Texas Libraries) University of Texas Digital Repository DSpace
University of Texas at El Paso (University of Texas at El Paso Library) DigitalCommons@UTEP Digital Commons

Texas also has the Texas Digital Library.

DCC Methodology for Designing and Evaluating Curation and Preservation Experiments V1.0

The Digital Curation Centre has released DCC Methodology for Designing and Evaluating Curation and Preservation Experiments V1.0.

Here's an excerpt:

The purpose of this document is to describe a Digital Curation Centre (DCC) testbed methodology which will serve as a workflow framework for designing experiments to validate the effectiveness of curation and preservation strategies. The methodology is grounded in the following general principles: the methodology must

  • conform to the fundamental standards of a scientific methodology,
  • be easy to follow and implement, i.e. accommodate experimenters of all levels of technical expertise,
  • be general enough to accommodate future changes and the evolution of ideas in curation and
  • preservation theory and practice,
  • be specific enough to provide concrete guidance in the immediate short term,
  • be sufficiently flexible and extensible to allow for technological advances and the evolving
  • complexity of available resources

RoMEO List of Publishers Who Allow Their PDFs to Be Deposited in Institutional Repositories

SHERPA's RoMEO service has made available "Publishers Allowing the Deposition of Their Published Version/PDF in Institutional Repositories."

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

SHERPA has analysed its records to determine which of the 414 publishers listed allow authors to deposit the publishers' version or publishers' PDF of a journal article into the author's institutional repository. 50 publishers allow immediate, un-embargoed deposit into repositories—even more allow use in restricted circumstances. This means that there is a large volume of work which can be deposited directly into repositories even if the author has not retained their own final draft. . . .

We have separated the publishers into sub-sets, indicating any restrictions that are imposed by the publishers on the use of their versions. The sub-sets are: no restrictions, embargos, fee required and embargo & fee required.

British Library Releases Its "Digitisation Strategy 2008-2011"

The British Library has released its "Digitisation Strategy 2008-2011."

Here's an excerpt:

Over the next 3 years we will build on our existing digitisation programme. Current projects include the digitisation of:

  • 20 million pages of 19th century literature [approximately 80,000 books];
  • 1 million pages of historic newspapers in addition to the 3m already digitised;
  • 4,000 hours of Archival Sound Recordings in addition to the 4,000 hours already digitised;
  • 100,000 pages of Greek manuscripts.

Our top priority digitisation programme in support of the Library's corporate strategy 2008-2011 is the digitisation of newspapers.

ALA-APA Survey: 2008 Mean Salary for Librarians with ALA-Accredited Master's Degrees is $58,960

The American Library Association has published the 2008 edition of the ALA-APA Salary Survey: Librarian—Public and Academic.

Here's an excerpt from the press release ("Librarian Salary Survey Reports Mean Librarian Salary Up 2 Percent to $58,960 in 2008"):

Analysis of data from more than 1,010 public and academic libraries showed the mean salary for librarians with ALA-accredited Master’s Degrees reported increased 2 percent from 2007, up $1,151 to $57,809. The median ALA MLS salary was $53,251 and salaries ranged from $22,000 to $331,200.

Note that the press release headline says that the mean salary is "$58,960," while the first paragraph of the press release says it's "$57,809." According to the press release for the 2007 edition, the "mean salary for librarians with ALA-accredited Master’s Degrees reported increased 2.8 percent from 2006, up $1,550 to $57,809." The 2007 mean salary ($57,809) added to the 2008 $1,151 increase gives $58,960.

OCLC Announces WorldCat Copyright Evidence Registry Beta

OCLC has announced the WorldCat Copyright Evidence Registry beta, a union catalog of copyright information.

Here's an excerpt from the press release:

The WorldCat Copyright Evidence Registry is a community working together to build a union catalog of copyright evidence based on WorldCat, which contains more than 100 million bibliographic records describing items held in thousands of libraries worldwide. In addition to the WorldCat metadata, the Copyright Evidence Registry uses other data contributed by libraries and other organizations.

Digitization projects continue for books in the public domain, but books whose copyright status is unknown are destined to remain in print and on shelves until their status can be determined. The process to determine copyright status can be lengthy and labor intensive. The goal of the Copyright Evidence Registry is to encourage a cooperative environment to discover, create and share copyright evidence through a collaboratively created and maintained database, using the WorldCat cooperative model to eliminate duplicate efforts. . . .

The Copyright Evidence Registry six-month pilot was launched July 1 to test the concept and functionality. Users can search the Copyright Evidence Registry to find information about a book, learn what others have said about its copyright status, and share what they know. . . .

During a later stage of the pilot, OCLC will add a feature enabling pilot libraries to create and run automated copyright rules conforming to standards they define for determining copyright status. The rules will help libraries analyze the information available in the Copyright Evidence Registry and form their own conclusions about copyright status.

NEH Office of Digital Humanities Announces Grant Awards and New Grant Opportunities

The National Endowment for the Humanities' Office of Digital Humanities has announced 22 Digital Humanities Start-Up Grants awards and 3 Institutes for Advanced Topics in the Digital Humanities awards.

Applications are being accepted for a new round of Digital Humanities Start-Up Grants with a 10/8/08 deadline.

Ithaka’s 2006 Studies of Key Stakeholders in the Digital Transformation in Higher Education

Ithaka Harbors has published Ithaka’s 2006 Studies of Key Stakeholders in the Digital Transformation in Higher Education.

Here'e an excerpt from the Faculty and Librarian Surveys Web page:

Our 2006 survey of faculty members sought to determine their attitudes related to online resources, electronic archiving, teaching and learning and related subjects. This study affords the opportunity to develop trend analysis of many measurements that we collected in the 2003 and 2000 faculty surveys. . . . In 2006, for the first time, we are also able to offer extensive comparison with the attitudes and perspectives of academic librarians on the perceived roles of the library and librarian on campuses; the impact of transitioning to electronic material on library practices; the place of digital repositories in the campus information-services landscape; and the future plans of academic libraries. Librarians surveyed include both directors and collection development leaders from a wide variety of 4-year academic institutions across the United States.

Syracuse University's iSchool Establishes Limited Residency Part-Time Executive Doctoral Program

Syracuse University's School of Information Studies has established a limited residency part-time executive doctoral program.

Here's an excerpt from the press release:

The Doctorate of Professional Studies in Information Management is a three-year program with fall, spring, and summer terms, which is offered in a limited residency, distance learning format. The 51-credit hour program involves 16 courses on methods, research, and practice topics (36 credits total), plus 15 credits for thesis work. . . .

The program received formal approval this spring by the Syracuse University Board of Trustees and the New York State Office of College and University Evaluation, and has begun accepting applications for the fall 2008 class. A successful candidate will have completed a master’s degree and have at least five years of experience in the information professions.

Shawn Bentley Orphan Works Act of 2008 Stalled in Senate

The Association of Research Libraries reports in the latest E-News for ARL Directors that the Shawn Bentley Orphan Works Act of 2008 (S. 2913) has stalled in the Senate over state sovereign immunity and qualifying searches issues. It is uncertain if the bill will be considered further in this session.

Read more about it at "Orphan Works Legislation Fails to Move Forward in US."

Ireland's Higher Education Authority Enacts Open Access Mandate

Ireland's Higher Education Authority, a major research funding agency in that country, has enacted an open access mandate that requires searchers to "lodge their publications resulting in whole or in part from HEA-funded research in an open access repository as soon as is practical after publication, and to be made openly accessible within 6 calendar months at the latest, subject to copyright agreement."

Stevan Harnad reports that this is the "world's 52nd Green OA Self-Archiving mandate (the 27th funder mandate)."

Lenz v. Universal: Fair Use Must Be Considered before Takedown Notices Are Sent

United States District Judge Jeremy Fogel has refused to dismiss Stephanie Lenz's EFF-backed lawsuit against Universal Music Publishing Group that "asks for a declaratory judgment that Lenz's home video does not infringe any Universal copyright, as well as damages and injunctive relief restraining Universal from bringing further copyright claims in connection with the video." Universal had issued a takedown notice to YouTube for Lenz's brief video of her young son dancing to Prince's "Let's Go Crazy." The Judge ruled that fair use must be taken into account before takedown notices are issued by copyright holders.

Here's an excerpt from the ruling:

Though Congress did not expressly mention the fair use doctrine in the DMCA, the Copyright Act provides explicitly that "the fair use of a copyrighted work . . . is not an infringement of copyright." 17 U.S.C. § 107. Even if Universal is correct that fair use only excuses infringement, the fact remains that fair use is a lawful use of a copyright. Accordingly, in order for a copyright owner to proceed under the DMCA with "a good faith belief that use of the material in the manner complained of is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law," the owner must evaluate whether the material makes fair use of the copyright. 17 U.S.C. § 512(c)(3)(A)(v). An allegation that a copyright owner acted in bad faith by issuing a takedown notice without proper consideration of the fair use doctrine thus is sufficient to state a misrepresentation claim pursuant to Section 512(f) of the DMCA. Such an interpretation of the DMCA furthers both the purposes of the DMCA itself and copyright law in general. In enacting the DMCA, Congress noted that the "provisions in the bill balance the need for rapid response to potential infringement with the end-users [sic] legitimate interests in not having material removed without recourse." Sen. Rep. No. 105-190 at 21 (1998).

Universal suggests that copyright owners may lose the ability to respond rapidly to potential infringements if they are required to evaluate fair use prior to issuing takedown notices. Universal also points out that the question of whether a particular use of copyrighted material constitutes fair use is a fact-intensive inquiry, and that it is difficult for copyright owners to predict whether a court eventually may rule in their favor. However, while these concerns are understandable, their actual impact likely is overstated. Although there may be cases in which such considerations will arise, there are likely to be few in which a copyright owner's determination that a particular use is not fair use will meet the requisite standard of subjective bad faith required to prevail in an action for misrepresentation under 17 U.S.C. § 512(f).

Read more about it at "Fair Use Gets a Fair Shake: YouTube Tot to Get Day in Court," "Judge Rules That Content Owners Must Consider Fair Use before Sending Takedowns," "More (and More) Good News for Fair Use," and "Woman Can Sue over YouTube Clip De-Posting."