A Better Alexandria

In “Toward a New Alexandria: Imagining the Future of Libraries” (The New Republic), Lisbet Rausing writes:

Imagine a new Library of Alexandria. Imagine an archive that contains all the natural and social sciences of the West—our source-critical, referenced, peer-reviewed data—as well as the cultural and literary heritage of the world's civilizations, and many of the world’s most significant archives and specialist collections. Imagine that this library is electronic and in the public domain: sustainable, stable, linked, and searchable through universal semantic catalogue standards. Imagine that it has open source-ware, allowing legacy digital resources and new digital knowledge to be integrated in real time. Imagine that its Second Web capabilities allowed universal researches of the bibliome.  

Well, why not imagine this library?

Read and dream on. From the concluding section:

The obstacles to a true and electronic Reformation are real, but perhaps also caused by the continuation of “business as usual,” perhaps ultimately founded in the mental difficult [sic] that older folk have imaginatively re-drawing work practices, as well as organizational and legal “silos.” Remember Henry Ford’s comment: “If I had asked my customers what they wanted, they would have asked for a better horse carriage.”

Libraries and Obituaries

From Whitman

In her review of Marilyn Johnson’s This Book Is Overdue: How Librarians and Cybrarians Can Save Us All, Pagan Kennedy links librarians and obituary writers:

They are people who struggle to bring the dead back to life. Johnson’s characters desperately care about half-forgotten brawlers, freedom fighters and canine celebrities. They are the guardians of all there is to know. It doesn’t matter whether they carry on their efforts in analog or digital format. For they are waging the holy battle to resurrect the entire world, over and over again, in its entirety—keeping every last tidbit safe and acid free.

This reminded me of something from John Milton’s Areopagitica:

books are not absolutely dead things, but do contain a potency of life in them to be as active as that soul was whose progeny they are; nay, they do preserve as in a vial the purest efficacy and extraction of that living intellect that bred them. I know they are as lively, and as vigorously productive, as those fabulous dragon's teeth; and being sown up and down, may chance to spring up armed men. And yet, on the other hand, unless wariness be used, as good almost kill a man as kill a good book. Who kills a man kills a reasonable creature, God's image; but he who destroys a good book, kills reason itself, kills the image of God, as it were in the eye. Many a man lives a burden to the earth; but a good book is the precious life-blood of a master spirit, embalmed and treasured up on purpose to a life beyond life.

Preservation Brought to You by …

In “Magazines Team Up to Tout 'Power of Print',” the Wall Street Journal reports on a multimillion-dollar campaign to boost magazine print advertising:

The ads press the case that magazines remain an effective advertising medium in the age of the Internet because of the depth and lasting quality of print, compared with the ephemeral nature of much of the Web's content.

"The Internet is fleeting. Magazines are immersive," says one ad.

Digital Documentation and Disappearance

Via AHA Today, two interesting pieces about the digital record:

The first, about the Center for History and New Media, which aims to build participatory “archives of the future,” argues that “collecting history online floats in a world between the uneditable, didactic Web 1.0 and the completely open and editable Web 2.0, leaving us with a place we are calling, ‘Web 1.5.’” (Note, however, that collection is not preservation.)

The second, “Digital Disappearance,” discusses a range of issues related to “unpublishing” and the impermanence of the things we access online.

From Institutional Repository to Personal Workspace

The University of Rochester has transformed its IR into an IR+, “a virtual workspace for academics,” which offers a suite of online tools to support the creation, presentation, and preservation of digital materials.  

In other IR news, JISC has created a guide that:

contains information on a broad range of topics running from the initial idea of a digital repository and the planning process, via detailed sections on repository set up and promotion, through to the maintenance and ongoing management of the repository. The main focus is on institutional repositories and the kit reflects current repository community best practice.

Sustainable Economics for Digital Preservation

The final report from the Blue Ribbon Task Force on Sustainable Digital Preservation and Access, “Sustainable Economics for a Digital Planet: Ensuring Long-term Access to Digital Information,” is available online.

From the executive summary:

Economic analysis of digital preservation of these materials [of long-term public interest] reveals structural challenges that affect all digital preservation strategies: (1) long time horizons, (2) diffused stakeholders, (3) misaligned or weak incentives, and (4) lack of clarity about roles and responsibilities among stakeholders. These risks, once identified, can be anticipated and provided for throughout the digital lifecycle. Major findings can be summarized as three imperatives for sustainable digital preservation (1).

The three imperatives are:

1. Articulate a compelling value proposition (“make the case for use”).
2. Provide clear incentives to preserve in the public interest.
3. Define roles and responsibilities among stakeholders to ensure an ongoing and efficient flow of resources to preservation throughout the digital lifecycle.

Things to Do in a Library

From our student paper: “Things to Do in a Library.” Suggestions include studying, sleeping, streaking, and reading:

The library is an especially convenient place to get books from because, well, it’s right there. And it’s a place where most people would be going anyway. So in a way, the library promotes the reading of books by making books easily accessible.

To learn more about our wonderful library and students, see this.

Image: Students working in the archives research room this morning.