I'm heading to Boston tomorrow to visit the folks at Ex Libris for some training. Speaking of work travel, that reminds me that I've gotten the go-ahead to attend the
3rd International Conference on Digital Curation with my boss and another colleague.
I will share my conference notes, but perhaps not in raw form.
ALA Midwinter will be the next work travel after dcc-2007. Beyond that, I don't want to think that far ahead.
If you're in the Boston area and want to meet up for a cuppa joe (or better yet, a nice tasty microbrow), give me a holler. Same applies for those of you in D.C. in December.
Labels: data curation, dcc-2007, digital preservation, metadata
I've finally had a chance to read the current issue of
D-Lib. If you're involved in science, engineering, or technology librarianship you should NOT miss
Anna Gold's two part article on Cyberinfrastructure, Data, and Libraries (full disclosure: Anna was my boss when we both worked at
UCSD's Science and Engineering Library).
Anna gives the best summary of the evolution of eScience/Cyberinfrastructure that I've read. Her bibliography alone is worth the price of admission. Even better, she describes the unique position of academic libraries amongst Cyberinfrastructure stakeholders and provides excellent advice on the new skills librarians should master if they hope to play a role in this emerging area.
This is key. I've often spoken to high level managers in science libraries who think that librarians do not have a role to play in the cyberinfrastructure and that data curation is best done by domain experts. Anna makes the point that "domain expertise may also be needed to provide credible expert help with data management problems or tools." It is indeed true that librarians aren't equipped to deal with peta scale storage and high performance computing. It is also true, however, that librarians are highly experienced with the assessment and selection functions inherent in developing "collections," developing standards and building communities of practice, applying metadata, preservation, managing licensing and access rights, and developing discovery services. Librarians know how to help people re-purpose information for multi and interdisciplinary use. Anna also suggests that library funding models may assist in the ongoing quest for a workable business model for data curation since libraries are accustomed to getting money from a variety of sources.
Go read this. Do not pass go. Do not collect $200.
Labels: cyberinfrastructure, data curation, digital preservation, eScience, metadata, scholarly communication
Announced today by Cheri Folkner, CC:DA chair
I am happy to announce that Patty Hatch has agreed to serve as CC:DA's webmaster through ALA Annual 2010. Patty received her MLS from Simmons College and currently works as an educational technology & communications Specialist at Harvard. Previously she was a senior training librarian in Harvard University Library's Office for Information Systems.
Patty will be working with Christine Taylor of the ALCTS office in transitioning the CC:DA website from Penn State to ALA hosted servers once ALA is ready to host the web pages -- that may be after Midwinter rather than this fall. I am sure that Patty will keep us updated on the timetable and progress of the transition. I have also appointed Patty to CC:DA's TF on internal/external communication.
Although John Attig will be doing some webmaster duties until the transition is complete, my hope is that the transition will ease the workload for him so he won't have to be worrying about the CC:DA website while performing his ALA rep responsibilities. John's work as CC:DA webmaster has been tremendous -- CC:DA is in his debt.
Congratulations Patty! I look forward to working with you via the CC:DA Task Force on Internal and External Communication
Labels: CC:DA, metadata
I finally have had the opportunity to use
MarcEdit (btw, recently updated to v.5.1!). The mission? Convert EAD to a collection level MARC and import to the ILS. 'Twas relatively simple and pain free.
I've spent a lot of time learning new-to-me things this past summer -- Palm OS, Mac OS and all the FOSSy software I've installed on it. In comparison, MarcEdit has wonderful ease-of-use and self-explanatoriness. Thanks Terry Reese!
Labels: EAD, MARC, MarcEdit, metadata
