Highlighting the history of scientific thought with the Royal Society of London's Trailblazing

The Royal Society of London has a new Web site called Trailblazing that contains 350 years of digitized content from its Proceedings. To mark is 350th anniversary, the Royal Society is also providing free access to the Royal Society Digital Journal Archive from November 23, 02009 to February 28, 02010.

Reading Tree, books for charity, a Canadian literacy initiative

Reading Tree is a Canadian literacy initiative that collects books for charitable purposes and places them in schools and libraries across British Columbia. This is a great way to preserve books, though they will of course eventually get worn out.

Points of View 19th century photography exhibit, British Library, October 02009-March 02010

The British Library opened a free physical and online exhibit on October 30, 02009 titled "Points of View: Capturing the 19th Century in Photographs." If you register for a free account with the Online Gallery at the British Library you can comment on the photographs and select your favorites. The library will choose the best comments for display in the physical gallery (I wasn't quite clear about exactly where this would happen). A blog for the exhibit that links the past with the present is also available.

OSS Watch, Open Source Software Advisory Service for the UK academic community

OSS Watch, which sounds like the title of a World War II B-movie, is managed through the UK's University of Oxford and is an open source software advisory service whose audience is actually more than just the UK academic community. The service features all kinds of useful information for software developers and others in the IT (information technology) community. Good stuff made possible in large part through funding from JISC, the Joint Information Systems Committee.

The OSS Watch Wiki is here.

The OSS Watch Twitter feed is at http://twitter.com/osswatch.

A number of OSS Watch RSS feeds are also available.

Library and Archives Canada adds digitized microform content

The Library and Archives Canada has started adding digitized microform content (numérisation de microforme) to its Web site. The only way to access the digitized microform is by title. The online experience replicates what you would experience viewing the film in person on microform equipment. Microform refers to microfiche (plastic sheets) or microfilm (plastic rolls on a spool or reel). If you've used their digitized "Black" and "Red" Series of RG-10, Indian Affairs records, or the digitized Canadian census records then you've already experienced the use of digitized microfilm. Curiously, as of November 26, 02009, the day of this post, they only have two sets of records listed and have not included the census records or the digitized RG-10 records.

Archives of Ontario (Canada) RFI for Trusted Digital Repository - Repository of Archival Digital Records

The Archives of Ontario (Canada) has issued a Request for Information (RFI) for Trusted Digital Repository - Repository of Archival Digital Records.

The purposes of this RFI are to:

- Gather information about the availability of Long Term Digital Preservation solutions (such as a Trusted Digital Repository) that might meet our requirements;
- Identify potential suppliers;
- Gain knowledge about suppliers’ capabilities in the design, development, implementation and maintenance of a Trusted Digital Repository;
- Assist in the determination of future purchasing options or requirements.

This RFI is not a solicitation for tenders or proposals. No contract or other form of commitment will be entered into with any vendor based on responses to the RFI. This RFI shall not constitute an authorization by the Government of Ontario to vendors to undertake any work that would result in any obligation, cost or liability to the Government of Ontario.

For full details of this Request for Information please find the link to MERX.

http://www.merx.com/English/SUPPLIER_Menu.asp?WCE=Show&TAB=1&PORTAL=MERX&State=7&searchtype=pubhome&id=186236&src=osr&FED_ONLY=0&ACTION=&rowcount=&lastpage=&hcode=jFg5GoWIgyT9U0p%2b2Y%2fWPg%3d%3d

Source: DIGITAL-PRESERVATION@JISCMAIL.AC.UK (02009 11 18)

Release of Web Curator Tool (WCT) version 1.5

From the announcement on DIGITAL-PRESERVATION@JISCMAIL.AC.UK (02009 11 19) about version 1.5 of the Web Curator Tool 1.5, the fourth major update:

Key enhancements include the optional integration of Wayback as an additional quality review tool and the simplification of system configuration using properties files. This release also contains a small number of additional enhancements and bug fixes. ...

This release was commissioned by the British Library and developed during July and August of 2009 by software developers from Oakleigh Consulting in the UK. ....

Version 1.5 of the Web Curator Tool is now available for download on Sourceforge: http://webcurator.sourceforge.net/.

AC+erm Project looking for your help with its literature review

Update for 02010 02 18:

The AC+erm Project is looking for your help to "mass peer-review" a subset of its literature review on electronic records management. According to the posting on several mailing lists on 02010 02 18,

If you are willing to share your knowledge and expertise, you can do so by downloading a Word document from our website, completing the response fields, and returning it by email to eb.acerm@northumbria.ac.uk. The document contains the full list of 104 articles along with brief descriptions of the cases and can be found at http://www.northumbria.ac.uk/sd/academic/ceis/re/isrc/themes/rmarea/erm/slr/

Original post, 02009 11 18:

Here is some news about the AC+erm Project (Accelerating Positive Change in Electronic records Management) as posted to the ARCAN-L mailing list (02009 11 18):

1. Third AC+erm Colloquium

This event was held on 24 September [02009] in Edinburgh, and focused on the Systems and Technology facet of ERM.

The outputs from the colloquium consist of versions of the initial documents presented to the delegates, adapted to include their collated notes and responses together with notes taken by the project team. During the workshop, delegates also developed their ideas graphically using tools developed in the course of the project; the outputs include images of these items.

The slides accompanying the project team's presentations are also provided.

http://www.northumbria.ac.uk/sd/academic/ceis/re/isrc/themes/rmarea/erm/diss/coll_diss/coll3_diss/

2. List of resources relevant to electronic recordkeeping and management

We have overhauled our annotated compilation of websites and documents relating to various aspects of electronic recordkeeping.
http://www.northumbria.ac.uk/sd/academic/ceis/re/isrc/themes/rmarea/erm/diss/resources/

The list includes official, professional and commercial institutions and organisations; publishers of journals and books in our disciplines, and various individual items such as articles, reports and similar documentary materials. We have checked existing links and repaired them where necessary. The updated version also includes prominent individual blogs.
http://www.northumbria.ac.uk/static/5007/ceispdf/resourcelist_2009_11.pdf

The online resources from the list have been added to the AC+erm custom Google search engine, which is intended to improve the relevance of search results by focusing only on records-related websites.
http://www.google.com/cse/home?cx=013466523144167055048:kyttraq2tw4&hl=en

Quick links to the online sources are now available through a set of Sqworl groups - links are grouped according to the same categories as used in the main list.
http://sqworl.com/u.php?user=2047

For more details, visit the web pages given above or visit the Project blog at http://acerm.blogspot.com/.

The AC+erm Project is also on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/Northumbria_RM

dpBestflow launched November 11, 02009

From the front page of dpBestflow.org, the new site for photographers on "Digital Photography Best Practices and Workflow":

The American Society of Media Photographers (ASMP) has announced that dpBestflow, the initiative funded by the Library of Congress through its National Digital Information Infrastructure and Preservation Program, will be launched on November 11th [02009] at the Navy Memorial Auditorium in Washington, D.C. as part of FotoweekDC.

Archivematica, the open archival information system for digital preservation

Update for 02009 11 17:

I easily downloaded and installed the Sun Virtual Box that's required to run Archivematica. Getting the zipped Archivematica file proved to be more challenging as it took three tries before I was able to successfully download the file. The instructions on the Archivematica site are clear and precise. Installation went smoothly and I was able to run the "virtual appliance" that is Archivematica. It's kind of cool to have Ubuntu Linux running virtually within Windows. I'll be following this project as it will likely be an extremely important tool in years to come. My congratulations to the developers for all they've accomplished to date and in such a short time frame.

Archivematica, the open archival information system for digital preservation, is another innovative software application from Artefactual Systems, the creators of the Qubit Toolkit, ICA-AtoM and the Canadiana.org Digital Collection Builder.

According to the front page of the Archivematica site,

"The objective of this project is to integrate a number of open source tools and applications to create a comprehensive digital archives system that is compliant with the ISO-OAIS standard and other digital preservation standards and best practices. ... This project is managed by Artefactual Systems in collaboration with the City of Vancouver Archives, UNESCO Memory of the World Subcommittee on Technology and a number of other client partners.

This project is in early stages of development. We expect to begin making more public announcements about the project technology and methodology by mid 2010."

Canadiana.org Digital Collection Builder software

The Canadiana.org Digital Collection Builder, created by Artefactual Systems and based on its Qubit Toolkit information management software, is available. Qubit is the software that powers ICA-AtoM, the archival description system software, and ICA-AtoM is what powers MemoryBC, the BC Archival Information Network, which will be officially launched the week of November 16, 02009 as part of British Columbia's Archives Week celebration.

November/December 02009 issue of D-Lib Magazine has hit the phosphor pavement

The November/December 02009 issue of D-Lib Magazine is out. Here are the articles:

"Beyond 1923: Characteristics of Potentially In-copyright Print Books in Library Collections" by Brian Lavoie and Lorcan Dempsey, OCLC Online Computer Library Center

"Service-Oriented Models for Educational Resource Federations" by Daniel R. Rehak, LSAL; and Nick Nicholas and Nigel Ward, Link Affiliates, Australia

"From TIFF to JPEG 2000? Preservation Planning at the Bavarian State Library Using a Collection of Digitized 16th Century Printings" by Hannes Kulovits and Andreas Rauber, Vienna University of Technology; and Anna Kugler, Markus Brantl, Tobias Beinert, Astrid Schoger, Bavarian State Library

"A Low Cost, Low Memory Footprint, SQL and Servlet-based Solution for Searching Archived Images and Documents in Digital Collections" by Cristina Tofan and Daniel Tofan, Eastern Kentucky University

"Measuring Citation Advantages of Open Accessibility" by Samson C. Soong, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology

"The Importance of Digital Libraries in Joint Educational Programmes: A Case Study of a Master of Science Programme Involving Organizations in Ghana and the Netherlands" by Marga Koelen, International Institute for Geo-Information Science and Earth Observation; and Jonathan Arthur Quaye-Ballard, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology

This is a test of the new Twitter 10KYearBlog feed

Yup, in case you didn't notice the widget in the sidebar, The Ten Thousand Year Blog is on Twitter as http://www.twitter.com/10KYearBlog. Essentially, posts made to my WordPress.com version get posted on Twitter. Carpe tweeti!

Chain, chain, chain, the new CHAIN of digital humanities organizations

An important announcement about a new meta-organization of digital humanities organizations, the Coalition of Humanities and Arts Infrastructures and Networks or CHAIN (via DIGITAL-PRESERVATION@JISCMAIL.AC.UK, 02009 11 12):

A meeting was held at King's College, London, on 26th and 27th October 2009, between representatives of the following networks, infrastructure projects, and planning initiatives working with digital technologies in the Arts and
Humanities:

• arts-humanities.net (http://www.arts-humanities.net/)



• ADHO - Association of Digital Humanities Organisations (http://www.digitalhumanities.org/)




• CLARIN (http://www.clarin.eu/)



• centerNet (http://www.digitalhumanities.org/centernet/)



• DARIAH (http://www.dariah.eu/)



• NoC - Network of Expert Centres in Great Britain and Ireland (http://www.arts-humanities.net/noc/)



• Project Bamboo (http://projectbamboo.org/)



• TextGrid (http://www.textgrid.de/)

We identified the current fragmented environment where researchers operate in separate areas with often mutually incompatible technologies as a barrier to fully exploiting the transformative role that these technologies can potentially play. We resolved that our present, proposed, and future activities are interdependent and complementary and should be oriented towards working together to overcome barriers, and to create a shared environment where technology services can interoperate and be sustained, thus enabling new forms of research in the Humanities.

In order to achieve these goals we agreed to form the Coalition of Humanities and Arts Infrastructures and Networks – CHAIN. CHAIN will act as a forum forareas of shared interest to its participants, including:

• advocacy for an improved digital research infrastructure for the Humanities;



• development of sustainable business models;



• promotion of technical interoperability of resources, tools and services;



• promotion of good practice and relevant technical standards;



• development of a shared service infrastructure;



• coordinating approaches to legal and ethical issues;



• interactions with other relevant computing infrastructure initiatives;



• widening the geographical scope of our coalition.

CHAIN will promote an open culture where experiences, including successes and failures, can be shared and discussed, in order to support and promote the use of digital technologies in research in the Humanities.

Digitization Activities planning document from the U.S. Federal Agencies Digitization Guidelines Initiative

The U.S. Federal Agencies Digitization Guidelines Initiative's Still Image Working Group has released a new planning document: Digitization Activities: Project Planning and Management Outline. FADGI was established in 2007 and consists of two working groups: "The Federal Agencies Still Image Digitization Working Group will concentrate its efforts on image content such as books, manuscripts, maps, and photographic prints and negatives. The Federal Agencies Audio-Visual Working Group is focusing its work on sound, video, and motion picture film."

Programmable Web, get your APIs and Mashups here

Programmable Web is a terrific resource for APIs and mashups. You'll even find contests here. Many of these APIs and mashups involving mapping applications. Among the newest players in this growing field is the mobile device company Nokia which is bringing out an open API platform called Ovi. The Ovi for Developers site has a lot of great information and tools.

Notes on Photographs wiki from George Eastman House

Notes on Photographs, George Eastman House, is a wiki that was launched in June 02009 and according to the About page "was begun as the Photograph Connoisseurship Resource by Luisa Casella during her 4th cycle fellowship in the Advanced Residency Program in Photograph Conservation at George Eastman House from 2005-2007."

CACAO Project offers some sweet spots for cross-language searches

The European Union's CACAO Project, a two-year project that started in December 02007 and ends in November 02009, developed a cross-language search and retrieval platform so Europeans could search for digital content and bibliographic citations in any EU language and see the results in the language of their search. Three subject portals for public access were also created: Geography, History of Europe and Mathematics. The European Library will adopt the CACAO infrastructure.

Archive of American Television (EmmyTVLegends.org)

Back in August 02009 my local newspaper reported on a story from the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences about a new Web site it was launching on September 1, 02009 at the URL TVlegends.org that "will have more than 2,000 hours of interviews, some of them more than three hours long, with luminaries like Burnaby-raised Michael J. Fox and Montreal native William Shatner." Today I went looking for this site only to discover it doesn't exist and the URL is likely EmmyTVLegends.org, otherwise known as the Archive of American Televison. The Web site indeed states that "The Archive has collected hundreds of in-depth video interviews with TV's greatest legends and pioneers -- now available worldwide. The interviews can be watched all the way through, or browsed by person, show, topic or profession. Enjoy the site and be sure to visit often -- new interviews and indexes are added regularly." For anyone in cultural studies this site has to be a dream come true. Congratulations to the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences Foundation for making this terrific resource freely available.

ECA 2010: 8th European Conference on Digital Archiving, April 02010

The 8th European Conference on Digital Archiving, abbreviated as ECA 2010, will be held in Geneva between April 28 and 30, 02010. Online registration for the conference is open. One of the speakers at the closing session is Charles Leadbeater, currently known for his book on ideasourcing called We-Think: Mass Innovation, Not Mass Production: The Power of Mass Creativity (02008).

1,000 Year Web Page

The 1,000 Year Web Page looks like a fascinating plan, but, as with any private enterprise on the Internet, it's buyer beware. This is the ultimate in online vanity publishing and at $59 it does seem too good to be true for 1,000 years, especially since the best longevity plan the two men behind the scheme could come up with was a cadre of volunteers. Currently, the company is accepting page reservations only at a cost of $10. Disclosure: I offered to provide them with a critique for a fee of their plan and technical infrastructure but they declined.

Openness and the Future of Higher Education: special issue of IRRODL

The International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning published a special issue on Openness and the Future of Higher Education (vol. 10, no. 5, 2009).