This presentation was provided by Evan Simpson of Brandeis University, during the NISO event "Collaborative Library Resource Sharing: Standards, Developments, and New Models for Cooperating," held October 7 - October 8, 2008.

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Thursday, October 9, 2008
Digitization, The Boston Library
Consortium, and the
Open Content Alliance -
A New Approach to Resource Sharing
Evan Simpson
Assistant Director for Public Services
Brandeis University Library and Technology Services
October 7, 2008
NISO Resource Sharing Forum
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Current information landscape
»“The Internets”…
-Unnamed family member
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Internets-inspired changes
» Big containers of information: Google;
WorldCat; Amazon; etc.
» More information to discover
» New user expectations
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Print
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> Digital
http://www.archive.org/details/nouvellesannales00parr
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But continuing use of print…
»“In History at least, we are still
very much a book-based
community of scholars and
scholarship. We like our books.
We seek them out.”
--Brandeis Faculty member

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Our response
» Recognize the trend toward information
seeking in big buckets rather than smaller ones
» Work with vendors to develop new systems that
address this trend and meet new expectations:
Federated Search; direct consortial borrowing
systems; systems like Ex Libris’ Primo; others
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Current Resource Sharing
Landscape
» Users seeking information in big containers, not
only local, smaller ones
» Information more discoverable+more
information resources discovered=more volume
for resource sharing/ILL
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More volume, new questions
» Can we “lend” the requested article from that
ejournal?
» Do we need to ship them that book, or is it
available electronically?
» Do we need to request that book, or is it
available electronically?
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We’re still about delivering print…
» People still want books!
» We’re really good at getting them and
delivering them
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Resource sharing technologies
» Toolbars, OpenURL apps, and others=resource
sharing technologies
» OpenURL: the ability for a user to submit a
request for something without really typing
anything fuels resource sharing
» They facilitate discovery and present access
options--access is sometimes via resource
sharing services such as ILL.
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Systems
» ILL/resource sharing systems built around
OCLC bibliographic data; access to OCLC
allows for matching a request to potential
lenders
» Finding potential lenders is predicated on
records present in OCLC, and accurate records
at that, so that you aren’t requesting the score,
but the sound recording; not the article from the
ejournal but from the print journal; not the
ebook in NetLibrary but the physical book you
know you can borrow/they can lend.

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Ranganathan…
»“Save the time of the reader.”
--Ranganathan
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BLC=Boston Library Consortium
Founded in 1970
Goal is to advance the research and learning of its
constituency
The BLC
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Who is the BLC?
Amherst College
Boston College
Boston Public Library
Boston University
Brandeis University
Brown University
MIT
MBLWHOI
Northeastern University
State Library of MA
Tufts University
Wellesley College
Williams College
University of MA
Amherst
Boston
Dartmouth
Lowell
Worcester
University of Connecticut
University of New Hampshire
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ILL/RS developments
» Long history of sharing both human and
information resources
» Teams and Task Forces
• Increase member participation
» Patron Initiated ILL
• SirsiDynix’s URSA (only 13 can participate)
» Rapid Delivery-books and journal content
• UPS
• RapidILL
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Digitization?
» Could digitization help us share materials?
» Could it provide the access that was
needed/wanted?
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Questions, questions…
» What to digitize?
• Co-ordinate collections or not
» Where to digitize?
• Locally or outsource
» The Money?
• Grant or self fund

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Moving forward
» Discussions held with IA
» BPL committed space
» Business Plan Reviewed
» Straw Poll at BLC Board ‘07 Retreat
» IA Scanning Team meeting in August
gave Collection Heads/IT staff opportunity to
meet and discuss the project
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Funding
» BLC given $$ target
» Initial proposal to dedicate 1% of collection
budgets failed
» Libraries would contribute what they
wanted/could afford
» Fund drive ran over summer ‘07
» BLC members surpassed the goal by 2x
• Additional monies contributed since project’s
inception
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A note on funding…
BLC made front page of NY Times:
“Libraries Shun Deals to Place Books on Web”
BLC’s role as the first large scale consortium to
self fund a digitization project
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IA/OCA to the rescue
» IA Mission: Universal Access to Human
Knowledge
» OCA Purpose: Book content and metadata
(out-of-copyright & public domain) are scanned
and made openly available for access and
reuse by individuals and organizations
» IA scanning experience:
• 2006- Production
• 2007- 8 sites; 5 M pgs or 12-15K bks/mo
• 2008- 13 sites; 10M pgs or 25K bks/mo
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IA scanning centers
» Scanning
• LA and San Francisco
• Univ. of Toronto
• Boston Public Library
• New York Public
• Library of Congress
» Fiche Scanning
• Univ. of Alberta
» Film Scanning
• Univ. of New Brunswick
Satellite Scanning
–UNC
–NC State
–Johns Hopkins
–Getty (LA)
–Smithsonian
–UIUC
–Guatemala
–London
–Nat’l Lib. of Scotland
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Open Content Alliance
» Free to read, view, listen, download, share
» Free to crawl, index, provide navigation
services (metadata fully exposed)
» Rehosting at discretion of contributor
» Corpus open for research and computation

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Scan on Demand
Happening in two ways: via OpenLibrary or locally
driven…
» Via OpenLibrary: Libraries contribute holdings to
OpenLibrary; user discovers record for public
domain work, requests access; request routed to
holding library participating in OCA project (i.e. has
access to scanning center); sends item for
digitization; user receives notification of availability
» Boston Public Library test site
• Other BLC members to follow? 26
Scan on demand
Locally driven scan on demand:
» Libraries add functionality to ILL system or
workflows to filter/catch lending requests for
items in the public domain
» Items are retrieved and sent to BPL scanning
center, digitized, and the requesting library
supplied with a URL
» No due dates, no renewals, no returns, no lost
mail…unlimited access for unlimited seats.
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Direct impact on users
» Circulating and non-circulating materials made
available to the desk-top
» Increased use of “hidden collections”
• Allows patrons to use materials whenever,
wherever!
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The challenge of discovery
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Silos abandoned
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BLC silos
» Digitized resources from BLC library collections
are not discoverable in any single interface or
system--archive.org does not provide an easy
way to see BLC books (or others!)
• archive.org not compliant with federated search
systems--cannot add to our federated search
platform; no GoogleBook-like API either
» BLC: No standards or best practices yet in
place for creation of records for digitized items
or contribution of said records in centralized
discovery systems

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Impact on resource sharing
» Silos make it hard for users: they want to find
stuff--but where to go for what?
• The result is requests for items that may already
have been digitized
» Silos make it hard for resource sharing: is this
book available digitally? They want it--where
do WE go to find it?
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What to do?
» So what about digitized items? How are
resource sharing shops in the BLC (and
beyond) who rely on the systems that connect
to OCLC finding digitized items?
» Highlights why consistency is important: some
BLC libs adding a URL to the 856 field of the
marc record; others creating separate
records…
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Our value
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Save the time of the reader
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Develop new services
» Develop new services that seek to save the
time of the reader
• Scan on demand
• Different delivery methods
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Adjust priorities and workflows
» Adjust priorities and workflows around the goal
of saving the time of our readers--and in light of
the amount of information/resources available
digitally
• Borrowing: take the time to set up filters that
help us identify requests for items that are
potentially available digitally
• Lending: same!

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Advocate for standards
» Advocate for best practices/standards within
our consortia and in other arenas that establish
consistencies and define the best containers to
contribute records to for each group--best for
users and resource sharing practitioners
» Advocate for technical standards that will glue
the silos together!
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IA today
» Mass scanning
• 2008- 10M pgs or 25K bks/mo
» Fold outs
• Top down scanner w/digital scanners
merged back into book
» Microforms?
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