Transcript Survey on aggregation, WP3 - University College London

Survey of Research Libraries on
Aggregation of Digital Content
Kathy Sadler, UCL
Plenary Board Meeting
Bratislava, 8 May 2010
Purpose of the survey
Designed in association with LIBER to serve 3 purposes:
Provide a snapshot of aggregation activity and attitudes across Europe
Help inform development and sustainability of the EuropeanaTravel aggregator
Help inform the strategies of LIBER and Europeana
12 questions covering these topical areas:
Aggregation activity at country level
Europeana-feeding aggregators : Participation and Expectations
Perceived aggregation needs
Attitudes towards paying for aggregation services
Aggregation at country level
Survey emailed to all LIBER members and results reported December 2009
Report deliverable available from Outcomes area of EuropeanaTravel website
39 responses from 25 countries
62% academic and university libraries
38% national, regional libraries or represent national bodies
22 countries described at national level
14 described countries have a national cultural or cross-domain aggregator
5 countries are aggregating research or journals
Material based aggregations eg multimedia, manuscripts
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Respondents
Participation in existing aggregation services
Already contribute
Could contribute
12
10
8
6
4
2
0
Missing Aggregators
12 respondents suggested aggregators not supplied in the list on the survey
17 aggregators named
•
5 are national aggregators for country of origin
Several scientific and research aggregators named
•
DRIVER and DART-EUROPE suggested several times
•
Influence of research libraries amongst respondents
•
Potential interest in Europeana expanding its cultural heritage remit
Reasons for non contribution to aggregation services
5; 5%
13; 13%
8; 8%
We are already considering joining /
negotiating to join
We were not aware of the aggregator in
question
7; 7%
We have decided not to join
Technical reasons / lack of technical
resources
Lack of other resources
29; 27%
19; 19%
Policy decision
Copyright issues
Other issues
6; 6%
15; 15%
Reasons for non contribution (cont/d)
Interest in Europeana from beyond its existing partners
An academic library said:
“Europeana (all flavours): We tried badly to contact them in order to provide our OAI
data but nothing happened”.
A library outside the EU said:
“We understood that this was only open to participants within the framework of a EU
funded project that Swiss institutions could not join. If this is not the case, we would be
interested.”
Decision not to contribute is often a policy decision
Someone else may be responsible for feeding the aggregator
Alternative routes may be preferred (eg TEL, other aggregators)
What do you see as the main benefits
of participation in aggregation for your institution?
11; 13%
Broader access
17; 21%
Building internal skills
Engagement with Europe
7; 9%
Enhanced value of collection
Increased usage
1; 1%
Material benefits
4; 5%
5; 6%
New services for user base
Partnerships, collaboration and sharing
3; 4%
Prestige
Promotion
7; 9%
5; 6%
Quality of search portal
Strategic development
5; 6%
6; 7%
2; 2%
5; 6%
4; 5%
Trust and stakeholding in the aggregator
Visibility (both materials and institution)
If you participate in any aggregators, what additional or
improved outcomes would your institution like to see?
3; 10%
Linguistic enhancements
2; 6%
Search enhancements
10; 32%
Extended aggregation
2; 6%
Extended content
Europeana-specific improvements
3; 10%
Addressing copyright and IPR issues
Harvesting from smaller institutions
3; 10%
5; 16%
3; 10%
Other
Which of the potential benefits of Europeana
are most attractive to you?
Cross-domain coverage
9; 6%
21; 13%
17; 11%
International exposure for your collections
Multilingual search
6; 4%
31; 20%
Bringing together digital content in different
formats
New distribution channel for your content, gains
more traffic
17; 11%
Effective promotion of the content by Europeana
Ability to get back enriched metadata e.g. with
language knowledge in metadata
20; 13%
19; 12%
16; 10%
Ability to give access to other resources to your
users
Ability to make use, via a webservice, of content
from others in your own portal
Proposals for New Aggregations
16 suggestions made by 10 respondents
Most common theme is Research
• Content from academic and research libraries (eg cultural material)
• Research activity, research data and published results
• Aggregation from existing portals eg DART-Europe
New Europe-wide aggregations proposed in these areas:
• Art
• History of technology
• Social sciences/humanities
Existing aggregations suggested to channel into Europeana:
• Manuscripts
• Early printed books
Would your institution be willing in principle to pay
to participate in aggregation services?
Only 1 respondent gave unqualified “yes”
8; 21%
11 gave an unqualified “No”
Yes
12; 31%
YES
NO
RESPONSE
6 already pay TEL, CERL or other memberships
and don’t want to pay again
5 agree in principle - but not much or not in
No
present economic circumstances
NO
Benefits must be demonstrated in advance
(increased traffic or resource savings)
No response
Digitisation is costly in itself
19; 48%
OAI is “open” and thus aggregation should be free
If you are interested in the development of new aggregation services,
how would you envisage that their development
and sustained running would be funded?
1; 1%
8; 9%
Our institution would contribute to
the funding
15; 17%
4; 5%
The aggregator’s portal should
display advertisements
Private sponsorship
13; 15%
National government funding
EU funding opportunities
Funding from Europeana
25; 28%
Other
22; 25%
Conclusion
• Wide interest in aggregation in general across Europe
• Respondents appreciate the benefits of wider exposure
• Enthusiasm for Europeana and its related projects
• Many potential contributors of digital content
• Several ideas for new aggregations
• Research is a common theme
• Respondents are generally unwilling to pay to support
aggregators
Thank you
Any questions?
[email protected]
Thank you!
Any questions?
[email protected]