5 Things Thursday: Special Collections, Elvis, NYPL, ROI

Here are five great things:

1. Before there were rules about patron confidentiality, Elvis autographed this library card to check out a book.


2. Read this paper on the rising importance of Special Collections (my favorite!).


3. Are you aware that Hack Library School compiled an entire useful e-book?


4. Thank goodness, NYPL rethinks its redesign. Read about it here.


5. Extensis has developed an ROI calculator for DAM. It really is worth it...

5 Things Thursday: Australia, Metadata for Mom, Libraries

Here are your five things:

1. Do you want your mom to understand metadata? Have her read this!


2. How are modern libraries branching out? Check out this NPR story.


3. Are you interested in Aboriginal culture? Well, the world's largest collection will soon be online.


4. Here are 32 great free webinars for librarians being offered in September. Lots of information on the affordable care act, fall books, homelessness, embedded librarianship, etc.


5. Need some resources to demonstrate the value of libraries? Stephen Abram has compiled quite a list.

5 Things Thursday: Taxonomy, Helper Apps, Vocab

Here are five things:

1. Take this survey on your favorite DAM helper app. Mine is Adobe Lightroom. We use it for all color correction, keywords and rating prior to uploading to DAM.


2. I have always wanted to attend Taxonomy Boot Camp in D.C., but my project budget will not allow for it. Perhaps yours will. You will enjoy such noteworthy speakers as Gary Carlson, Seth Earley, Heather Hedden and Bram Wessel.


3. The Chattanooga Public Library is an innovator, "striking a balance between analog and digital platforms [which] can be a difficult task in today's information age" Thanks, Gordon Belt!


4. Here is a great post on creating taxonomies and thesauri from that pesky natural language. Library systems and search have largely been reliant on users ability to post-coordinate terms while using the catalog. This is even more difficult in terms of finding the correct way to state it. Taking a lesson from e-tail, enabling findability is a constant challenge, but trends drive vocabulary (like the unfortunate jegging fashion adventure - jeans and leggings) - the same holds true of library collections.


5. Can museums use DAM systems to manage their collections? Check out this post.

5 Things Thursday: DPLA, DAM, Archives

In honor of my 450th post, here are five things plus for your enjoyment:

1. Check out all the super cool content accumulating on DPLA. I especially like the explore options (by map, by timeline) and also collections like the ski archives from Mountain West Digital Library.


2. Can a DAM system be both functional and beautiful? In my opinion, this is the next level of evolution for DAM - read what CMS Wire has to say on the subject.


3. Have you been searching for personal digital archiving resources? Your search is over thanks to the Backblog.


4. Read this piece on linked data and name matching. Interesting points about epithets, special characters, mismatches, etc.


5. Do you want to learn more about the WorldCat API? Here's a workshop for you coming up next week.

BONUS: Get a cool metadata sticker for your notebook, skateboard or car.

5 Things Thursday: MOOC, DAM, Digital Preservation

Here are five things I find interesting:

1. What is a MOOC? A massive open online course, of course. Read about the New Librarianship MOOC here on Hack Library School. I think I want to take this course immediately.


2. How can DAM interact with social media platforms? DAMNEWS examines the perils and benefits of employing DAM features to integrate with social media.


3. Does your library need more cool promotional tools for free? Check out what ProQuest has compiled for you in this Public Library Toolkit.


4. Here are some digital preservation resources - a Business Case Toolkit as well as some in-depth analysis of current digital preservation policies.


5. Preparing for banned books week September 22-28? Here are some resources from ALA as well as a quick list on Wikipedia.

Finally, an image of a librarian on the telephone from the Multnomah County Library's digital collections. Groovy eyeglasses...

CONTENTdm Conference Summary - #CONTENTdm @SPLBuzz @OCLC

I was fortunate to attend some of the CONTENTdm User Group conference held at The Seattle Public Library this week. Here are some summaries and links to resources from the presentations I found interesting. I think the presentations will eventually be linked to the website for the event, but in the meantime, I wanted to share my notes.

CONTENTdm is digital collection management software used by many libraries and institutions to allow access to digital collections.

Keynote Speaker - Stephanie Chase, SPL Director of Library Programs and Services

The main event kicked off with an inspiring presentation by Stephanie Chase of The Seattle Public Library. With experience everywhere from NYPL to the Multnomah County Library system in Oregon, Stephanie had many ideas to share regarding user experience in a time of information parity versus scarcity. An interview with Ms. Chase can be found here. There is also a paper called Digital Isn't Working (Yet) which brings up many relevant points.

Stephanie spoke a lot about the fact that libraries and institutions can have all this cool stuff, digitized or not, but if users do not know how to find it or even that it exists, it is not useful. When serendipity (i.e. a patron doing research) causes an intersection with something the library owns or has online, they meet an exact need. However, taking cues from the advertising industry to promote the items can be key.

Stephanie also quoted one of my favorite librarians turned UX gurus, Aaron Schmidt (weareinflux.com/ux), to talk about how a site or experience needs to be useful, usable and desirable. Creating that experience digitally and in the physical library requires a talent for connecting people with information with a human element, an enthusiasm for the material and asking what experience can users have regardless of format? All in all, some very intriguing points.

The presentation also used this example from Google Analytics UK of a poor guy trying to find skim milk in a store. Think about this next time you think about your website.

Automated or Nothing: Large Textual Projects in CONTENTdm, Utah State Archives

The Utah State Archives digitized an enormous amount of content in a short time with few staff resources. Gina Strack gave an overview and shared some helpful hints on tools she uses to automate parts of the digitization and metadata processes.

From using Microsoft Access to create tab delimited files and demonstrating how the container list plus the digitization data can be integrated to form the final collection metadata on giant compound objects, Ms. Strack highlighted several useful tools such as Quick File Rename.

In addition, there is a treasure trove of resources in the Best Practices section of the Utah State Digital Archives site on everything from building good digital collections to metadata and imaging guidelines.

Washington Rural Heritage: Collaborative Digitization in Washington State

Evan Robb of the Washington State Libraries talked about the Washington Rural Heritage project, a statewide collaborative digitization initiative. The feature of this presentation was an example of how the Sno-Isle Library System partnered with the South Whidbey Island Historical Society to get an invaluable local history resource digitized and accessible. Becky Bolte and Colleen Brazil, who I met at InfoCamp last year, got into the nuts and bolts of working on a unique collection in a collaboration with the historical society.

This was inspiring to me as I work with the Ballard Historical Society and something like this could help take collection access to a new level.

The project involved selection for scanning, descriptive information supplied by the experts at the historical society, confirmation of permissions for usage of materials, scanning, a Google form to collect metadata, and catalogers at Sno-Isle vetting the metadata, cleaning it up and making it into Dublin Core compliant values for ingestion into CONTENTdm.

Ultimately, photos and videos are displayed on this wonderful site. Some of the tools used or mentioned included Viewshare which is a free platform for customizing views of collection items and the resources found on the project page at the Olympic Peninsula Community Museum site.

From Boutique to Mass Digitization: Metadata Description Using Existing Finding Aids, Brigham Young University

Marisa Snyder and Becky McKown from BYU described some amazing efficiencies they created when converting finding aids to more useable interactive online records. From making the finding aids DACS compliant to using Archivists' Toolkit and prioritizing which collections to process based on patron driven input, their mode of mass digitization embodies More Product, Less Process in a big way.

Their team worked collaboratively with the collection curators to turn static finding aids into more easily searchable CONTENTdm items with links to the materials. You can see an example here as well as many more on the site for the collections.

5 Things: Get a Job, DAM, Subject Headings

Lots of great advice this week on landing a library job as well as other interesting material:

1. Best article I've seen on how to land a library job. While some of this advice applies to landing any job, this one does not shy away from subjects like competitiveness, flexibility in thought and location and finally, doing your research - you are a librarian after all!


2. That said, over on Hiring Librarians, there is an interview with a hiring manager on how to best present yourself.


3. LAC Group also features the top five skills required by the librarian of today (and tomorrow).  I heartily agree with digital preservation and information curation especially!


4. Can there truly be objectivity when applying subject headings? James Weinheimer puts in his two cents. I agree regarding consistency and that the end user (the searcher) is largely unaware of subject headings.


5. From the DAM Foundation, is your organization ready for total digitization?

BONUS FOR SEATTLE/PNW FOLKS: Registration is open for InfoCamp 2013!