Tefko Saracevic 1

Diversity in digital libraries

Related types, institutions, forms

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ToC

Note on diversity

Examples of: National libraries Academic libraries Public libraries Borne digital libraries Museums

Subject resources Societies, organizations Books on the Web Archiving the Web Conclusions

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Diversity?

Digital libraries come not only from libraries (academic, public, national …), but from many other institutions & subjects not at all connected with a given library (academic, public, national …)

Many shapes, forms Variety of context & content

many specific subject oriented Most importantly: Used by a variety of users &

for a variety of uses

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But are they DLibs?

Question could be asked: but are they ALL digital libraries? Or are they just portals because they cover and

organize digital resources?• when is a portal (links, ecatalog) also a digital library?

A broad view: if they are organized & used for accessing information resources why not consider them DLibs? users do not care what they are called or how are

they classified

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National libraries - US

Library of Congress:

American Memory Projecthistorical materials –no. of sites

Of course, there is a LoC Blog

Digital Libraries Federation not a national library, but took

over from LoC many functions of the National Digital Library that was at LoC

National Library of Medicine

National Agricultural Library

National Archives

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National libraries - global

The European Library Search through resources of

European National Libraries

Europeana“cultural collections of Europe”

Die Deutsche Bibliothek

Bibliothèque Nationale de Franceincludes Gallica – digital library

The British Library includes Turning the Pages

Vatican Libraryincludes Vatican Secret Archives

National Library of New Zealandseveral demonstration collections in

various fields

free DLib software they developed

The National Library of China

National Library of Singapore

Bibliotheca Alexandrina (Egypt) – not a national library, but close

Biblioteca National (Mexico)

African Online Digital Library – international undertaking, work in progress

National & University Library – Croatia

includes Digital Heritage

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Academic libraries

California Digital Library

unifies all libraries in UofC system

Univ of Michigan

Harvard Univ Librarysystem of over 80 libraries;

open access to digital collections

Univ of Utahalso houses Ski Archive

University of Wisconsin Digital Collections

Cambridge University Libraryincludes Open Access movement

Oxford University,

also houses Bodleian Library

with unique historical collections

browse further through LibWeb

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Public libraries

US:

New York Public Librarymany research collections; branch

libraries; includes Digital Gallery

Albuquerque/Bernalillo County Library System

including KidClicks

Montclair Public Library including link to Listen NJ

Los Angeles Public Library – e.g. check databases available, photocollection or TeenWeb

International:Toronto Public Library

including Virtual Reference Library

Aarhus Public Libraries (Denmark)

City of Swan Libraries (Australia)

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Borne digital

Libraries emerging only on the Web

Virtual Library Switzerland, US, UK & other

countries – ‘oldest virtual library on the Web’

Internet Public Library hosted at Drexel - merged with Librarians' Internet Index (LII).

 Academic Info Digital Librarymany links to digital collections

& resources in various subjects

IbiblioU North Carolina“the largest "collections of

collections" on the Internet”“Public’s library and digital archive”

International Children's Digital Library

among others, read children books in great many languages

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Museums

Museum of online museums a delight

The State Hermitage MuseumOne of the greatest museums in the

world, and one of the best museum site – developed with IBM help –take a virtual tour

National Museum of Science and Technology Leonardo da Vinci

MuseumStuff.com“We have 1000's of museums, zoos,

historical societies and related organizations in our database”

Muzej Grada SplitaA number of collections

Arheoloski Muzej Zadar

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Subject resources

Many subject specific sites available new coming up all the time rich & often unique coverage & services different approaches & requirements should they also be considered as DLibs?

High use in their own subjects or for given tasks Most are independent of libraries

many developed with government funding some clearly commercial

Many lead to other subject resources

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subject resources …

Humanities Perseus Digital Library Tufts

University covers antiquity to renaissance; one

of the best subject sites on the web; affected the whole field

KIRKE - Katalog der Internetressourcen für die Klassische Philologie aus Berlin

German; a variety of resources for classics

DiotimaMaterials for study of women and gender in

the Ancient World

Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophya comprehensive encyclopedia and

library

Abraham Lincoln Historic Digitization Project

And of course…at Cornell

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subject resources…

Government, official

U Mich Document Center official documents from all over

the world

US State Department about the U.S & other countries

FirstGovthe US government official web

portal

Dag Hammarskjöld Library (UN)

NewsNew York Times article archive

1851 – present

Newspaper Archive

“the largest historical newspaper database online, contains tens of millions of newspaper pages from 1753 to present.” Requires paid membership

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subject resources …

Health WebMDHealth news, medical informationRxlist

Internet Drug Index

Mayo Clinic HealthOasis health advice

Kidshealthsites for parents, kids, teens

ScienceArXiv Cornell U, National Science

Foundation

e-print service in the fields of physics, mathematics, computer science, quantitative biology

Ocean Planet NASApresentation of earth & its vast

oceans

Public Library of Science advocacy of open access

Encyclopedia of Lifean ambitious project – key info about

life on earth – in progress

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subject resources …

Moving Images Collections“MIC documents moving image collections

around the world.” Part particularly oriented toward science educators. Now at Library of Congress, but developed at Rutgers

And, of course …Snoopy

The Official Peanuts Website

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Societies, organizations

Many societies, agencies developed their sites great many rich sources for

searching & resources differences in requirements,

depth, richness major (sometimes only)

access point to societal or subject literature

Societal pages, but available through RUL (Indexes and databases)

PsycINFO (psychological literature from the 1800s to the present)

Am Psychology Assoc

ASIST Digital Library American Society for Information

Science & Technology

ACM Portal – Digital Library Association for Computing

Machinery

MLA International Bibliography Modern Language Association

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Books on the Web

Million Book Project digitizing books and providing free

access

Digital books Index“ ... provides links to more than

165,000 full-text digital books from more than 1800 commercial and non-commercial publishers, universities, and various private sites. More than 140,000 of these books, texts, and documents are available free.”

includes list of eBooks: Libraries, Librarianship, Electronic Librarianship

Google Booksstarted with several universities,

but mushroomed globally

Project Gutenberg

“Project Gutenberg is the first and largest single collection of free electronic books, or eBooks.”

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Archiving the Web

Web sites are highly unstable – they disappear, change one of the worst feature of

the Web “digital dark ages”

Several projects try to archive the Web mammoth undertaking

Internet Archive 85 billion Web pages archived

Includes: Wayback Machine

on Internet Archive search for old versions of Web pages

CyberCemetery “permanent public access to the Web

sites and publications of defunct U.S. government agencies and commissions.”

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Conclusion

Wide and constantly increasing diversity of DLibs & related collection & portals suggests several issues traditional libraries are not traditional any more

• but come in many DLib forms

many new “players” have entered the arena• particularly in subject areas

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conclusions …

Web companies & libraries are joining hands in book digitization e.g. Google project in providing cataloging & holdings information

Some libraries are providing model DLibs e.g. LoC American Memory – example copied widely

But at the end most important is their usefulness

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… a few more fun examples

Smithsonian 1996 campaign Web sites“how presidential candidates

and parties first used the Web.”

ASIST SIG/CON archivemaintained by Candy Schwartz,

Simmons College

you can see her Digital Libraries – course resources

Humorous phases of funny facesfrom LoC – a 1906 film

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