New York Public Library Invites a Deep Digital Dive; New York Times, 1/6/16

Jennifer Schuessler, New York Times; New York Public Library Invites a Deep Digital Dive:

"But the game is what you might call a marketing teaser for a major redistribution of property, digitally speaking: the release of more than 180,000 photographs, postcards, maps and other public-domain items from the library’s special collections in downloadable high-resolution files — along with an invitation to users to grab them and do with them whatever they please.

Digitization has been all the rage over the past decade, as libraries, museums and other institutions have scanned millions of items and posted them online. But the library’s initiative (nypl.org/publicdomain), which goes live on Wednesday, goes beyond the practical questions of how and what to digitize to the deeper one of what happens next...

A growing number of institutions have been rallying under the banner of “open content.” While the library’s new initiative represents one of the largest releases of visually rich material since the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam began making more than 200,000 works available in high-quality scans free of charge in 2012, it’s notable for more than its size.

“It’s not just a data dump,” said Dan Cohen, the executive director of the Digital Public Library of America, a consortium that offers one-stop access to digitized holdings from more than 1,300 institutions.

The New York Public has “really been thinking about how they can get others to use this material,” Mr. Cohen continued. “It’s a next step that I would like to see more institutions take.”

Most items in the public-domain release have already been visible at the library’s digital collections portal. The difference is that the highest-quality files will now be available for free and immediate download, along with the programming interfaces, known as APIs, that allow developers to use them more easily."

Building a Digital Public Library of America; Library Journal, 11/26/12

John Palfrey, Library Journal; Building a Digital Public Library of America: "...how can the DPLA provide access to knowledge in a digital era, given the restrictions of the copyright act and the related constraints of contract law and digital rights management technology? The law is often seen as a constraint to the work of libraries today. In the digital era, many librarians feel that they cannot carry out their mission under the current legal regime. The DPLA as an institution will always respect copyright interests, but it also will take on the role of advocate for libraries in terms of making the most of what the law permits. Dedicated volunteers, many of them top experts in their respective fields, have spent hundreds of hours in meetings talking about each of these questions, among others, and coming up with initial answers to inform the project’s launch. The answers to these big questions, and many others, will be addressed in part through the April, 2013 launch of the DPLA initiative. Each of these essential questions will also be the topic of a future column here in Library Journal in the months to come."

Podcast [2 hours, 3 minutes], Robert Darnton and Susan Flannery: "Digitizing the Culture of Print: The Digital Public Library of America and Other Urgent Projects", 11/2/12

Podcast [2 hours, 3 minutes], Robert Darnton and Susan Flannery: "Digitizing the Culture of Print: The Digital Public Library of America and Other Urgent Projects" : ""The role of the library in the digital age is one of the compelling questions of our era. How are libraries coping with the promise and perils of our impending digital future? What urgent initiatives are underway to assure universal access to our print inheritance and to the digital communication forms of the future? How is the very idea of the library changing? These and related questions will engage our distinguished panelists, who represent both research and public libraries and two of whom serve on the steering committee for the Digital Public Library of America. Robert Darnton is Carl H. Pforzheimer University Professor at Harvard, Director of the Harvard University Library and one of America's most distinguished historians. He serves on the steering committee of the Digital Public Library of America and has been a trustee of the New York Public Library since 1995. In a recent essay in the New York Review of Books, Darnton defended a NYPL plan to liquidate some branches in the system while renovating the main Fifth Avenue branch. The essay sparked a number of responses. In November of last year, Darnton provided a status report on the DPLA. Darnton is the author of many influential books including The Case for Books, Past, Present, and Future and The Great Cat Massacre. Susan Flannery is director of libraries for the City of Cambridge and past president of the Massachusetts Library Association."

Reforming Copyright Is Possible; Chronicle of Higher Education, 7/9/12

Pamela Samuelson, Chronicle of Higher Education; Reforming Copyright Is Possible:

"The failure of the Google Book settlement, however, has not killed the dream of a comprehensive digital library accessible to the public. Indeed, it has inspired an alternative that would avoid the risks of monopoly control. A coalition of nonprofit libraries, archives, and universities has formed to create a Digital Public Library of America, which is scheduled to launch its services in April 2013. The San Francisco Public Library recently sponsored a second major planning session for the DPLA, which drew 400 participants. Major foundations, as well as private donors, are providing financial support. The DPLA aims to be a portal through which the public can access vast stores of knowledge online. Free, forever."

From Shelves to Internet: America's Digital Library Takes Shape; Live Science, 5/27/11

Jeremy Hsu, Live Science; From Shelves to Internet: America's Digital Library Takes Shape:

"Palfrey and the library steering committee must also consider how to secure copyright permissions for lending digital materials not in the public domain, so that future library users can enjoy some of the latest best-selling books or Hollywood blockbusters."