BHL update for the Council on Botanical and Horticultural Libraries annual meeting

1. Growing the
BHL
BHL Collections Coordinator
Bianca Crowley
April 2014
CBHL

2. http://biodiversitylibrary.org

3. Consortium Participants
• Academy of Natural Sciences
• American Museum of Natural History
• California Academy of Sciences Library
• Cornell University Library
• Ernst Mayr Library of the Museum of Comparative Zoology
• e Field Museum
• Harvard University Botany Libraries
• Library of Congress
• Marine Biological Laboratory and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Library
• Missouri Botanical Garden Library
• National Library Board (Singapore)
• Natural History Museum, LA County
• Natural History Museum, London
• e New York Botanical Garden
• Royal Botanic Garden, Kew
• Smithsonian Libraries
• University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
• United States Geological Survey Libraries
• Washington University of St. Louis

4. Growing organization
• Vision : Inspiring discovery through free
access to biodiversity knowledge.
• Mission :The Biodiversity Heritage Library
works collaboratively to make biodiversity
literature openly available to the world as part
of a global biodiversity community.

5. Growing organization: Goals
1. Relevant Content : Build and maintain the BHL as the largest reliable,
reputable, and responsive repository of biodiversity literature and archival
materials.
2. Tools and Services : Develop services and tools which facilitate
discovery and improve research efficiency of BHL content.
3. User Engagement : Increase global awareness about the BHL through
outreach, learning and education, and branding through engagement and
collaboration with existing and new user communities.
4. Membership and Partnerships : Grow BHL consortia membership
and partnerships while fostering cross-institutional collaboration that
continues to serve as a model for digital library development.
5. Financial Sustainability : Ensure sustainability and relevance by being
flexible, adaptable, and financially sound while the content and services
remain openly and freely available.

6. Growing consortium
• 4 New “Gardeners”
– Washington University Library (St. Louis, MO)
– National Library Board Singapore
– Los Angeles County Museum of Natural History
Research Library
– University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign,
University Library

7. Growing consortium
• BHL Central “Tract”
– 16 institutions in the United States
– 2 institutions in the United Kingdom
– 1 institution in Singapore
– Verses global “plots” elsewhere in Africa,Australia,
Brazil, China, Egypt, Europe

8. New Membership Structure
Members
• $10K annual dues
• Guide BHL decision making
• Funding for digitization
• Access to specialized software
and technical support
• Opportunities to participate in
technical development
• Collaborative fund-raising
opportunities
• Possible travel support
• Achieving economy of scale
for access to, and storage of,
digital collections in a safe
repository
Affiliates
• No annual dues
• Participation in an active,
award-winning collaborative
program that is making
biodiversity literature freely
available to the world
• Opportunity to provide advice
about the growth and
development of the BHL
Program
• Discounts on service fees for
content ingest, access and
technical assistance

9. Growing Collections
• 76,000+ titles
• 137,000+ volumes
• 43 million+ pages!

10. BHL, BHL…
How does your garden grow?
• Digi$za$on
:
BHL
consor+um
libraries
send
books
to
the
Internet
Archive
for
scanning
• Aggrega$on
:
Harves+ng
non-­‐BHL
consor+um
materials
from
Internet
Archive
corpus
based
on
criteria
of
subject
headings
and
call
numbers
• Aggrega$on
Experiment
:
indexing
metadata
for
content
available
on
external
websites
=
3rd
party
links

11. 3rd Party Links

13. ©
Copyright
Status
Status
language
License
Permissions
(1923
in-­‐copyright
pubs)
In
copyright.
Digi+zed
with
the
permission
of
the
rights
holder.
Crea+ve
Commons
AOribu+on,
Non-­‐Commercial,
Share-­‐Alike
(CC-­‐BY-­‐NC-­‐SA
Due
Diligence
(1923-­‐77
US
pubs)
No
known
copyright
restric+ons
as
determined
by
scanning
ins+tu+on.
NA
Public
Domain
(pre-­‐1923)
Public
domain.
The
BHL
considers
that
this
work
is
no
longer
under
copyright
protec+on.
NA

14. Growing Website: en

15. Growing Website: Now

16. Pruning, Weeding, De-bugging
General
feedback
form
Scan
request
form
http://biodiversitylibrary.org/contact

17. Issue Tracking System

18. Sowing for the future
• “Macaw” software for loading content scanned
outside our standard workflow
• Full Text Search!
• Innovative projects:
– Purposeful Gaming
– Art of Life
– Biodiversity Library Exhibitions
– Digging into Data
– Field notebooks

19. Questions?
Thank you!
crowleyb@si.edu

20. • Open access
• Open data
• Deliver content where users are already
working
– Via other biodiversity websites & taxonomic
resources
– Via social media
• Involve users in collection &
technical development
…not just another silo

23. Issue Tracking
Software
Vols.
6,
8,
10
Vols.
1-­‐5
Vols.
7,
9,
11-­‐21
Communicate & Document Regularly

24. Standard Digitization Workflow

25. Sowing for the future: “Macaw”
Metadata Collection and Workflow System