[This is also going out to DLF-ANNOUNCE, so my apologies if some of you
get two copies.]
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THE JISC DIGITAL CURATION CENTRE
Two weeks ago I attended an informational (and packed) "town meeting" on
a British proposal to create a Digital Curation Centre there, funded
initially for three years by JISC and the UK's e-Science Core Programme.
The official presentations and a transcript of the following discussion
are now available at the following address, and my thanks to Neil
Beagrie for doing this:
http://www.jisc.ac.uk/digcentre_townmeeting.html
What follows below are my impressions from this meeting, and from
various side conversations I had while there, as a supplement to the
material on the JISC site. I think there is a good potential for DLF
institutions and initiative groups to work in partnership with the
Digital Curation Centre.
David
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Meeting notes and observations
David Seaman
The goal of the DCC is to create an internationally-significant research
programme into data curation, with initial funding of one million pounds
a year for three years, with the expectation of further support. The
funding combines support from JISC with support from the e-Science Core
Programme (the latter organization now has data curation as one of its
six main areas of focus). Both agencies recognize that there has been a
much greater investment in data creation than in data curation, and are
responding to that imbalance.
DCC may take the form of a single centre at a single lead institution,
with other partners, or a more evenly distributed virtual centre (I got
the impression that the former is more likely), and the nature of the
government funding allows involvement of the private sector but is not
predicated on it.
DCC builds on work done in previous UK initiatives, such as CEDARS
(http://www.leeds.ac.uk/cedars/), CAMILEON
(http://129.11.152.25/CAMiLEON/dh/ep5.html), and PRONOM
(http://www.pro.gov.uk/about/preservation/digital/pronom/default.htm).
DCC will be expected to cover:
1) new research in digital curation (about a third of the effort)
2) file format information
3) tools, testbeds and certification
4) advisory and outreach services -- a clearinghouse function; an
awareness-raising function; and promotion of good practices.
There is an expectation that OAIS minimum criteria will be underlying
its recommendations, and they expect strong links with other relevant
initiatives and organizations (including the DLF).
DCC will engage with both "born digital" and "born-again digital"
material but it is not itself creating data -- it is a research and
development center; DCC is not itself saving data in a data store, nor
building a national preservation infrastructure; instead, it is
informing these endeavors, which take place elsewhere.
Finally, much was said about the deliberate choice to aim this at the
curation of resources, which includes preservation but is not limited to
it; DCC is expected to concentrate on a range of stewardship and data
lifecycle management needs from creation to preservation (how do you
build "preservation-friendly" data in the first place, for example),
with data re-use and continuous access as crucial concepts.
David Seaman
Executive Director, Digital Library Federation
1755 Massachusetts Ave., NW, Suite 500
Washington, DC 20036
tel: 202-939-4762
fax: 202-939-4765
e-mail: [log in to unmask]
web: http://www.diglib.org/
David Seaman
Executive Director, Digital Library Federation
1755 Massachusetts Ave., NW, Suite 500
Washington, DC 20036
tel: 202-939-4762
fax: 202-939-4765
e-mail: [log in to unmask]
web: http://www.diglib.org/
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