cfl mc cadden 10 18_2012dam

Digital Asset Management:

Lessons Learned

10/18/2012

Maureen McCadden

Digital Resource Specialist

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DAM

What?

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What is DAM?

Digital Asset Management consists of management tasks

and decisions surrounding the ingestion, annotation,

cataloguing, storage, retrieval and distribution of digital

assets.

Digital asset management systems (DAMS) include

computer software and hardware systems that aid in the

process of digital asset management.

The term "digital asset management" also refers to the

protocol for downloading, renaming, backing up, rating,

grouping, archiving, optimizing, maintaining, thinning, and

exporting files.

- Wikipedia

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DAM

Is simply the effective management and distribution of digital assets

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DAM is not: a temporary fix

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DAM is: a product – financed and managed like any other

Service in the organization. Images are information!

What kind of files?

Photos

Audio files

Video files

Course materials

Publications

Spreadsheets

Etc!

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Assets

Are anything your

organization says they are

– whatever your

organization wants to

preserve and make

accessible

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DAM

Why?

DAM is a positive step in the right

direction to gaining operational and

intellectual control of digital assets.

But…….. Why?

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Spike, Herb, & Nate

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Focus: Solving problems – NOT software features

Question should be: “HOW does your DAM do….”

NOT “Can your DAM do…”

DAMs

Improve efficiency

Increase brand/voice

consistency

Provide customer service

Save $$, Save time, Make life easier!

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DAM

How?

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Uphill Climb?

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Plan, Plan, Plan

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Process12 Person Cross-Departmental Team

Needs Analysis

Define Functional Requirements

Resulted in 5 questions for each team member:

What images do you currently have?

How do you use these images?

How do you manage these images?

What can you currently do with these images?

What would you like to be able to do with these

images?

Answers became project goals, then functional

requirements of our RFP (request for proposals)

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Repurposed our functional requirements, using them to

develop a yes/no criteria for evaluating systems.

The real evaluation question becomes:

How well does this system serve its intended purpose?

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DAM

Now

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DAM

Future

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Lessons Learned

#1 Stakeholder needs to define the

project goals. Project goals define the

technology

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Lessons Learned

#2 Ease of use promotes a blend of

centralized and de-centralized system

management

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Real Goal: Enthusiastic Users

Garden Party 1915©Longwood Gardens

ResourcesAsset Bank: http://www.assetbank.co.uk/

Journal of Digital Asset Management:

http://www.palgrave-

journals.com/dam/journal/v6/n6/index.html

OS (open source) DAM solutions (2012):

Review of Available Open Source DAM Software

by Naresh Sarwan

http://www.opensourcedigitalassetmanagement.org/review

s/available-open-source-dam/

DamNews 10 Common myths about OS software:

http://digitalassetmanagementnews.org/features/10-

common-myths-about-open-source-software/

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Resources

Horodyski, J. (2009): Digital Asset Management: What To

Know Before You Go!

http://digitalassetmanagement.com/dam-white-papers-

thank-you/

Digital Library Federation:

http://www.diglib.org/

A useful vendors list here:

http://digitalassetmanagementnews.org/dam-vendors/

Nielsen, (2005) Ten Usability Heuristics

http://www.useit.com/papers/heuristic/heuristic_list.html

NEDC (2000) Handbook for Digital Projects: A

Management Tool for Preservation and Access.

Http://www.nedcc.org/resources/digitalhandbook/dman.pdf

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Resources

VRA – Visual Resources Association:

http://www.vraweb.org/

DAM Educational Resource Site:

http://digitalassetmanagement.com/

DRM – Digital Rights Management, from ALA:

http://www.ala.org/advocacy/copyright/digitalrights

ALA Definitions of Digital Preservation:

http://www.ala.org/alcts/resources/preserv/defdigpres0408

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Questions?

Contact:

Maureen McCadden

Digital Resource Specialist

Longwood Gardens

610.388.5266

mmccadden@longwoodgardens.org

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Copyright © 2012 Longwood Gardens All rights ReservedNo part of this presentation may be used without the expressed written permission of Longwood Gardens