eca 2014 navarete

Measuring benefits of digital open archives

Trilce Navarrete

ECA | BCN | 2014

Motivation

• Archives serve for memory | accountability

• Universal right to information | past | future

• Digital distribution can exponentially increase access

• Technology and user behavior continue to change

• Digital access | use metrics are being developed

The Netherlands

• How much has been digitized?

• ENUMERATE 2013:

• (via DEN)

Sectors merge online

The Netherlands

• Dissemination of collections archives

The Netherlands

• Dissemination of collections

The user

• What do we know of the user?

The Amsterdam City Archive

• Online visitors: 400% increase in 10+ years


• Buyers: 65% man | 35% woman | 9% Amsterdam


• Income from weekly scan sales


• Workflow: digitization of 15,000 objects per week (1.5 million per year)

• Low-resolution and limited metadata

• Annual budget of ca. €200,000 (of which ca. €130,000 is paid for by consumers)

• Selection is made with an information policy and by digitization on demand.

• Collection information (11m scans online) is fully available (on-site for free).


• Onsite visitors have not decreased

• In 2013:

• 22,455 orders (963 users)

• 11,430 paid orders (329 users)

• 823,020 scans viewed (50% extern IP address)

• 900,000 website visits (300,000 image bank)

Other models

• “Many users might not be able to express information needs for a cultural heritage artifact in a query” Stiller, 2012.

• Institutions have explored alternative distribution channels (social media | portals | wikipedia)

• What is the impact?

The Wikipedia archive

• LABS wikimedia foundation tools

Opening up the archives

• Heritage content contains jewels that need to be ‘found’ | repositioned

• Content developed by the crowd reinforces the long tail effect (few images used often)

• Wikipedian in residence may serve to increase content pool |access new materials

• New business models are required to reflect the digital society

Future research

• New methods to measure access | use

• Data set collection | availability | analysis

• Value proposition based on social impact

• Long-term efforts on a global net | geographic and financial implications

Thank you !

• [email protected]

• @trilcenavarrete

mailto:[email protected]

eca 2014 navarete

Education