Data curation

Abstract (ENG):
The lockdown and the serious COVID-19 pandemic have forced all of us to experience a new approach to everyday life as mediated by digital tools: often this extensive use of technology was brought about in a forced manner; in other cases, however, the opening of wider horizons towards digital content took place in a more natural way. These considerations apply not only to individuals but also to cultural institutions. The Internet has in fact turned into the alias of mankind that is forced, held back, but for this very reason even more eager for expansion, evasion, and knowledge. With this in mind, the "Viaggio intorno alla mia camera", Xavier de Maistre’s first work, can be used as a significant metaphor of what each of us has lived and is still experiencing, all projected into the digital dimension of the 21st century, from the now simplistic dimension of the online to the deeper pervasiveness of the infosphere, of onlife. All of us, in fact, are now used to quickly finding every type of service in digital form by applying the minimum effort but do not make the mistake of not considering the vast technical context in the background of the digital transformation in progress, underestimating the other side of this coin: in fact, specific implementation strategies, huge infrastructural investments (globally and locally), even more substantial financial resources, and highly qualified personnel are necessary to address the challenge to turn it into reality. So are digital assets really that obvious? Can ubiquitous access to them be considered so obvious?

The author considers the possibility of mastering the position
of a digital curator by a humanist. Digitalization of scholarship
and increasing in the volume of available data amend the protocol
of empirical research and change the modes of representation
for the outcome of investigation. It is possible that tomorrow
the author’s contribution to the production of knowledge will be
measured not only by a monologic writing, but also by curated
datasets, layouts and thematic collections. How can one remain
a researcher-humanitarian producing critical knowledge, being
sensitive to contexts and being capable of reflection in the process
of accompanying data? Since in the actual digital humanities
the conceptual language for data curation hasn’t developed, the
author asks this question to discourse of cultural content curating
in the Web, to e-science with its interest to long-life data curation
and to curatorial trend at the contemporary art.

“Who is the “curator”, that bizarre figure who has recently appeared in lots of articles dealing with the promotion of journalistic (or marketing) content? A curator is basically someone who takes an inordinate mass of material, and turns chaos into order, or in more recent slang, turns “noise into signal”. With the rise of social media platforms and the flood of atomized content coming from users, content curation now plays a central role in how news stories are created by newsrooms and then delivered to an audience.

Without giving up their traditional skills, journalists are becoming more and more information “managers”.  They are behaving like human filters which due to the absence of boundaries (i.e. space limitations, like television's airtime or newspapers’ pages) typical of the digital world, verify and add context to what user-generated content they think to be relevant, and feed it onto Web pages or mobile applications.

Thanks to the rise of new social media curation platforms, the same role can be played by independent professionals (whether journalists or amateurs), who are “independent storytellers”. They might be freelancers or amateurs, or they might be working for a news organization, although with such a level of independence and visibility to transform their job into a one-man-show.

This research shows that this increased participation has both its drawbacks and opportunities. For news organisations, one of the dangers is to assume that what you find and hear on social media is the real and only “voice of the crowd”, without taking the time to analyse in more depth other possible points of view. Resources are scarce and this could be a real temptation; but not everybody is on the Internet, especially in developing countries, and even if they are, it should not be taken for granted that they are willing to testify online what's happening in their surroundings.

As for independent storytellers, they could play a double role in the future: supplement, replace or somehow integrate the coverage done by mainstream media; or just take advantage of the new possibilities offered by curation tools just to transform them into propagandistic platforms. To strike a balance, to make use of user-generated content without “being used” by it, it's not an easy task.”

The concept of data curation has been a well-known term for scholarly communities. The understanding of data curation itself is necessary for research institutes that manage any kinds of research data set. Yet, research institutions have already set their plan and management to ensure that research data management is going well and supports the objectives of the institutions. For that reason, this paper was made to evaluate the research data cycle and management at several research institutions in Indonesia. The purpose of this paper was also to observe and to analyze how the standards and system have been used at research institutions and how they were effective. Also, it is essential to know how institutions find the term data curation and how it links to the management of research data and its implication to research data. This study used phenomenological method on data curation and how it would affect the performances of research data. The result showed that vital aspects were identified both from the informants and the previous studies. They were the appropriate curation model, data curation regulations, finding problems at the institutions and knowing supported technology, and system for data curation implementation.

This paper advocates the necessity of developing a pragmatic alternative to the dominant custodial theorization of digital curation as an "umbrella concept for digital preservation, data curation, electronic records, and digital asset management". Starting from a historical account and an examination of prevalent definitions, it points to the current dependence of digital curation on a prescriptive approach rooted in its cognate field of digital preservation, and aiming to serve the needs of professional stewardship. It demonstrates the disconnect of this theorization with the rich historical traditions of museum curatorship where the notion of curation originated, and its inability to act as a framework for understanding the diversity and pervasiveness of contemporary digital curation practices "in the wild" (such as content curation, personal archiving, and pro-am digitization), and its dependence on a "wild frontier" ideology dissonant with contemporary critical cultural heritage scholarship. The alternative, pragmatic approach proposed views digital curation as a "contact zone" practice, routinely performed by a broad range of actors including researchers, artists, users and communities, on dynamically evolving objects, domain knowledge representations and interactions, beyond the curation lifecycle prescribed for custodial environments. On this basis, it calls for a formal re-conceptualization of digital curation, adequate knowledge representation of its objects, evidence-based research on curation practices, and establishment of curation-enabled digital infrastructures suitable for curation in the continuum. Reaching beyond a custodial view, this approach aims to establish digital curation as a field of intellectual inquiry relevant to emerging pervasive curation practices in the digital environment.

In October of 2015, Johns Hopkins University ( JHU) Museum Studies Program convened a group of cultural heritage professionals to discuss digital curation, its integration into the art museum community, and the role the JHU Program in Digital Curation might play in this effort. Attendees included representatives from museums, libraries, archives, foundations, and the JHU Museum Studies Program.
The meeting took place over two days. The first day and a half included a series of short presentations that addressed innovative projects; infrastructure, staffing and workflows; digital curation tools; curatorial considerations; internships, residencies and research opportunities; and local and international collaborations. Each presentation served as a springboard for facilitated discussions where these issues were considered in greater depth. Breakout sessions on the last afternoon moved the discussions from conceptual to pragmatic. Participants met in small groups to discuss ways to increase awareness of digital curation in art museums; to identify what the key principles, roles, and responsibilities of digital curation internships in art museums should be; and to suggest innovative student/intern
research projects that would contribute to digital curation and advance a museum’s mission.
In the course of these activities, Summit participants discussed the definition of digital curation (and digital curator), how this field is evolving, and who might assume the roles and tasks of digital curation in art museums in the near future. The following definition of digital curation used by the JHU digital curation program was adopted for the purpose of Summit
discussions:
Digital curation is the planning and management of digital assets over their
lifetime, from conceptualization, through active use and presentation, to long-term preservation in a repository for future use.
Common themes that emerged during discussions included: 1) the different challenges digital curation poses for small, medium, and large museums, 2) the need to promote digital curation as a way to mitigate the risk of losing cultural heritage embodied in digital form, 3) the types of digital curation education and training needed in the museum community,
and 4) how digital curation can lead to changes in other areas of museum practice.
This report summarizes the Summit presentations, follow-up discussions, and the following suggestions for “next steps.”

This petition argues that erotic comics are an important cultural record of the way in which diverse sexualities are understood and portrayed, and sexual fantasies explored. An Erotic Comics Anglophone Archive (ErotiCAA) will preserve these works for research by scholars in many different disciplines.

One of the biggest problems facing anyone researching pornography/erotica or comics, and therefore doubly so for anyone researching erotic/pornographic comics, is finding and gaining access to primary materials. So we have decided to have a go at establishing an archive in the UK to collect and catalogue English-language porn and erotic comics.

We intend to approach a number of libraries and research institutions to host and/or fund the archive. Persuading them to support us will be a lot easier if we an show that there is a need for this archive, so to help with that we’ve started this petition.

We’ve already got this kick-ass logo designed for us by Alison Lucy Stone and meetings set up with a couple of big libraries. Help us out by signing the petition? And if you’d like to be more involved, please tweet Dr Anna Madill @UKFujoshi or Dr Jude Roberts @tangendentalism - we’d love to hear from you!

Fabio Cusimano
A 'cloud' full of digitized manuscripts. The Veneranda Biblioteca Ambrosiana, from the Custos Catalogi to the Data Curator.

Keywords (ENG.):
Veneranda Biblioteca Ambrosiana, digital library, digitization, cooperation, free access, 'cloud', data curation, International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF).

Abstract (ENG.):
Digital libraries and digitization projects have developed from their inception as a temporary phenomenon to become a real opportunity. Today the dissemination of knowledge can make use of new web-based technologies, while also benefiting from the improved quality of digital objects, more mature metadata standards, more capable retrieval technologies, etc. But the roots of libraries are older than the so-called digital revolution, as can be seen from the case of the Veneranda Biblioteca Ambrosiana in Milan. Since the first years of the 17th century, this prestigious conservation library has managed and curated a special and unique collection of precious manuscripts, and, now as then, it makes those masterpieces freely available for users from all over the world, both at its reading room and, today, through its new digital initiative. Many librarians (also known as custodes catalogi) have succeeded each other over the centuries, always pursuing preservation and conservation targets, and always enriching and curating the catalogs. Today we are still inspired by those masters of the past, but we are also engaged in making these precious sources available for an ever-increasing audience thanks to our new freely accessible digital library.

Focusing on North America and the United Kingdom, this critical literature review underscores the ways in which sharing, accessing, and reusing science data allow researchers and other stakeholders to address new imperatives in
scientific research. Science data stakeholders should harness the principles and
practices of digital curation, an overarching concept that encompasses data curation
and that centers on adding value to digital data assets. This review first probes data
sharing, access, and reuse in specific intellectual and institutional contexts. Next, it
examines the ways in which science data sharing, access, and reuse benefits
scholarship, primarily by encouraging new research questions and by allowing the
reproduction of previous findings. Third, it addresses the infrastructure of science
data curation, particularly the roles of cyberinfrastructure, research communities,
collaboration, planning, policy, and standards and best practices. Fourth, it turns to
the role of institutions—archives, research libraries, institutional repositories, and
centers—in curating science data. Archival principles such as provenance, selection
and appraisal, authenticity, metadata, risk management, and trust play a pivotal
role in digital curation. Finally, it delineates avenues for further research such as
sustainability, costing, planning and policy, training and education, researcher
practices, and raising awareness.

ENG:

THE DIGITAL LIBRARY OF THE AMBROSIANA CUTS THE GOAL OF 500 MANUSCRIPTS FREELY CONSULTABLE ONLINE

In these days, the milestone of 500 manuscripts fully digitized and freely accessible online by connecting to the site https://ambrosiana.comperio.it/library-digital, without any subscription or registration, has been reached.
Among the 500 specimens, are very ancient manuscripts of capital importance for the history of knowledge, as well as many beautifully decorated and illuminated manuscripts, for a total of over 287,000 images, equal to more than 13 terabytes.
Even in a complicated period, marked by the pandemic that is still in progress, work has not stopped; indeed, it has proved to be of great help to scholars: to date, in fact, over 23,000 users from all over the world have been able to consult the material in the Ambrosiana digital library.
Due to the lockdown and subsequent precautionary limitations that prevented the work from continuing in presence at the Ambrosiana digitization laboratory, the Data Curation activities on the collections of digital images created in the course of previous projects and the consequent growth of the digital collections has always been active and conducted remotely.
All the efforts undertaken in this sense were fundamental to achieving the goal of 500 fully digitized manuscripts: for this purpose the technical characteristics of the project itself played a key role, from the very first moment strongly aimed at the service to users; having joined (the first Italian library) the community of the International Image Interoperability Framework-IIIF, in fact, has allowed the digital library of the Ambrosiana to confirm itself as a flexible platform with agile consultation through different types of electronic devices: from computers desktops, laptops, up to mobile devices featuring small screens, such as smartphones and tablets.
In this way, the project continues to achieve its general objectives, that is, to enhance the main manuscript collections, in order to encourage their use and preservation, ad publicum commodum et utilitatem (“for public good and utility”), according to the expression of the founder of the Ambrosiana, the far-sighted cardinal Federico Borromeo.

ITA:
La Veneranda Biblioteca Ambrosiana è lieta di annunciare il raggiungimento del traguardo dei 500 manoscritti integralmente digitalizzati e liberamente fruibili online tramite la biblioteca digitale <https://ambrosiana.comperio.it/biblioteca-digitale/>.
Il 07/11/2019, data dell'inaugurazione e della presentazione ufficiale del progetto alla comunità internazionale degli studiosi, la collezione liberamente fruibile online comprendeva 341 manoscritti digitalizzati: ad oggi, dunque, l'incremento si attesta nell'ordine delle 159 nuove copie digitali integrali, per un totale complessivo di oltre 287.000 immagini digitali liberamente fruibili online, pari a oltre 13 terabyte.
In questa occasione giova ricordare che l'intero progetto di digitalizzazione dei manoscritti ambrosiani-compresa, dunque, la realizzazione e la gestione della complessa infrastruttura che rende possibile il funzionamento della biblioteca digitale-si basa sulla collaborazione tecnica e scientifica tra la Veneranda Biblioteca Ambrosiana, l'Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore di Milano e la University of Notre Dame (Indiana, USA).
Nonostante le notevoli difficoltà causate dalla pandemia ancora in corso, il progetto si è affermato quale utile strumento per gli studiosi: a tutt'oggi, infatti, ben oltre 23.000 utenti da tutto il mondo hanno fruito della biblioteca digitale dell'Ambrosiana. Quando, nel corso dei 17 mesi trascorsi dall'inaugurazione della biblioteca digitale, non è stato possibile proseguire con le attività di digitalizzazione presso il Laboratorio di digitalizzazione dell'Ambrosiana-a causa del lockdown e delle successive limitazioni precauzionali-le attività di Data Curation sulle collezioni di immagini digitali realizzate nel corso di precedenti progetti e la conseguente attività di accrescimento delle collezioni digitali è stata sempre attiva e condotta da remoto. Tutti gli sforzi intrapresi in tal senso sono stati fondamentali al raggiungimento del traguardo dei 500 manoscritti integralmente digitalizzati: a tal fine hanno giocato un ruolo-chiave anche le caratteristiche tecniche del progetto stesso, fin dal primo momento fortemente indirizzate al servizio verso gli utenti; l'aver aderito (prima biblioteca italiana) alla comunità internazionale dell'International Image Interoperability Framework-IIIF, infatti, ha consentito alla biblioteca digitale dell'Ambrosiana di confermarsi quale piattaforma flessibile e dall'agile consultazione attraverso tipologie diverse di dispositivi elettronici: dai computer desktop, ai computer portatili, fino ai dispositivi mobili caratterizzati dai piccoli schermi, quali gli smartphone e i tablet. Il tutto senza la necessità di sottoscrivere alcun abbonamento né di effetuare alcuna iscrizione al servizio.

In their seminal report, Our Cultural Commonwealth (2006), the American Council of Learned Societies underscored the need for scholars engaged in digital humanities work to leverage their access to data both to expand their audience to the general public and to generate new research questions. "Now is the Future Now?" argues that the progress made in digital humanities toward these goals has depended and will depend not only on digital data, but also on their appropriate curation. The article defines digital humanities, data, so­-called Big Data, and digital curation. Next it examines digital curation initiatives in the sciences and in the humanities that occurred before the release of Our Cultural Commonwealth. It then considers and evaluates the digital curation work undertaken in the sciences and in the humanities after the report’s publication. In theory and in practice digital curation has benefited substantially from practices developed and tested first in the natural sciences and
subsequently adapted for and extended in the humanities. Finally, the piece explores the future work necessary to facilitate symbiosis between digital curation and digital humanities. Collaboration and cooperation, transcending geographical, disciplinary, and institutional boundaries, data sharing, policies and planning, education and training, sustainability — all remain pressing issues.

Abstract (ITA):
Prendendo spunto dalle suggestive sensazioni che il celebre racconto breve La Biblioteca di Babele di Jorge Louis Borges evoca, propongo una riflessione sul rapporto tra "digitale" e "biblioteca analogica". Non si intende affatto sostenere in modo oltranzista la convinzione del "digitale" quale miracolosa panacea per le "biblioteche analogiche", bensì riflettere partendo dall'esperienza quotidiana frutto della creazione e della conseguente gestione a 360° di un complesso progetto di digitalizzazione: da questa applicazione concreta emerge una visione smitizzata del "digitale", che tende a porre in evidenza i punti a favore delle tecnologie digitali applicate affinché una biblioteca possa crescere in termini di accessibilità e fruizione libere. Dalle collezioni digitali chiuse, moderni silos tecnologici colmi di dati che rimandano ai silenti "esagoni" della Biblioteca di Babele borgesiana, incapace di comunicare e interconnettersi, alla crescita dell'accessibilità e dell'interoperabilità garantite dall'applicazione di moderni standard. Tutto questo, però, senza mai sottovalutare l'ineluttabile dualismo che le moderne tecnologie digitali portano seco: il rischio sempre presente della frammentazione, del labirinto senza uscita, dello "specchio" borgesiano che illude e confonde.

Abstract (ITA):
La massiccia proiezione di contenuti informativi nel mondo digitale e la sempre maggiore pervasività e ubiquità delle risorse web based sono fenomeni inarrestabili che obbligano a un’attenta riflessione sul ruolo che le biblioteche pubbliche e le biblioteche di conservazione giocano nel panorama culturale tradizionale; su come esse vengano percepite dall’utenza; su come esse vengano sollecitate dal mondo digitale e su come si adattino (o, quanto meno, tentino di farlo) al cambiamento verso tale dimensione.
Il concetto di biblioteca pubblica può certamente essere considerato come una delle innovazioni culturali più dirompenti dell’era moderna: tale innovazione ha segnato profondamente lo sviluppo della nostra società fino al giorno d’oggi, contribuendo a plasmarne la forma mentis e divenendo via via sempre più “trasparente” perché ormai considerato “normale”; molte sono, però, le insidie e le difficoltà che la nostra società, iper-connessa e bulimica nella spasmodica ricerca di contenuti accessibili in digitale, pone dinanzi alla biblioteca pubblica, ancor di più se ad essa corrisponde la particolare accezione della biblioteca di conservazione. La biblioteca pubblica e la biblioteca di conservazione, molto spesso facce di una stessa medaglia, anime di una medesima istituzione, si trovano dinanzi alla sfida della dimensione digitale.

Parole chiave (ITA):
Biblioteca pubblica; Biblioteca di conservazione; Utenza; Biblioteca digitale; Accesso libero; IIIF.

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Abstract (ENG):
The massive projection of information contents in the digital world and the ever-increasing pervasiveness and ubiquity of web-based resources are unstoppable phenomena that force a careful reflection on the role that public libraries and conservation libraries play in the traditional cultural scene; on how they are perceived by users; on how they are solicited by the digital world and how they adapt (or at least try to do so) to change towards this aspect.
The concept of public library can certainly be considered as one of the most disruptive cultural innovations of the modern era: this innovation has profoundly marked the development of our society up to the present day, helping to shape its forma mentis and gradually becoming more and more “transparent” because now considered “normal”; however, there are many pitfalls and difficulties that our society ‒ hyper-connected and bulimic in the spasmodic search for accessible contents in digital ‒ puts forward the public library, even more, if it corresponds to the particular meaning of the conservation library. The public library and the conservation library are very often faces of the same coin, souls of the same institution, face the challenge of the digital dimension.

Keywords:
Public library; Conservation library; Users; Digital library; Free access; IIIF.

Reliable health information technology (HIT) in general, and electronic health record systems (EHRs) in particular are essential to a high-performing healthcare system. When the availability of EHRs are disrupted, alternative methods must be used to maintain the continuity of healthcare. We developed a survey to assess institutional practices to handle situations when EHRs were unavailable for use (downtime preparedness). We used literature reviews and expert opinion to develop items that assessed the implementation of potentially useful practices. We administered the survey to U.S.-based healthcare institutions that were members of a professional organization that focused on collaboration and sharing of HIT-related best practices among its members. All members were large integrated health systems. We received responses from 50 of the 59 (84%) member institutions. Nearly all (96%) institutions reported at least one unplanned downtime (of any length) in the last 3 years and 70% had a...

The Bologna Process (BP) leads the internationalisation of higher education towards the gradual emergence of zones of mutual trust and aims to create one European educational space. The general aim of the chapter is to assess the impact of the Bologna Process (BP) on LIS education in Europe investigating the curriculum content, the different quality concepts and values of LIS institutions, the learning and teaching definition and the learning outcomes orientation, with student empowerment and transformation considered the first outcome to be achieved. The main problem evidenced by the research is that there are different concepts of quality and that the internationalisation of quality in LIS education lends itself to various interpretations.

This report outlines the development of a new corpus, which was created by refining and modifying the largest open-access L2 English learner database the EFCAMDAT. The extensive data-curation process, which can inform the development and use of other corpora, included procedures such as converting the database from XML to a tabular format, and removing problematic markup tags and non-English texts. The final dataset contains two corresponding samples, written by similar learners in response to different prompts, which represents a unique research opportunity when it comes to analyzing task effects and conducting replication studies. Overall, the resulting corpus contains ~406,000 texts in the first sample and 317,000 texts in the second sample, written by learners representing diverse L1s and a large range of L2 proficiency levels.

Purpose Public-funded research in Digital Humanities (DH) enhances institutional and individual research missions and contributes open data to a growing base of globally-networked knowledge. This case study on the Digging into Data 3 challenge (DID3) (2014-2016), an international, interdisciplinary, and collaborative grant initiative, explores skills that faculty and students brought to projects and others they acquired and shared on collaborative teams. Design/methodology/approach Rooted in the naturalistic paradigm, this qualitative case study centers on semi-structured interviews with 53 participants on 11 of the 14 DID3 projects. Documentary evidence complements empirical evidence; analysis is constructivist and grounded. Findings Hailing from diverse academic research institutions, centers, and repositories, participants brought 20 types of discipline-based or interdisciplinary expertise to DID3 projects. But they reported acquiring or refining 27 other skills during their project work. While most are data-related, complementary programming, management, and analytical skills push disciplinary and interdisciplinary expertise toward new frontiers. Project-based learning and pedagogy function symbiotically; participants therefore advocate for aligning problem-solving skills with pedagogical objectives at home institutions to prepare for public-funded DH projects. A modified content analysis juxtaposes DID3 skills with those advanced in 23 recent DH syllabi to identify commonalities and gaps. Originality/value Pedagogy has an important yet under-researched and underdeveloped role in public-funded digital humanities.

Neste trabalho discutimos a importância da curadoria de conteúdo a partir de suas origens, características e aplicações no contexto da comunicação contemporânea e digital. Buscamos ainda compreender o que é, como e onde pode ser aplicada, porque é utilizada e quem é o curador de conteúdo no cenário comunicacional atual.

Palavras-chave: curadoria; conteúdo; comunicação; contemporânea; digital; curador; in- formação.

In this work we discuss the importance of curating content from its origins, characteristics and applications in the context of contemporary and digital communication. We also seek to understand what it is, how and where it can be applied, why it is used and who is the curator of content in the current communicational scenario.

Keywords: curatorship; content; Communication; contemporary; digital; curator; information.

In this paper, we describe the current challenges to the effective management and preservation of research data in UK universities, and the response provided by the JISC Managing Research Data programme. This paper will discuss, inter alia, the findings and conclusions from data management training projects of the first iteration of the programme and how they informed the design of the second, paying particular attention to initiatives to develop and embed training materials.

Path-breaking in theory and practice alike, digital humanities (DH) not only secures a larger public audience for humanities and social sciences research, but also permits researchers to ask novel questions and to revisit familiar ones. Public-funded, international, and collaborative research in digital humanities furthers institutional research missions and enriches networked knowledge. The Digging into Data 3 challenge (DID3) (2014-2016), an international and interdisciplinary grant initiative embracing big data, included fourteen teams sponsored by ten funders from four nations. A qualitative case study that relies on purposive sampling and grounded analysis, this article centers on the information practices of DID3 participants. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 53 participants on eleven of the fourteen DID3 projects. The study explores how Data Management Plan (DMP) requirements affect work practices in public-funded digital humanities, how scholars grapple with key data management challenges, and how they plan to reuse and share their data. It concludes with three recommendations and three directions for future research.

New types of digital data, tools, and methods, for instance those that cross academic disciplines and domains, those that feature teams instead of single scholars, and those that involve individuals from outside the academy, enables new forms of scholarship and teaching in digital humanities. Such scholarship promotes reuse of digital data, provokes new research questions, and cultivates new audiences. Digital curation, the process of managing a trusted body of information for current and future use, helps maximize the value of research in digital humanities. Predicated on semistructured interviews, this naturalistic case study explores the creation, use, storage, and planned reuse of data by 45 interviewees involved with 19 Office of Digital Humanities Start-Up Grant (SUG) projects. Interviewees grappled with challenges surrounding data, collaboration and communication, planning and project management, awareness and outreach, resources, and technology. Overall this study explores the existing digital curation practices and needs of scholars engaged in innovative digital humanities work and to discern how closely these practices and needs align with the digital curation literature.

NCBI&#39;s CDD, the Conserved Domain Database, enters its 15(th) year as a public resource for the annotation of proteins with the location of conserved domain footprints. Going forward, we strive to improve the coverage and consistency of domain annotation provided by CDD. We maintain a live search system as well as an archive of pre-computed domain annotation for sequences tracked in NCBI&#39;s Entrez protein database, which can be retrieved for single sequences or in bulk. We also maintain import procedures so that CDD contains domain models and domain definitions provided by several collections available in the public domain, as well as those produced by an in-house curation effort. The curation effort aims at increasing coverage and providing finer-grained classifications of common protein domains, for which a wealth of functional and structural data has become available. CDD curation generates alignment models of representative sequence fragments, which are in agreement with d...

In this paper, we describe the current challenges to the effective management and preservation of research data in UK universities, and the response provided by the JISC Managing Research Data programme. This paper will discuss, inter alia, the findings and conclusions from data management training projects of the first iteration of the programme and how they informed the design of the second, paying particular attention to initiatives to develop and embed training materials.

Abstract (ENG):
The Veneranda Biblioteca Ambrosiana in Milan, thanks to a complex project resulting from the cultural and scientific collaboration and the sharing of resources between the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart of Milan and the University of Notre Dame (IN, USA), has recently inaugurated its new digital library devoted to the open and free access to its digitized manuscript collections: an inevitable turning point made possible thanks to the adoption of innovative technologies such as the IIIF-International Image Interoperability Framework.

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Abstract (ITA):
La Veneranda Biblioteca Ambrosiana di Milano, grazie a un complesso progetto frutto della collaborazione culturale e scientifica e della condivisione di risorse tra l’Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore di Milano e la University of Notre Dame (IN, USA), ha recentemente inaugurato la propria nuova biblioteca digitale ad accesso aperto e gratuito dedicata alla fruizione del proprio patrimonio manoscritto digitalizzato: una svolta inevitabile resa possibile grazie all’adozione di tecnologie innovative quali IIIF-International Image Interoperability Framework.

Il digitale in biblioteca: opportunità di crescita e integrazione, o deriva verso la frammentazione?

Abstract (ITA):
Prendendo spunto dalle suggestive sensazioni che il celebre racconto breve La Biblioteca di Babele di Jorge Louis Borges evoca, propongo una riflessione sul rapporto tra "digitale" e "biblioteca analogica". Non si intende affatto sostenere in modo oltranzista la convinzione del "digitale" quale miracolosa panacea per le "biblioteche analogiche", bensì riflettere partendo dall'esperienza quotidiana frutto della creazione e della conseguente gestione a 360° di un complesso progetto di digitalizzazione: da questa applicazione concreta emerge una visione smitizzata del "digitale", che tende a porre in evidenza i punti a favore delle tecnologie digitali applicate affinché una biblioteca possa crescere in termini di accessibilità e fruizione libere. Dalle collezioni digitali chiuse, moderni silos tecnologici colmi di dati che rimandano ai silenti "esagoni" della Biblioteca di Babele borgesiana, incapace di comunicare e interconnettersi, alla crescita dell'accessibilità e dell'interoperabilità garantite dall'applicazione di moderni standard. Tutto questo, però, senza mai sottovalutare l'ineluttabile dualismo che le moderne tecnologie digitali portano seco: il rischio sempre presente della frammentazione, del labirinto senza uscita, dello "specchio" borgesiano che illude e confonde.

It happens all the time, it's nothing to be ashamed of. We bring back our materials from the field and they get stuck somewhere, sometimes because it's convenient to our analysis, sometimes because we have no other space, sometimes 'just because.' But there comes a time in the life of every archaeologist when we must return to those collections and send them off with our best wishes to be properly and responsibly curated. For many, this time comes with retirement. This paper is intended to help you think through the process of getting those collections ready to be curated.

The potential of the diverse chemistries present in natural products (NP) for biotechnology and medicine remains untapped because NP databases are not searchable with raw data and the NP community has no way to share data other than in published papers. Although mass spectrometry (MS) techniques are well-suited to high-throughput characterization of NP, there is a pressing need for an infrastructure to enable sharing and curation of data. We present Global Natural Products Social Molecular Networking (GNPS; http://gnps.ucsd.edu), an open-access knowledge base for community-wide organization and sharing of raw, processed or identified tandem mass (MS/MS) spectrometry data. In GNPS, crowdsourced curation of freely available community-wide reference MS libraries will underpin improved annotations. Data-driven social-networking should facilitate identification of spectra and foster collaborations. We also introduce the concept of…

Abstract (ENG):

The Digital Library – used here to connote a general category – aims to innovate the range of services offered to the public by ‘analogue libraries’ to a varied group of users. These services cross the multifaceted cases of public reading libraries (and a large and generalist pool of users), of university libraries (and an equally large pool of users made up of students, undergraduates, faculty, and researchers), and also extend to the world of conservation libraries, which attract a specialized niche audience, very often of international origin. The digitization of precious, ancient, books – both manuscript and printed – represents a great and complex challenge from many points of view (conceptual, design, implementation, logistics, economic, personnel management, etc.), but also the most intuitive way we have now to expand the services offered to users in digital form. In the (recent) past, many digital library initiatives have been carried out in this sense by individual library institutions, as well as by individual private programs or government projects, with variable results in terms of objectives actually achieved, sustainable permanence online, and their ability to effectively counteract the so-called ‘digital obsolescence’ by updating the entire technological infrastructure of the project itself, as well as the individual digital contents, to guarantee their survival. Nowadays, web-based technologies have evolved, increased, and standardized to such an extent that a new approach is possible for digital libraries in terms of usability, visualization, and multi-platform replication of digital content.

Keywords: Digital Library, Digitization, Free Access, Data Curation, Workflow

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Abstract (ITA):

La Biblioteca Digitale – qui intesa come categoria generale – si propone da tempo di innovare la gamma dei servizi offerti al pubblico dalle “biblioteche analogiche” a una variegata compagine di utenti. Non si pensi soltanto al multiforme scenario delle biblioteche di pubblica lettura (e a un ampio e generalista bacino di utenti), o alle biblioteche delle università (e a un altrettanto ampio bacino di utenti fatto di studenti, tesisti, docenti, ricercatori), ma si guardi anche al mondo delle biblioteche di conservazione, che attirano ad esse un pubblico di nicchia, specializzato, molto spesso di provenienza internazionale. La digitalizzazione del prezioso patrimonio librario antico, manoscritto e a stampa, rappresenta una grande e complessa sfida da molti punti di vista (concettuale, progettuale, realizzativo, logistico, economico, della gestione del personale, ecc.), ma anche la più naturale modalità di cui oggi disponiamo per espandere i servizi offerti all’utenza in forma digitale. Nel (recente) passato molte sono state le iniziative compiute in tal senso dalle singole istituzioni bibliotecarie, come anche da singoli programmi privati o da progetti ministeriali, con esiti altalenanti in termini di obiettivi realmente raggiunti, di effettiva permanenza online e di capacità di contrastare in modo efficace la cosidetta “obsoloscenza digitale” aggiornando l’intera infrastruttura tecnologica del progetto stesso, come anche i singoli contenuti digitali, al fine di garantirne la sopravvivenza. Al giorno d’oggi le tecnologie web based si sono a tal punto evolute, aggiornate e standardizzate da rendere possibile per le biblioteche digitali un nuovo approccio in termini di usabilità, visualizzazione e fruizione multi-piattaforma dei contenuti digitali.

The Digital Curation Institute (DCI) at the Faculty of Information at the University of Toronto is an interdisciplinary research unit uniting leading researchers in digital curation in a broad, inclusive perspective on the field, with the aim to provide a vibrant space of investigation, exchange and discussion (http://dci.ischool.utoronto.ca).

The DCI is calling for applications for a one-year funded Fellowship in the broader area of sustainability and curation. Applications are due by March 31, 2020. We are seeking a curious individual who pursues creative friction and synergies across disciplinary boundaries, especially those between the humanities, social sciences, natural sciences and engineering, design, computing and technology.

All authors in publication order:
Williams, John W. Grimm, Eric C. Blois, Jessica L. Charles, Donald F. Davis, Edward B. Goring, Simon J. Graham, Russell W. Smith, Alison J. Anderson, Michael Arroyo-Cabrales, Joaquin Ashworth, Allan C. Betancourt, Julio L. Bills, Brian W. Booth, Robert K. Buckland, Philip I. Curry, B. Brandon Giesecke, Thomas Jackson, Stephen T. Latorre, Claudio Nichols, Jonathan Purdum, Timshel Roth, Robert E. Stryker, Michael Takahara, Hikaru

The Neotoma Paleoecology Database is a community-curated data resource that supports interdisciplinary global change research by enabling broad-scale studies of taxon and community diversity, distributions, and dynamics during the large environmental changes of the past. By consolidating many kinds of data into a common repository, Neotoma lowers costs of paleodata management, makes paleoecological data openly available, and offers a high-quality, curated resource. Neotoma’s distributed scientific governance model is flexible and scalable, with many open pathways for participation by new members, data contributors, stewards, and research communities. The Neotoma data model supports, or can be extended to support, any kind of paleoecological or paleoenvironmental data from sedimentary archives. Data additions to Neotoma are growing and now include >3.8 million observations, >17,000 datasets, and >9200 sites. Dataset types currently include fossil pollen, vertebrates, diatoms, ostracodes, macroinvertebrates, plant macrofossils, insects, testate amoebae, geochronological data, and the recently added organic biomarkers, stable isotopes, and specimen-level data. Multiple avenues exist to obtain Neotoma data, including the Explorer map-based interface, an application programming interface, the neotoma R package, and digital object identifiers. As the volume and variety of scientific data grow, community-curated data resources such as Neotoma have become foundational infrastructure for big data science.

[T]his brief contribution will trace the history of the fellowship from its origins to the present, including remarks on some reactions to the program over the years and a brief characterization of the program as it welcomes its twelfth cohort in the 2015- 16 academic year.

Online curation is shaped and defined not merely by its content, but just as much by the nature of the structure and the systems that are used by curators and artists. It could be argued that this applies to any medium, but as this essay will show, the Web profoundly influences the role of the curator in new ways. In this paper we show how curation on the Web is not merely concerned with presenting art, but that curation functions within a wider ecology of social and technical power relations. This shift is characterized by a collision of different interests driven by economic, cultural, and socio-political agendas, and can be framed as a new space of performativity: signaling a move from curating a set of objects to a conceptual and operational process that puts different constellations of human and machinic agents, objects and practices into relation with one another. This means that a curator needs to take into account a complex interrelated network of dependencies and contexts t...