WLA 2009: Canoe the Open Content Rapids

Canoe the Open Content Rapids
Dorothea Salo, UW System Digital Content Group

• http://www.slideshare.net/cavlec/canoe-the-open-content-rapids [under Creative Commons Attribution license]

Instruction

• Digital storytelling - copyright issues over pulling from files found on Google Images - sets a bad example
• Scholarship reasons to provide copyright education, provide proper information sources
• Different from country to country
• Instructors tend to violate copyright, as well as avoid activities that are probably fine

Copyright

• Limited monopoly over original works that are fixed in a tangible medium (includes stuff on Internet)
• It's in the Constitution - not about making money, about promoting "progress of science and the useful arts"
• Life of author + 70 years; 95 years corporate entities
• OK to copy for scholarship, parody/satire, library preservation, classroom use; limited copying for other reasons = "fair use"
• You can: a) sell in whole/part, b) give it away for free, c) license it for free/payment
• Faculty generally fall into (b) without realizing it - they think because they wrote an article, they own it
• Fair use - only way you know for certain is if you're sued and win
• General guidelines do exist
• Legislation has become more and more restrictive; results - culturejamming

Public domain

• Prefer to think of things as "rising" into the public domain, not "falling"
• Google Books - includes items clearly in the public domain (pre-1923), others clearly under copyright, others are "orphan works" because we don't know who owns copyright (or if they're alive etc.)
• Hathi Trust will decide whether items Google is vacillating about are actually in the public domain
• Musopen - building collection of online recordings - raise money for your group to record a piece (long-dead composers, score acquired legally) and upload
• Flickr Commons - photographs in public domain; allows libraries and other digitizers to share and receive comments
• Project Gutenberg - one of the first; scanned, transcribed public domain texts
• Gov docs - work produced by fed employees in course of jobs is in public domain (except classified works); includes images
• State gov docs = depends on the state

Open access

• Includes peer-reviewed works, digital collections, working papers, technical reports, conference presentations, crowd-sourced solutions to mathematical problems
• "Green" open access - "self-archiving" (not really), repositories (Dorothea doesn't like the term)
• "Gold" open access - originally published open access, no subscription fees, no cost to access
• "Mandates" - FACULTY granting to their institutions the right to post their research results online (some places aren't considering publications towards tenure unless they're deposited in repository; controversy over whether open access publications are getting a citation edge); FUNDERS especially federal agencies want taxpayer-funded research results to be available freely to the public; LIBRARIES at research institutions]
• Biggest tool to find OA materials = OAIster (soon to become part of WorldCat); also DOAJ, Google, Google Scholar
• Open Courses - controversial - http://ocwfinder.com
• Learning materials - OER Commons, MERLOT (long-standing) - points to materials stored elsewhere, ODEPO directory
• Creative Commons - generate license granting specific rights for your works (attribution, no derivatives, non-commercial use, requirement to release the new work under the same license)
• Flickr has a Creative Commons search, or Flickr Storm has advanced CC license search
• Music (ccMixter, Incompetech, Jamendo)

To Do

• When you accept a work for digitization, educate the creator and ask for their desired status for the items
• Read all publication agreements, and ask for what you want - Dorothea hasn't heard of any publishers taking back their decision to publish based on copyright addenda
• Instead of libraries and librarians being the "copyright cop" - promote Creative Commons

GovInfoDay: Cynthia Etkin from U.S. GPO

Library Roles in Facilitating Open Access to Government Information

• Federal Depository Library Program
• NIH Public Access Policy
• Transparency and Open Government Initiative - Pres. Obama's memorandum 1/21/09 - http://www.whitehouse.gov/open - http://recovery.gov/ - http://data.gov/
• Letter from Public Printer to Pres. Obama 3/9/09 - support for initiative, offering assistance to carry out through FDLP and Public Law 103-40
• Goals: FDsys as official federal govpub repository, Web2.0 functionality, public input into pending legislation, etc.

Marketing Government Information in Libraries

• Librarians are not generally good at marketing - we think statistics are marketing
• What is marketing?
• "...an organizational function and a set of processes for creating, communicating and delivering value to customers and for manageing customer relationships in ways that benefit the organization and its stakeholders." - American Marketing Association, http://www.marketingpower.com
• ... NOT just promoting
• ... a strategy that ensures user needs continue to be met, and provides value to library users
• ... Product (what we provide or COULD provide) + position (what we want users to believe about libraries and staff) + promotion (increase awareness)
• Think about saying... "Members" and "Guests" instead of "users" or "patrons" or "customers" or "visitors"
• Environment: we're competing for funding, space & resources
• OCLC report 2008: "From Awareness to Funding":
• ... perceptions of vs. support of libraries
• ... "transformational" libraries more likely to get tax increase support than "informational" l ibraries
• ... should target marketing messages to different segments of voting public
• GPO Data Gathering for Marketing: 2007 Biennial Survey:
• ... 67% of FDLP libraries hadn't surveyed users about quality of depository services
• ... Though library staff are informed of new fedgov resources in many ways, the public is mainly informed through handouts and displays, some via events and articles.
• FDLP provides:
• ... materials to promote services and collections (posters, bookmarks, pamphlets, letterhead, graphics, PSAs)
• ... pocket cards in Spanish
• ... Vision/Values statement
• ... Feedback form "button" you can put on your website
• ... Marketing plan
• ... Radio spots to share with campus stations
• ... Videos - up on YouTube: "Easy as FDL: Free information, dedicated service, and limitless possibilities," "GPO takes to the streets" (asked people if they knew what a federal depository library was, what their favorite government publication was, and what they think of when they hear "library")
• Image: pyramid of collections, services, & communications = collaboration/flexibility to provide access to depository materials
• We want:
• ... your success stories
• ... tips about what works and doesn't work
• ... quantitative data (website usage, materials dispersed, collection usage changes)
• ... you to use AskGPO
• Developing a Library Partner Relations Program, will collect data for benchmarking success - working with OutSell consulting firm

Comment: It would be nice if the videos were customizable to our local libraries.

Comment: We can't fix all the ignorance that U.S. citizens have about their government :)

Question: Are the radio spots only suitable for campus stations, or also community radio? A: I haven't listened to them yet, but community stations would be fine.

Question: How does GPO foresee changing, in this changing library environment? A: Many of our policies are actually written as laws, so slow to change. Picking low-hanging fruit. Streamlining needs & offers (disposition).

Comment: I see a danger of libraries dropping out of the program, if GPO doesn't make radical changes. A: We've all been thinking about it - our hands are tied, and unfortunately it may take a mass dropout to change things. I can't tell you to lobby.

Comment: There would need to be a library consensus on needed changes. Last time (1998), the photocopier lobby nixed it. There are always some people in Congress who say we don't need the Congressional Record at all. A: At Tampa meeting, we asked "If you could change 1 or 2 things about Title 44, what would you change?"

Comment: If it's all online, what is left? Provide internet access to the public, and staff who understand the landscape/organization of government information. Unfortunately, libraries will probably stop hiring people to provide that expertise. In Wisconsin, the universities have a long tradition of serving the entire state. But northern Wisconsin does not have high-speed internet.

Cynthia: We're told "our collection isn't getting used." So we ask them, "are you promoting it?" But not always enough staff to do so.

Cynthia: We're waiting for a report on the minimum number of documents recommended per state, under various conditions.

Comment: I'm happy that I'm not needed to answer the simple questions anymore, but to still be there to help with the in-depth research questions.

Comment: There's still a role for trustworthy, .gov information. Though patrons don't always know where the information is from - they think it's from Google.

Cynthia: The courts are starting to accept documents beyond just the media and government.

Cynthia: Version control is going to be built into the online repository system. The URL will go to the agency website, unless it changes, when it will revert to the archived copy.