Developing a Digital Collection Policy for Québec's Public Libraries Renae Satterley, MLIS II McGill University
Introduction The introduction of mechanics' libraries in Québec in the nineteenth century and municipally-funded public libraries in the twentieth heralded an age whereby any citizen, from the very poor to the very rich, was given access to a broad range of informative, educational, and engaging materials. At the dawn of the twenty-first century, many now regard the Internet as the new public library, because it provides access to a similar range of informational, entertaining and educational materials. Unlike accessing the public library, however, access to the Internet is not freely available to every citizen due to the technological and communicative devices required to access it. In addition, it is becoming increasingly evident that many Web sites cannot be trusted to provide the user with authoritative and up-to-date information. Québec's public libraries, therefore, must respond to this dilemma by giving their users access to the whole range of reliable print and digital information resources now available. The public library also has to educate its users in the use of these new types of information sources, lest it continues to assume that the Internet truly is the new public library of the twenty-first century. Like the public library itself, the value of a digital collection is that it provides timely access to a wide range of information, both via its message (subject) and its medium (format). A digital collection can include e-journals, databases, e-books, Web sites, electronic fact sheets, and materials digitized by the library itself. However, a useful and effective digital collection must respond to a diverse range of users with a broad range of informational needs and technical abilities. Accordingly, this paper will outline the basic policy considerations that Québec's public libraries should take into account when building a digital collection. 2
Diversifying the Public Library's Offerings From magic lanterns to microfiche and cassette tapes, the public library has experienced a continuing dilemma: how to incorporate new technologies into the general collection. Digital resources, whether they consist of CD-ROMs, Web sites, databases, or digitized images, pose their own incorporation problems, since they can only be accessed with a computer. This entails, among other things, having to purchase a large bank of computers, installing a network, training users and staff, and creating new types of catalogues and catalogue entries to effectively collect digital resources. Accordingly, the public library must create a collection policy geared specifically to digital formats, as the issues surrounding the various types of digital resources tend to be the same: They can only be accessed via a computer. They require a level of technical skill to manipulate and use. They require a different level of protection against copyright theft and vandalism (i.e. viruses). The treatment and preservation of digital materials, therefore, differs from that of the 'regular' collection and is an important consideration when designing a collection policy. As with the existent collection policy, a successful digital collection policy must take into account not only the message, but also the medium. Digital materials work best when they respond to a user need not otherwise adequately met by traditional formats. For example, while novels are easier to read in print, statistical data is easier, and faster, to access via a manipulatable database. In addition, due to the fact that digital materials are a constantly and quickly changing medium, the collection policy needs to 3
be highly adaptable. It must also be able to cater to the general public's requests and feedback, and to their varying levels of technical abilities. Moreover, as with any collection policy, a digital collection policy must include certain basic criteria that will allow the public library to fulfill its mandate: to provide access to a wide range of educational, informative and recreational materials that are appropriate for and useful to its users. Consequently, the digital materials collected should be able to meet the following basic criteria: affordability, appropriate content (educational, informational or recreational), ease of use and access, authority, timeliness, accuracy, format appropriate to the library's technical equipment, format better in digital format than in print/other, no legal rights infringement, and no duplication of an existing resource in a usable format. Combined with the above criteria, the public library can develop a strong digital collection by collecting within three broad medium types: purchased digital resources, reformatted resources (i.e. materials digitized by the library itself), and annotated Web links. Due to their digital nature, all of these formats can offer materials of superior quality in terms of timeliness, accuracy and access than do their print counterparts. In fact, with regards to the annotated Web links, the BREF 1 project initiated by la Grande Bibliothèque du Québec constitutes a strong bank of Web links. The digital collection policy, therefore, should mandate that all Web links be collected in conjunction with the BREF project and follow the guidelines set out by la Grande Bibliothèque du Québec. 1 See: La Grande Bibliothèque du Québec. Bibliothèque de référence électronique pour les ressources sur Internet à l'intention des bibliothèques publiques at http://www.bpq.org/bref.htm. 4
Serving the Needs of Public Library Users Public libraries serve a very broad and diverse range of users. From the very young to the very old, from the techno-savvy to the Luddite, the public library collection must be able to respond to the demands of a very diverse group of users. Creating a usable digital collection can be quite difficult in this context, as technological aptitude will vary greatly. Accordingly, there will be a certain amount of compromise when choosing which electronic resources to collect and develop. The public library also serves as a community access point, one which provides unique local, cultural, political, and historical information, e.g. public library in Baie- Comeau will offer materials that differ greatly than those in Montréal. Public libraries also often provide basic language, employment and immigration information to their community. A strong collection policy, therefore, will focus on collecting resources that will have the greatest appeal and usefulness to a broad range of users, in addition to digitizing materials that are unique to its library. However, as public libraries are chronically under funded, they do not necessarily have the financial and technological resources required to digitize their unique collections or purchase a wide range of e-resources. This problem can be solved via a collection policy that specifies the library purchase the resources best suited to the digital medium for the subject areas with the highest demand and incorporate reliable and free information sources (such as government information). Subject areas that are in high demand and better accessed digitally include: Genealogy: Promoting local heritage by providing access to unique materials in the municipality which are not available elsewhere. This can include county 5
atlases, manuscript censuses, local history books, local street guides, maps, and local photos. Such a digitization initiative, although costly in the beginning, will inevitably attract users from outside the community and increase library use. Outside users could be charged a fee to access the digitized materials, thus balancing out the cost of the digitization projects. General Reference Materials: Online dictionaries, thesauri, encyclopedias, howto guides, and bibliographies. These types of general reference materials are becoming more widely available digitally, in easy-to-use and inexpensive formats. This category could include full-text, broad subject databases, which are highly useful tools that can offer the user a wealth of authoritative information in one place. Government Documents: Government publications, reports, statistics, and census data are in high demand, yet are available free from most government Web sites. Because the information is often difficult for inexperienced users to find, the Web sites and databases need to be accompanied by instructional fact sheets. Health Care: A wealth of reliable health information is available electronically, including many that are free of charge: Health Canada publications, some online medical journals and the Medline database. Language Learning: A number of translation dictionaries are available online, including one offered free of charge by the Office québécois de la langue française, Le Grand dictionnaire terminologique. 2 Otherwise, this category 2 See Office québécois de la langue française. Le grand dictionnaire terminologique at http://www.granddictionnaire.com. 6
should include purchased language learning software and CD-ROM language courses. Community Information: Local history, job seeking, immigration information, community resources, maps, municipal information, etc. Much of this information is available free online but needs to be adequately catalogued and annotated by experienced library staff to become useful to the average user. News and General Information: It has become the norm for magazines and newspapers to be available electronically, and publishers often provide libraries with simultaneous subscriptions to the print and electronic version of their publications. 7
Access Issues Since the public library clientele has a broad range of technical skills, the first priority of the digital collection policy is to make access to materials widely available. This can be achieved by focusing on particular subjects like those mentioned above and by choosing resources that are available in easy-to-use formats. Web sites that follow accessibility guidelines 3 and databases that are user-friendly and intuitive, for example, should be given priority in the selection process. Although a library's digital collection can be accessed via the Internet twenty-four hours a day, there are certain technological and/or legal concerns that make this impossible. Some resources will require on-site-only access or be protected by a password. For example, full-text databases or holdings of purchased language learning resources are copyrighted materials with strict licensing agreements. These agreements dictate who is allowed to access the material and how often. In situations like these, passwords and log-ins could be used, based on cardholder information and bar code numbers. The question of whether access is made available via remote log-ins or onsite only needs to be outlined within the general digital collection policy. For the majority of the digital collections, however, having the resources accessible online twenty-four hours a day and seven days a week is possible and achieves the goal of providing increased access to materials of the greatest use to patrons. This is especially true for reference materials, which are often consulted quickly and on a needto-know basis. Genealogy and local history materials will also benefit greatly from digitization, which gives access to researchers who do not live in the municipality. 3 See W3C's Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 1.0 at http://www.w3.org/tr/1999/wai-webcontent- 19990505 for an example of how to make the World Wide Web accessible to those with disabilities. 8
Since materials will be accessible without direct supervision, every resource within the digital collection needs to be carefully protected in accordance with existing copyright laws and licensing agreements. The protection of materials has to be an integral component of any workable collection policy, as protecting the materials means protecting use for all patrons, both present and future. Purchased materials come with licensing agreements that require careful negotiations to fulfill the public library's service and access mandates. Likewise, some Web site owners do not allow for direct linkage to their site, and all materials digitized by the library have to be cleared of copyrights for public use. Therefore, since many public libraries work with minimal resources in terms of computer terminals and full-scale Internet access while nonetheless serving a broad range of users, it is important to collect e-resources that have the most flexible licenses and copyrights and which allow for both on-site and off-site access. Lastly, the question of how to archive the digital collection must be a fundamental component of the collection policy. With primary scanned materials, back-up storage must be arranged and replaced as necessary, since the materials (diskettes, CD-ROMs, DVDs) used to archive digital materials can become obsolete very quickly. As Web links cannot be archived in a reliable and useful manner, the policy should outline how to replace links that are no longer useful or simply disappear. Does the library replace a dead Web link with a Web site treating a similar subject, for example, or simply delete it from the collection? The digital materials that will pose the most difficulties, however, are the purchased resources: databases, electronic serials, and CD-ROMs. The licensing agreement arrived at with the vendors must address the archival issue in such a way that access to the materials is guaranteed in perpetuum. When a library 9
purchases a book, it will have that book forever, whether or not the publisher goes out of business. The policy for the acquisition of digital resources of the Conférénce des recteurs et des principaux des universités du Québec (CREPUQ), for example, states that: 3.1 La licence accorde le droit de faire des copies de securité ou de charger localement l'information. 3.2 La licence permet aux établissements participants l'accès perpetuel aux données et specifie les mécanismes, p. ex. une entente avec le fournisseur ou avec une tierce partie. 4 Because public libraries cannot afford to reproduce their own copy of every e- resource, the collection policy should stress the fact that the library will only purchase resources with some form of guaranteed perpetual access. 4 CREPUQ. Sous-comité des bibliothèques. Principes pour la négotiation d'achat en commun ou l'acquisition de licences d'acces à des produits documentaires électroniques: at http://crepuq.qc.ca/documents/bibl/achat_com/principes.htm. 10
Technological Concerns As mentioned earlier, a digital collection incorporates a variety of materials that are created (scanned) by the hosting institution, purchased, or canvassed and annotated. These three categories of materials pose different technological concerns for the library, and the collection policy should provide a plan for solving such problems. The scanning of primary materials can be a costly initiative and should therefore be kept to a minimum in the public library setting. For example, goals can be set within the collection policy whereby projects are carried out at a rate of one to five per year, or as special funding allows. Libraries can also take advantage of the decreasing cost of scanning equipment and investigate the possibility of using open-source software 5 to alleviate budgetary constraints. The network of public libraries could also benefit from sharing hardware and software costs amongst themselves. A centralized scanning office and server could be created and made accessible to all public libraries within an administrative region. The collection policy also has to specify the fact that any purchased resource, such as language-learning CD-ROMs or full-text databases, must be easy to integrate into the library's existing computer networks. If extra hardware or software is required to run these materials, then an alternative should be considered, unless the library has the financial means to accommodate extra technical requirements. In terms of collecting Web resources, the libraries should not face too many technical difficulties, as the majority has already installed public computer stations with Internet access. However, as mentioned earlier, the collection policy should follow the BREF 5 Some examples of useful open source software in this context include The Gimp and OpenOfficeOrg. See the article entitled Open Source Software for Libraries. LITA: Chicago: 2002. 11
project guidelines when integrating the links into the collection. For Web site links that the library wants to collect outside of the BREF project, however, the manner in which they are chosen and annotated must nonetheless reflect the general collection concerns regarding the Web site s appropriateness to the library's patrons: is the Web site educational, informational, or recreational? Is it easy to use, written by an authoritative source, updated frequently, and accurate? The digital collection policy must also address the changing nature of Web links and ensure that there is a proper verification process in place whereby the links are validated on a regular basis, and dead links removed promptly. This process should be akin to the weeding process already existent in the regular collection policy. Lastly, the collection policy should stipulate that each digital resource be described accurately through the use of metadata tags. Proper metadata tags ensure that the resources become useful and usable, and allow for the proper integration of electronic resources into existent databases and catalogues. 12
The Role of the Bibliothèque Nationale du Québec The Bibliothèque National du Québec (BNQ) will be an invaluable ally when building the public library's digital collection and will be able to provide libraries with a variety of resources to build their digital collections, including archival tools, access to Web links, technical and legal guidance, and consortia opportunities. Firstly, the BNQ should make its own digital collection policies available online for consultation and comparison purposes. Secondly, by creating a partnership with Québec's public libraries, the BNQ will be able to provide legal and technical help, and help draw up official guidelines for the network of public libraries in Québec. The BNQ should also be able to advise the libraries in their negotiations with the vendors of fulltext databases, electronic serials, and networked CD-ROM materials, and in the licensing issues attached to these resources. The public libraries should strongly consider forming a consortium with the BNQ to negotiate group deals with these vendors. 6 Such a consortium initiative could also pave the way for a centralized archival service of all of Québec's public library e-resources, including databases, e-serials, and digitized materials. Moreover, if online request forms were made available, the BNQ's inter-library loan service could become an extension of the library's digital collection, in that it would allow patrons to request items that are not available in the public library s collection. In other words, this service would be a digital resource collected by the public library. The Québec bibliography provided online by the BNQ should be another digital resource collected by the public library, as it is an important reference tool. 6 Some examples of library consortia include COOL (Consortium of Ontario Libraries), and CREPUQ's (Conférence des recteurs et des principaux des universités du Québec) sub-committee of libraries. 13
Lastly, given that the BNQ currently has a digital collection available to the general public online, the public libraries can provide direct links to these materials. Once the public libraries' own materials are digitized, they could be hosted by the BNQ. As new projects are digitized by public libraries, the BNQ could gradually develop into a centralized digital Québec library and bring together all of the digital projects under one Web site and one server. In addition, the BNQ may be able to provide start-up funds for such projects in the form of grants, access to scanners, technicians, and graphical software. 14
Conclusion Developing a digital collections policy for the public libraries in Québec should not pose too many serious problems for the seasoned collection policy developer. It must be remembered that digital resources pose unique problems, though, such as different types of copyright and licensing issues, and differing levels of public accessibility. But with technical and legal aid provided by the Bibliothèque Nationale du Québec, the collection issues that are unique to digital materials can be overcome. A strong collection policy geared specifically to digital materials in all of their forms will inevitably help strengthen the public library and ultimately attract a broader range of users. 15
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