I’m thinking the best shot of getting this to go forward is to wiki-fy it, so that any interested DPLA participant can contribute their ideas and thoughts without me or others getting in the way as a gatekeeper. Toward that end, I’ve created a Wiki page for what I’ve called Digital Library Core Collections which I hope I and others can fill in to flesh out the idea and see if it’s viable in the DPLA context.

Regarding your note about what people want to read, I’m not a public librarian, but I have heard that lots of people go into libraries looking for a specific title, often a popular best-seller. As I note above, i don’t think it’ll be viable to get most of those into the DPLA;s digital collection any time soon. But I wonder whether this could be a point of possibly synergy between the DPLA and local libraries; that is, someone going to the DPLA with a specific hot title in mind gets referred to local libraries where they can borrow a print copy, but also gets suggestions of related digital titles they can read online. Or, someone visiting a local library looking for a broader range can get referred, among other things, to relevant, high-quality titles in the DPLA’s collection. (It does seem quite common in my experience for someone going into a library looking for one thing to come up with other things as well.)

A colleague sent me this blog post the other day:
http://ebooksinlibraries.blogspot.com/2011/04/what-ebook-readers-want-from-libraries.html

In it, it says “People want libraries to provide the expensive eBooks versions of print books. And the demand is not just for fiction, over 40% want good non-fiction. People care less about libraries providing cheaper indie eBooks and care almost nothing about eBook versions of free public domain books.”

As much as I sympathize with this call from the users, there’s a little part of me that says “oh yeah? well too bad.”
New and popular media will always be ‘premium’ and carry a ‘premium’ price tag. That’s capitalism.
I want a ‘free’ copy of the newest everything too, but I don’t actually expect to get it from my library.

What do you think of that? I’m not even sure that I know what I think of that…

Some of these services will indeed be largely technology-driven. Your example of a discussion service build around cultural works, for instance, could be one useful such service. (Though there are lots of other discussion services, some also built around works, that are already out there, and many more than have been proposed or launched but that failed to thrive.) I’m very happy to have people try developing these and other services in a digital public library project, but a robust digital library also needs collections that meet its users needs, and that side of things, and the support requirements it implies, seem to be relatively neglected in the DPLA discussions I’ve seen so far.

You’re also right that “collections that are popular in print” are not the only content people want from public libraries. I’m not so much looking for collections that are popular, but collections that meet the public’s main information needs in an accessible, appealing way. Not everything that’s useful is popular in the marketplace; and not everything that’s popular needs to be included. The point is to be proactive about determining what sorts of things are most needed in a digital collection that serves a broad public, and to make a serious effort to fill in holes in coverage (particularly in areas where current and reliable content is critical) by whatever means necessary.

I also want to be clear that a “realistic beta sprint project” cannot simply consist of me. (Nor would I be the appropriate leader for the sort of sustained collection development program that I describe above.) What I hope to do by registering a statement of interest for the DPLA sprint is to see if there are institutions and librarians with interest and expertise in planning a proactive, sustainable collection development program within the DPLA framework. If there are, I’ll be happy to help shape a planning agenda for such a program, insofar as my time and expertise (both limited) allow. If someone else has already put in a statement of interest along these lines with more heft behind it, I’ll be glad to defer to theirs. And if there isn’t sufficient interest within the DPLA community to get a viable effort going– well, that’ll tell us something too.

To give the proposal a fair shot, I’ll be raising it in DPLA discussions over the next few days. But I’m also happy to see further comments here, and appreciate the ones you’ve made thus far.

I guess one version of a DPLA would do exactly what you speak of here. It seems that people want the DPLA to be everything all at once, likely because of its name. Right now, my library gets different kinds of electronic content from countless vendors… Overdrive, Ebsco, bla bla bla. You are describing a DPLA that seeks to offer the same collections that are popular in print in an electronic format. Nothing wrong with that, sounds like a good plan… but it’s worth noting that this is **not** the only content people want from public libraries.

I was suggesting that DPLA platform development could start before having some kind of collection development policy because a DPLA could begin by enabling localized conversation and context-creation around whatever opportunistic content exists- and that would be a big win for public library users. It would be great for a small library in Arkansas to offer web users the ability to have conversations about and draw relationships between a painting in the Smithsonian, a copy of Huck Finn, and a photo from their local history collection. If a collection development policy evolved that enabled a digitally lendable copy of a Grisham novel to be included in that conversation, all the better.

Nate asks: “Do you think that one can begin developing something from the opportunistic standpoint, with the intention of adding the user-centered acquisition model you describe?”

In a word: No.

Now, don’t misunderstand me: I think that opportunistically acquired materials play an important role. There are various high-quality free online resources already out there, and collecting, adapting, and reusing appropriate ones will be an important part of building up a digital public library collection. (Indeed, insisting on starting from scratch could easily condemn a digital public library project to much the same fate as Nupedia or Citizendium, two projects that aimed for crowd-supported high-quality but completely new content, and failed to thrive.) And all those digitized books from the past can fill out a digital library’s research stacks quite nicely.

But I really think that if your aim is to create a truly useful and viable digital library for the American (or world) public, you have to commit and invest in the collections that implies from the start. The reason is that the people you’re going to need, the investments you’re going to make, the strategies you employ to develop a collection that meets your users’ needs on a reasonable budget, and the funding models you’re going to depend on, are going to have to be quite different than what they would be if you focus primarily on building platforms and just using or digitizing whatever content is to hand.

We can see this with the National Science Digital Library, an NSF-funded program that talked for a long time about building a rich public library of K-12 science education materials, but which was largely driven by technology research groups and funded by project grants. As a research program, it produced some useful technology, findings, and collaborations. (And, to be fair, it also produced some content that may well be worth preserving or adapting.) But as a public library, it failed: 10 years and $175 million in, most science teachers and students have rarely or never used it, and it’s about to lose its funding.

I don’t think the main things holding back an effective public digital library are a lack of platform architectures, or the fact that we haven’t finished digitizing all the public domain volumes in the Harvard libraries. The main things we need to support viable public libraries, whether digital or local, are well-developed, well-funded, user-responsive and cost-effective collections and services. We can build those now, if we want to, and invest the right resources and expertise.

Don’t get me wrong: I think developing new digital library technologies is important; that’s primarily what I do in my job, after all. And I’m always happy to see and promote newly digitized resources, as I’ve done for years on The Online Books Page. But an initiative that mainly focuses on those isn’t going to build an digital public library at the level of adequacy that Americans have enjoyed in our long-standing local public libraries. If the DPLA wants to focus on technology and digitization, fine: they can rename the project to something like the “Digital Research Library of America”, and I’ll still cheer them on and maybe even pitch in. But billing a project as a “digital library in service of the American public” without investing in what it really takes to become one risks distraction and frustration on the part of the participants and funders, and it can suck the oxygen away from other possible projects that could actually fulfill the promise.

I’ve gone ahead and submitted a summary of my idea (with a link to this page) to the DPLA beta sprint. If there are groups (involved with the DPLA or not) who are interested in pursuing this proactive collection-building strategy, and perhaps fleshing out a beta plan, I’d love to hear from them. Or, if anyone reading this thinks I’m wrong here, I’d be very interested in hearing your case.