Comparative views and the prospects for transatlantic cooperation : German resources in African studies ; paper for the 6th Frankfurt Scientific Symposium: "GNARP und wie sie die Welt sieht: Aussichten transatlantischer Partnerschaft im digitalen Zeitalter", "The World according to GNARP: Prospects for Transatlantic Library Partnership in the Digital Age", 5.10.2006 - 7.10.2006

The paper presents an overview about some of the international relevant projects of digital resources in Germany. Online presentations of primary sources, e.g. photographic material, and bibliographic tools supporting research, such as cross searching, will be presented as potential partners of resource sharing with North America. Not only the possibility of cooperation will be sketched, but also necessary preliminary work and some obstacles will be outlined. This report is accompanied by a short characterization of African studies in Germany and the status quo of Open Access-initiatives

Re-Envisioning Distributed Collections in German Research Libraries – A View from the U.S.A.

German research libraries are undergoing a major shift as the distributed system of “Special Subject Collections” (Sondersammelgebiete) supported by the German Research Foundation (DFG) transitions to a new, restructured program of “Specialized Information Services for Research” (Fachinformationsdienste für die Wissenschaft). Many of the structural issues underlying the programmatic changes in German libraries are also at work in U.S. research libraries. This article reflects on the parallels and differences in approaches to cooperative collection development in U.S. and German research libraries and reports on an ongoing discussion between the DFG and the Center for Research Libraries (CRL), a library consortium based in Chicago that supports international collections in libraries in and outside the U.S

Digital library activities in Germany: the German Digital Library Program GLOBAL INFO

"Several digital library projects have emerged in Germany in recent years. The German Digital Library Programme GLOBAL INFO, which is funded by the federal ministry for education and research from 1998 to 2003, is about to become the most important of them. It has the aim to ad-vance for the single scientist 'optimal access to the world-wide electronic and multimedial information on full texts, literature references, factual databases and software' at every workdesk. The programme requests the close cooperation between all the parties taking part in the processes of provision of information and documents. A first wave of projects has recently started. Their areas of concern are tools and standards in the production of documents (along the publication chain), description and retrieval of documents and dealing with their heterogeneity (i.e. metadata and retrieval, distributed systems), and provision and payment systems for published documents in distributed systems. Some more projects in other fields (dynamic documents, large distributed systems, administration systems for users and integration of electronic business models and payment systems) have been or will be handed in and evaluated in the course of 1999." (author's abstract

Performing Art Libraries at Duesseldorf : their role in the field of introducing computer-based information management within the Theatre Museum and the Film Museum

Düsseldorf is the capital of North Rhine-Westphalia, the state with the highest number of inhabitants in Germany. The city has a rich cultural history: The theatre history started in 1485 (the festivities in the context of a princely marriage at Düsseldorf). Theatre historiography marks three great periods for Düsseldorf (Immermann, 1834-1837; Dumont-Lindemann, 1905-1933; Gründgens, 1947-1955). The city has a long history of involvment with film, too. For instance the first German film journal „Der Kinematogaph“ began publishing here in 1907. Düsseldorf became after 1945 a distribution center and served for decades as site of all major German and foreign distributors‘ headquartes. It offers still a lot of cultural events: performing arts in different forms (theatre at the Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus, musical at the Capitol, opera and ballet at the German Opera Düsseldorf-Duisburg, dance at the Tanzhaus (Dance House) North Rhine-Westphalia, free and independant theatre groups, private theatres, cinema, media, museums, cultural institutions, representing other countries like France, Poland ..

The long and winding road : institutional and disciplinary repository at Saarland University and State Library

The article describes the Open Access archiving of scientific primary and secondary literature on the institutional and the disciplinary repository of the Saarland University and State Library. The challenges, opportunities and success factors of both repositories are compared and evaluated. The article is based on the findings and experiences of eight years of Open Access archiving practice. Basic requirements for success and acceptance are - quality control and standardisation; that could be proved for example by an official certificate, - visibility and dissemination; researchers emphasize that their documents are indexed by the databases most common within their community. This applies especially to disciplinary repositories. Universities should undoubtedly offer an institutional repository. Usually the university library runs this repository. The article lists some key points that should be considered when an organisation plans to start respectively run a institutional or disciplinary repository

EBSLG Annual General Conference, 18. - 21.05.2010, Cologne. Selected papers

Am 18.-21. Mai 2010 fand in der Universitäts- und Stadtbibliothek (USB) Köln die „Annual General Conference“ der European Business Schools Librarians Group (EBSLG) statt. Die EBSLG ist eine relativ kleine, aber exklusive Gruppe von Bibliotheksdirektorinnen und –direktoren bzw. Bibliothekarinnen und Bibliothekaren in Leitungspositionen aus den Bibliotheken führender Business Schools. Im Mittelpunkt der Tagung standen zwei Themenschwerpunkte: Der erste Themenkreis beschäftigte sich mit Bibliotheksportalen und bibliothekarischen Suchmaschinen. Der zweite Themenschwerpunkt Fragen der Bibliotheksorganisation wie die Aufbauorganisation einer Bibliothek, Outsourcing und Relationship Management. Der vorliegende Tagungsband enthält ausgewählte Tagungsbeiträge

Open all hours? Institutional models for open access

Conclusion: In H G Wells’s ‘Country of the Blind’ the “one-eyed man is king’, while Canadian author Margaret Atwood has said, “an eye for an eye only leads to more blindness”! Many in the academic community remain “blind” to OA issues and are often constrained in taking action by historical practices, and more importantly by reward systems, both perceived and real. They thus occupy the academic institutional “country of the blind”. Informed institutional leadership, combined with vibrant advocacy programmes and enhanced reward systems, is required for relevant eyes to be opened to the nature and benefits of OA. Institutions now have the chance to accelerate the OA scholarly communication process. Such “action does not require total agreement with the OA movement's beliefs and proposals, but it requires an active engagement with them.”(Bailey, 2005) This “engagement” with individual researchers in institutions will be the key to scholarly communication change

Technical alignment

This essay discusses the importance of the areas of infrastructure and testing to help digital preservation services demonstrate reliability, transparency, and accountability. It encourages practitioners to build a strong culture in which transparency and collaborations between technical frameworks are valued highly. It also argues for devising and applying agreed-upon metrics that will enable the systematic analysis of preservation infrastructure. The essay begins by defining technical infrastructure and testing in the digital preservation context, provides case studies that exemplify both progress and challenges for technical alignment in both areas, and concludes with suggestions for achieving greater degrees of technical alignment going forward