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Oregon State University and The Flickr Commons Experience 2009 February 27

There is an interesting news brief on The Chronicle of Higher Education Web site about Oregon State University releasing photo collections to Flickr Commons. While OSU already had the same images up on their own Flickr account for seven months they found significant usage increases after putting the photos on Flickr Commons. The article quotes Ms. Edmunson-Morton as saying “When we launched into the Commons, it was literally shocking: Our first week, we had 15,000 image views. And we hadn’t that many in our other Flickr account, total.” More information about the OSU Archives’ Flickr Commons Experience is available on their Web site.

I think using these places are a great way of providing content to users. Many universities, including the one I work at. have put many images in local digital library tools, but get no where the level of use as OSU’s photos are now seeing. I don’t see Flickr Commons as a preservation solution, but it is a great way to provide access to digital collections. Of course, there are many reasons, including copyright, why libraries can’t do this with all of there digital imagea, but it is something I hope more libraries start following OSU’s lead when possible.

Ma.gnolia data is lost 2009 February 21

At the beginning of the year, I wrote a post about the demise of JournalSpace. JournalSpace’s demise was caused because they lost all of the data on their database server and didn’t have an adequate backup. Well it has happened again to another Web 2.0 site: the social bookmarking site Ma.gnolia. While Ma.gnolia did have backups, they apparently were not keeping older copies of the backups. There was a data corruption issue on the server, and backing up bad data isn’t going to help when you have an issue. The person who ran Ma.gnolia, Larry Halff was interviewed by Citizen Garden and takes full responsibility and discusses what went wrong. It is a learning lesson for everyone in the Web 2.0 world.

While neither JournalSpace or Ma.gnolia were the biggest in their Web 2.0 niches, it is a big loss to users of these services. I am sure this will happen to other sites, so if you use these sites and you want to make sure you have perpetual access to your data,you need to make sure you have your one backups. Also, if you put one of these services up, make sure you have a proper backup strategy.

Facebook Privacy Kerfuffle 2009 February 19

Last week after an article on Consumerist.com brought up Facebook’s new Terms of Use (since rescinded), a bit of a kerfuffle ensued. Blogs were full of posts about how this was unacceptable and Facebook groups were formed to protest the change and some people even joined groups say they were going to delete their accounts if the policy wasn’t changed back (or to something else). For a good summary, see Katherine Lynch’s blog post about the situation.

For the most part, I just sat by on the sidelines and smiled. First off, although people didn’t like Facebook’s explanation, they were correct when they explained that section of the policy did say it was subject to a users privacy settings. More importantly, while I would like some things to be kept to my friends, it is just unrealistic to expect in this day and age. Maybe I shouldn’t by so cynical but the reality is that if you share stuff with people, you have to expect that it might get out.

I’m a realist to know that Facebook might find a way to use what I post for some reason, friends can see what I posted so they can share it, and also understand that Facebook is a big target for hackers. Thus, there is nothing that makes me believe anything I post will remain private. I understand this is a trade-off for using this service. With that in mind I don’t post anything I don’t expect others to see. I can understand that might feel only slightly comforting to some, but it is good enough for me.

Also, and probably more importantly, I believe in Open Access. With that in mind, I have no problem with people using the content I post in other ways. In fact about the only thing this latest kerfuffle has changed with my actions on Facebook is that I have decided to explixitly license the my original content that I post on Facebook under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States. I am also doing the same with my Twitter account. My ‘dents’ on Identi.ca, like all data on the service, continues to be available under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license.

PALINET & SOLINET Merger Approved 2009 February 6

I don’t think it was really surprising to anyone that PALINET & SOLINET merger has been approved (PDF). Maybe the initial announcement of the plan was, but at this point I think most of us following it were not surprised by the vote (95% in favor).

I don’t know any more about the merger than any other outsider, but I think the combined PALINET & SOLINET, which will be called Lyrasis, will be a force to be reckoned with. As Library Journal points out, their “combined resources, shared expertise, and improved operating efficiencies to achieve rapid implementation of new programs; greater consortia savings opportunities; extended networking and collaboration among members; innovative technology solutions; and an expanded education curriculum/”

What I wonder is how with this combined mega-organization effect other Regional Service Providers/Cooperatives such as NELINET, NYLINK and MLC? Lyrasis’ vision statement calls for a “regional base and national scope” and says that Lyrasis “will be an acknowledged leader – regionally and nationally – in innovation, collaboration, and effective support for libraries and cultural heritage organizations in helping them fulfill their education, information, and community-building missions.” (emphasis mine)

With online learning and new ICTs they will be able to offer training and other programs and services nationally. Will the smaller regions be able to compete in this environment? Long gone are the days of being the middle-man between OCLC and member libraries was sufficient for these service providers. While it may still be a significant function of regional providers, additional revenue streams and business models are necessary. Will the smaller regions be able to do this alone, or will they have to join with each other, or merger in with a larger group such as Lyrasis? Only time will tell, but there are many challenges (and opportunities) ahead for these organizations.