NEWS The National Library of Sweden has granted SEK 237,000 in project funding to Umeå University for the internet-based digitalisation of old books during 2010.
The goal is to - as part of a pilot project - test, implement and evaluate a new model of research-driven digitalisation. The project idea is to open all non-copyrighted collections for online orders via the common library catalogues. The books will be digitised and sent as PDF files to the user. In other words, the customers - researchers, will decide what books should be converted to electronic form.
"The preface is a system which is currently exists at around 20 European libraries in the eBooks on Demand (EOD) project. We will be the first Swedish participant, and the hope is that our involvement will inspire more libraries in the Nordic region" says Mats Danielsson, Head of Research Archives, Umeå University Library.
The EOD service is fee-based but subsidised, and the results are incorporated later into the library's digital collections (open access).
"We see the project as an important complement to more large-scale digitisation efforts," says Christer Karlsson, Project Coordinator at Umeå University Library. "Expansion provides us with an opportunity for researchers to clarify the management of our selection for digitisation. It also gives researchers and students access to books from other libraries, old books which are not normally accessible only for reading on site, and then often only in special monitored reading rooms," he continues.
The project partly includes investigating what actions are necessary to adapt EOD to the Swedish system with regards to language, and that standards are followed for digitisation and organisation of workflow. A central part of the project is to integrate the ordering function in the leading catalogue systems - Aleph and IPAC - for automated ordering procedures.
Contact Persons:Christer Karlsson, Project Coordinator, Umeå University Library
E-mail: christer.karlsson@ub.umu.sePhone: +46 (0)90-786 98 84
Mobile: +46 (0)70-699 66 23
Mats Danielsson, Head of Research Archives, Umeå University Library
E-mail: mats.danielsson@foark.umu.sePhone: +46 (0)90-786 66 44
eBooks on Demand
Editor: David Meyers