From David Rothman: “‘So,’ in effect argue some supporters of the Digital Public Library of America, the promising library initiative hosted by Harvard’s Berkman Center, ‘why can’t the DPLA actually be the public library system online? We’ll never get a good one otherwise.’ I disagree.”
In the two videos embedded here Darnton also considers what this proposed library would mean for scholars in the humanities and history in particular.
“Last December, the Sloan Foundation funded an initiative to study this proposal in earnest, and the Digital Public Library of America committee began meeting at Harvard’s Berkman Center for Internet and Society.”
Robert Darnton has championed the concept of a national digital public library through a series of galvanizing essays in The New York Review of Books.
“On December 13, 2010, the Berkman Center for Internet and Society announced that the Center is hosting an initiative for a Digital Public Library of America involving a large and diverse group of stakeholders to define the scope, architecture, costs and administration for a proposed Digital Public Library of America.”
“Although librarians have been interested in creating a more expansive digital library for about 15 years, progress in mass digitization now is making this a more viable goal, said Maura Marx, a fellow with the Berkman Center for Internet and Society and executive director of the Open Knowledge Commons.”
“In case you haven’t noticed, public libraries are moving from being a place about products – books and magazines – to being a place about process – learning and creativity. In this transition, it makes sense for different branches of a public library system to develop different specialties.”
From David Rothman: “The library should serve not just the needs of academics, researchers, and lovers of high culture.”
“In October 2010, Robert Darnton, the historian and university librarian at Harvard, talked to Wired Campus about the possibility of building what was then being described as a National Digital Library.”
“Harvard University’s Berkman Center for Internet and Society has announced it will research and plan an initiative to construct a ‘Digital Public Library of America’ with funding from the Sloan Foundation.”
