Another catch-up post

Time for a catch-up. It's been quite a while, after all (umm, not counting the Ithaka post I wrote whilst failing to finish this one), and though I've got a bunch of drafts waiting they'll never come to anything so here goes with a bunch of things that have happend or caught my eye recently-ish.

• Didn't get a job. Went for one, lucky enough to be interviewed, didn't clear that hurdle but did learn a bit along the way. Firstly, I really need to get more structured project management experience. Secondly, gotta calibrate my confidence gauge correctly. Am I accurately putting across what I'm capable of? Do I really know what I'm capable of? I don't want a job I'm unable to perform well but I do want to be stretched; it's a fine line and I think the employer is vital in assessing this question but they need the most accurate information to decide this (rather than bullshit), but equally I need to be able to assess myself objectively. For when the next job comes up.


• Did get some help. Back in June we finally got me some help from Julia Fernee, a contractor (at present) with a museum/art background and whizzo tech skills who's just a god-send (hope that doesn't compromise my agnostic credentials). Julia's been working on the LAARC access system, which is one of those systems that's been broken since our Mimsy upgrade in late '07. She's worked methodically through the system fixing all the routines and various bugs, enabling downloads of digital archives (yay!), auditing, documenting, unf***ing stuff. We're going to look at the whole data access layer next and rebuild it in a proper service-orientated way, so that we can finally start re-using that amazing resource in other places and ultimately offer a public API. All assuming we can keep JF for long enough.


• Got a boss. I posted before about Antony Robbins joining MOL. He started earlier this month and now we in the web team (i.e. Bilkis and I) need to start thinking of ourselves really as part of the Communication department. It's hard - we still sit with our old IT buds most of the time - but they're a good lot in Comms and there's an enthusiasm for e-marketing and social media. At the same time a number of other things are happening that hopefully bode well. These include MOL taking the first steps to a proper digital (or is it web?) strategy; the creation of a "digital museum manager" post to lead our team; and the initiation of a social media group with participants from many departments.


• MOLA and Nomensa. We had a very useful review of the MOL Archaeology website from Nomensa. We were well aware of many of the problems but having some fresh eyes to help develop ideas on how to solve them is really helpful. They also picked up various points we'd not really noticed. Lots of the issues relate to our complicated new brand, which has made confusing messages almost inevitable; nevertheless we can do better.


• Open Repository. I went over to Gray's Inn Road to talk to the folks at BioMed about Open Repository, which hosts a never-realised-but-still-paid-for repository that was intended to provide an OAI gateway for some PNDS data. They were wondering (rather honourably I thought) whether we fancied making anything of the investment. It seemed like a good chance to reduce my ignorance of exactly how repository software fits into the general scheme, its overlap with e.g. DAMS and so on. There's a nest of problems in our Collections Online Delivery System that such software might play a part in addressing, but equally it will be but one part of the architecture and does it fit better than alternatives, or a custom-made "black box" (see below)? I learnt a lot, but haven't reached a resolution yet.


• CODS. So, speaking of CODS, we struggle on. Can I bear to go into it now? Not really. We're getting closer to defining the edges of the bit we can't define (the "Black Box") but whether anyone will want to build it for us, or think we're anything other than insane for proposing it, is another matter. The Black Box, by the way, is the part that takes data from multiple sources and aggregates it, but also enables its enrichment via the creation of new associated content and relationships between entities. It doesn't have to do the discover part or offer many services but it does have to offer a reasonable authoring/management interface. It's not a hole that seems to fit any off-the-shelf software, so as I say perhaps we're simply stupid to dig that hole in the first place.
  Anyway, deadlines loom and something must congeal before then. Should be a laugh seeing what it is. Oh god.
  
• IT dead people. I'm helping to put together a proposal for a project I won't be able to give details of as yet, but it's an interesting opportunity to wed multiple strands of archaeological/historical research with popular interests, notably family history.


• MCN2009. I'm honoured to have been invited to present a paper for which I submitted an abstract, it seems like an age ago. MCN2009 takes place in Portland, Oregon in November - again, seems like an age away but I'd better not leave it too long before I get scribbling in earnest. I'm very excited, both to be asked there and by the paper itself, which I think should be quite fun to write.
  
• Went to Paris in the the spring. Well, June, when I tripped over to IRLIS (next to the Pompidou Centre) for a Europeana meeting to develop API requirements. It was an interesting exercise and I think we made progress with evolving ideas for end-uses and for figuring out priorities. One of the most important things to work out is how to intertwine the API build with that of the internal architecture, so that we can make best use of what's going to be built anyway.
  

I think that covers most of it for now. Still awake at the back?

IMLS looks to the future

Once again, kudos to Nina Simon for her latest post, Notes from the Future: Reflections on the IMLS Meeting on Museums and Libraries in the 21st Century. I have to admit I've not read it thoroughly yet but (a) there's lots going on in the IMLS study that overlaps with my research interests and (b) as usual, she has a pretty strong take on it and interesting things to say, and it's productive perhaps to triangulate between her strong perspective and the equally strong conservative perspective she cites. Have a look. If I have time I'll try to digest it properly and give a proper response - both here and on her blog since they want our thoughts (perhaps even non-US thoughts...)

Slicing the market

To follow up my recent posts on the 21st century museum and the National Collections Online feasibility study, here's a little more about the question of how funds are allocated by bodies like HLF, and how come we've tended to see them requiring digitisation projects to run from end to end, from digitisation to web publication.



I don't really know enough about the programmes that were run in the past like, for example, NOF Digitise and the HLF (still funding today). However from the projects that I do know that drew on these funding streams, it seems clear enough that concentrating on digitisation per se was never enough - a user-facing product was expected. These did have a sort of aggregated interface (http://www.enrichuk.net/, now pointing at MICHAEL UK) but not really what I've got in mind.



It's quite understandable that this practice persists, indeed there is a good case for it. For funders, they want to see direct user impacts, and a website that can generate stats is nice for that. For museums, well they have a two-fold role - to hold and to document their collections; and to research and interpret them for various audiences. Naturally, then, there will be forces within them urging them to do something with the stuff they digitise, and do it now. The downside is that this has led to fragmentation of the materials digitised for these programmes.



My argument is that for modest sized projects it's not good to spread yourself too thinly trying to do everything, but instead to concentrate on part of the value chain. It's a straighforward architectural thing, and essentially I've realised that I'm just asking for a shift in the assumptions of funding bodies from demanding vertical slices to demanding (contributions to) horizontal slices - in short, to encourage the building of a strong sector-wide layered architecture. Vertical businesses deal in multiple (if not all) links in the chain from production to consumption. This is not really suited to much of what we do. Indeed even behemoths like Amazon don't yet do this (though they a strategically building out from their core business) - they don't actually write books or commission, edit and publish them, print them, or market them, or at the other end deliver them. They flog 'em and dispatch them, and act as an agent for others to do the same.

It's crazy to ask, as a precondition for funding, that a museum or partnership does the whole chain from digitisation and record enhancement, to search engine development, perhaps aggregating records, through to building the user experience as a website, a game etc. Things get done again and again and again, effects are diluted, money wasted. Lots of good stuff will still be made, of course. I don't know what this horizontal architecture would be like, though just possibly we can see parts of it falling into place with PNDS and the Integrated Architecture, and I don't know to what degree it would play a part in many projects in which UK museums engage, but I'm just suggesting that instead of HLF, for one, getting hung up on projects doing the whole end-to-end thing they should support us in coming up with a model to slice the market differently, working on one step at a time, and recognising that the very process of creating the digitised content is a valuable step that is somewhat independent of the creation of an audience-facing instance of it. Vertical slices make silos.

For more on slicing and dicing see here. Shalom.

The slightly better shape we're in

Well one thing I didn't mention yesterday was the good news, which is that Friday saw the official launch internally of a new set of guidelines for "digital programmes". This is something that Pete had been working on for some time, doing exactly what I've been arguing for from the point of view of planning, not just for current usefulness, but for longevity. That is, he makes explicit links between the strategic and business aims of the organisation, and our digital activities. From there he turns this into a set of principles or activities that must be followed/carried out by "any member of staff considering the creation of a digitally based resource either as an item in its own right or in support of an exhibition, publicity campaign or event ". It's a very thoughtful document and a really big step for us. In fact it's pretty big full stop - 25 pages big.

Another part of the document outlines the planned ICT committee (heavy on the web), and gives a dozen strategic considerations that underlie the document such as centralised programme assessment, interoperability, technical fit, and some interesting ones like flexibility, which relates to the ability of potential partners to respond to our needs.

There's plenty more in there. There are still holes to fill, but I'm hopeful that this document will make a difference to how commissioning takes place from now on, with fewer nasty surprises for us and better allocation of resources for all.