Feb 2012Teldap, Taipai1 Creativity, Collaboration, Convergence and the change from print to a digital environment: Theme and case study. (Also Friday 09:30 ECAI) Michael Buckland Electronic Cultural Atlas Initiative, and School of Information, University of California, Berkeley. Benefiting from the Work of Others

Feb 2012Teldap, Taipai2 If this scholar were working on the same topic as you, then you would want to share ideas, notes, and prior work – and ideally work in the same room! Benefiting from the Work of Others But sharing the same workspace is impractical for many reasons. Theme: How can we come close to this ideal?

Feb 2012Teldap, Taipai3 Benefiting from the Work of Others Sharing workspace is impractical for many reasons: Distance Institutional constraints Cost Inflexible Does not scale Time differences: Interests change. Researchers die! We converge and collaborate indirectly by depending on documents through publication and bibliography.

Feb 2012Teldap, Taipai4 A Case Study: Preparing Scholarly Editions The Humanities depend on access to historically important documents – which need explanation. Hence scholarly editions, including: Berkeley: Papers of Emma Goldman, , Anarchist. New York: Papers of Margaret Sanger, , birth control activist

Feb 2012Teldap, Taipai5 A Case Study: Documentary Editing Documentary editors prepare “editions” of documents (letters, diaries, and other writings) that value as evidence for political, intellectual or social history. Editors add explain the context (people, places, events) through notes and commentary. Documentary editions always have transcribed texts and explanatory notes. Sometimes chronologies and images of original documents. Sometimes explanatory essays on the background. This requires special expertise and extensive research for many years. Funding is difficult.

Feb 2012Teldap, Taipai6 A Case Study: Limitations of Print Editions Print editions are slow, expensive and require detailed research to provide contextual explanations as commentary, footnotes, etc. Editors make notes about evidence, reasoning and uncertainties. Publishers limit notes to lower cost reducing benefit from editors’ work.

Feb 2012Teldap, Taipai7 A Case Study: Preparing Scholarly Editions The same limitations apply with Sanger papers. Much of editors’ careful research is not made available. Goldman and Sanger were active in the same environment and interacted with the same people. So the editors’ work is duplicative as well as partly wasted. If only they could share the same offices! This duplication and waste extends to other related editorial projects also and scholars everywhere. Editors notes (evidence and reasoning) are mostly discarded.

Feb 2012Teldap, Taipai8 A Case Study: A Digital Remedy Save as.html ! Make editors’ notes available in full as early as possible on a webpage regardless of what happens in the eventual published edition. Immediately available. Indexed by Google, etc. Notes in memory or handwritten Notes, clippings, images. in folders, boxes, Brief notes in published volume Notes keyed or scanned Files in digital repositories Detailed notes rapidly web accessible More a change in work practice than a technical challenge. Published on the Web Published I deas Working notesNotes

Feb 2012Teldap, Taipai9 A Case Study: editorsnotes.org Documents --- Topics --- Notes

Feb 2012Teldap, Taipai10 A Case Study: Sample Editor’s Note

Feb 2012Teldap, Taipai11 Converge via Publication and Bibliography In practice we collaborate with the work of others by depending on documents through publication and bibliography. The Editors’ Notes project extend the notion of publication by making notes accessible – like the 19 th century Notes and queries. Notes are made across the Humanities: Archivists, translators, historians, curators,... Preserve the Notes as a ‘workshop’ – active or lightly hibernating. Reverse the relationship between notes and publications: Now publisher volumes are the result and notes are lost. Instead make Notes the primary resource, with published volumes as valuable by-products.

Feb 2012Teldap, Taipai12 Discover and Select the Work of Others Publication is not enough. Many different problems must be resolved before the work of others can be used: 1. Discovery: Does a suitable data set exist? 2. Location: Where is a copy? 3. Permission: May I use it? 4. Too deteriorated and/or obsolete to use? 5. Interoperability: Standardized enough to be usable? 6. Description: It is clear enough what the data represent? 7. Trust: Origin, lineage, version, and error rate acceptable? Modernized bibliography -- for description and selection.

Feb 2012Teldap, Taipai13 The Notes – Book Relationship So far, the published volumes are the only objective. When volumes published, the working notes are not saved. Working notes not kept. The book is only result.

Feb 2012Teldap, Taipai14 Reverse the Notes – Book Relationship ‘Publishing’ more of scholars’ working notes makes more of it is available for everyone to use. Notes on web More books by more people.

Feb 2012Teldap, Taipai15 Preserve the Workshop! Preserving the working notes allows the ‘workshop’ become a permanent resource with the books as by-products. A continuing Web accessible resource to be used and added to by other, later scholars elsewhere to generate future volumes. Working notes are everywhere in the Humanities: curators, archivists, translators, historians,... Harvest notes across many communities for ‘digital humanities.’ Source reference for linked data. The more the notes are made a primary resource the closer we -- converge on a work of others and -- can collaborate on shared resources.

Feb 2012Teldap, Taipai16 Liberate the notes! Expand ‘publication’ to notes Notes as a primary resource Expand ‘library’ Published volumes as derivative Modernize bibliography Preserve the ‘workshop’ Make work environment closer to a shared office (convergence), enable collaboration, and support creativity. More at ECAI workshop Friday 09:30. Agenda I thank the A. W. Mellon Foundation and of the Coleman Fung Foundation for support and the project collaborators. ecai.org/mellon2010 ecai.org/KnowledgeUnix editorsnotes.org