eRecords Project

What is the Library doing on Pinterest?

Thu, 02 May 2013 12:54:46 +1000

We ran a working group of library staff for 12 weeks with a brief to explore Pinterest, engage with the Pinterest community, and evaluate Pinterest’s potential to help us deliver services and facilitate access to our collections.

Pinterest is a website that allows users to create virtual pin boards of their favourite images and to interact with other pinners and their selections.

ASSESS

Pinterest was chosen because it is a popular social media resource in the Australian community, with more than 630,000 people each month using it[1], there were other cultural institutions using it (eg. Europeana, Getty and British Library) and it seemed to be a good match for displaying the Library’s digitised photographs and other services.

There were a number of risks and issues we had to consider and manage, including copyright – we used photographs prior to 1955 which are usually out of copyright[2] and images on publishers websites with a “Pin It” button indicating implied permission to pin images. We cited details of copyright owners and in some cases contacted copyright owners to ask permission to pin their images (eg Book Art). In representing the Library online we also consider our reputation – when choosing boards and accounts to follow and items to repin, we always keep in mind that this is an implied endorsement by the Library.

EXPLORE

As part of the working group we established three accounts: one for most Library collections and services , and separate accounts for services that have specific client groups: Druginfo and Multicultural services.

We have pinned a variety of images and links to Pinterest, including:

a “reading list” of books set, published or written in NSW
our research guides and resources (including Family History and HSC students and teachers)
links to Hot Topics and Find Legal Answers
boards to support our exhibitions (eg Greatest Wonder)
resources relevant to our learning programs (Seeking Shakespeare, Antarctica Uncovered, Early Explorers)
images to showcase the Library spaces, services and environment
boards showcasing many items from our collections
of course, our mascot Trim has his own board!

We tried to promote the library spaces and services as well as collection items, expanding the ways we could use Pinterest. We also tried to challenge the stereotype that Pinterest was mostly of interest to women.

ENGAGE

The “group boards” feature in Pinterest allows multiple users to pin to a single board. We have extended an invitation to NSW public library staff to join our group board “Books in NSW”.
We deliberately pinned library fan photos from instagram (we were inspired by the Insta-Getty board to try this idea)
Repins from our boards continue to grow steadily to more than 1100 to April 2013.
Our most popular board continues to be HSC resources, targeting high school students and their teachers.

EVALUATE

We monitored how many people interacted with our pins via liking, repinning and commenting. This helps us to estimate the return on investment for the time involved and the reach into the community.
Team members wrote an article for ALIA’s Incite magazine about using Pinterest and Historypin for community engagement around the Library’s collections.
With limited access to analytical tools to measure virality, we couldn’t measure how many times something that is repinned from our boards was repinned further. It would be interesting to know where some of our pins end up.
We are continuing to use Pinterest in different ways and an interesting example is promoting the Jean Arnot Memorial Fellowship.

References:

Barwick, K. and A. Reddacliff, V. Tracey (2013 March) "Pin-pointing Communities: The NSW State Library's Innovation Project", Incite Volume 34 Issue 3 p. 22

[1] http://www.socialmedianews.com.au/social-media-statistics-australia-april-2013/

[2] http://www.copyright.org.au/find-an-answer/browse-by-what-you-do/photographers/

Small pieces loosely joined - developing a strategy for online engagement

Mon, 04 Feb 2013 09:27:56 +1000

It can appear that social media in an organisation is a lot of small pieces loosely joined, a variety of channels and disparate audiences focussing on different formats and niche interests. But online engagement, reaching out to target audiences and allocating resources to support our interaction with those online communities, effectively coordinating and cross promoting activities and campaigns online and onsite, and measuring effectiveness are critical pieces of an online engagement strategy.

“You’ve got to think about big things while you’re doing small things,
so that all the small things go in the right direction.” (Alvin Toffler)

SCALING UP FOR THE FUTURE

An added dimension for the State Library is the large scale digitisation project, Digital Excellence. Through this project we will have a rapidly increasing amount of material that will be available via our virtual reading room, just as through the eRecords Project we are drastically increasing the online catalogue access to our collections. Our online engagement will need to scale up to promote many more collections and to meet the growing demand of clients and communities. As part of the Digital Excellence project, the Library is developing a whole of Library web and new media strategy. In 2012 the Innovation Project leaders recognised a need for a strategy that sits within the larger whole, one that focuses on what we aim to achieve through using social media channels to deliver library services and engage with our communities.

We found some excellent articles, blog posts and books on the topic (see the reading list below) but we also wanted to build the capacity of our staff to be involved in online engagement and to see how it could be a useful part of their own work and incorporated in planning future activities. Good ideas can come from many different places in a large and diverse organisation like ours, so we also need a shared understanding of what we mean by online engagement in social media spaces and how we make it happen.

DIGITAL ENGAGEMENT FRAMEWORK

While exploring these ideas we stumbled upon a blog post by Jasper Visser introducing the concept of a Digital Engagement Framework. Although it was primarily developed for museums, the Library has a lot in common with other collecting institutions and the framework appeared to translate well to the Library’s environment.

We were fortunate to have the opportunity for Library staff to attend a two day workshop exploring Digital Engagement with Jasper in November 2012. The workshop was a two day journey through the digital engagement framework, exploring it in the context of our Library, our assets (collections), our audiences (clients and communities) and learning about a range of social media tools that could be used, metrics that could apply, and lessons learned from other social media campaigns, both best practice and cautionary tales.

This framework now forms one part of our overall web and new media strategy for the Library, but perhaps more importantly has given us a common language to describe our intentions in planning online engagement and the way we will go about it.

Australia Day - World War I ephemera

Wed, 16 Jan 2013 14:04:47 +1000

In the lead up to the 100th anniversary, there is a lot of interest in World War I related ephemera. A recent eRecords find, in a collection of photographs by mid-20th century commercial photographers Bradford Pty Ltd, is a programme for an ‘Australia Day’ fund raising event held in 1915.

The dinner and show was held on ‘Australia Day’, 30th July 1915, a national day for raising funds for the war that was first proposed by Mrs Ellen (Ellie) Wharton-Kirke of Manly, NSW following the Galliopoli campaign. At that time, the day we know as Australia Day on January 26 was known as Foundation Day.

This fund raising theatre dinner must have been quite an occasion. The program included music ’Your King and Country Need You’, ‘Australian National Song’ and perhaps surprisingly, ‘The Marriage Market’ as well as a rather unusual menu of ‘West Australian Real Turtle Soup’, ‘Roast Corn-fed Bathurst Turkey and ‘Prime Ballarat Ham’.

Photograph: Ben Woods

Catalogue: Pictorial material from the Bradford family papers, ca. 1898-1949

Digital engagement ... lessons from the front

Wed, 19 Dec 2012 14:47:16 +1000

The announcement by Instagram of a change in terms of service unleashed a huge reaction from #igers (Instagram users) and the broader community alike. It resulted in a carefully worded message from Kevin Systrom, Instagram's co-founder a day later.

Many libraries, museums, archives and galleries use social media tools for digital engagement with their clients and the community. Due diligence includes monitoring the shifting sands of terms of service in this space and active risk management but there are other aspects of digital engagement and lessons to note:

Inter-dependencies:

Large scale digitisation of assets in cultural institutions means objects have their own addresses on the internet. In the best case scenario these addresses would be persistent identifiers that can be relied on in a linked open data world. Many clients will use these addresses to reference items in digital research, online publications and to build their own tools and interfaces. (eg. Dr Tim Sherratt’s work mining the treasures of the Trove Australian newspaper database)

A change to the URLs assigned to digital assets, due to a change of domain or content management system, could cause a cascading problem with broken links. Instacanv.as, a company that allows Instagram users to create canvas versions of their own photographs responded to the changes at Instagram with an announcement of their own.

Community "ownership":

The #igers community reacted swiftly and expressed their anger and dissatisfaction with the changes to the Instagram community they regarded as their own. Libraries host and interact with more and more online communities in social media forums and through crowdsourcing projects.

The sense of ownership and engagement in these communities may also generate large scale client / community reaction to decisions and changes to services, requiring careful handling, effective communication and online community management. Changes may also drive dissatisfied community members to leave the community or disengage with the institution.

Communication wildfire and back burning:

The speed with which the Instagram news travelled around the internet burning up Twitter, news feeds and even resulting in posts to Flickr was astonishing. It's also a global world so the waves of distress and outrage swept around the world, echoing back and forth in different time zones. This means that often people react to a tweet or message in their own ecosystem without checking if there has been an update.

Posting accurate information in multiple forums at intervals seems to be the only possible way to fight this type of communication situation. Actively using the hashtags that are employed in the conversation will also help in getting the message out. Including the hashtag could have made the tweet from Instagram acknowledging the debate and an upcoming announcement automatically part of the global conversation.

The future:

The outcome of the changes at Instagram are still being played out, and could affect institutions like Brooklyn Museum, Museum Victoria and Queens Library who currently use Instagram to engage and communicate with their communites ... but that remains to be seen.

Remember who you are ... representing your Library brand online

Tue, 04 Dec 2012 10:44:53 +1000

Social media presents many opportunities for libraries to promote collections, events, exhibitions and services online. But as many people have noted, social media is “free like puppies, not free like beer” (source unknown), it requires resourcing and the staff who are involved in representing their organisation online need guidance and support.

Being an active social media user in a private capacity as well as operating official accounts can challenge staff as they switch between their personal and corporate identities, with different principles to guide their actions online. Social media policies are an important part of this framework and there are some additional considerations in representing your brand online which we address in online engagement training for staff.

The Library has a clear ‘brand’ and identity onsite and online. Although our social media spaces are hosted by third parties, any official library accounts must represent our brand in a positive and consistent way. This includes a clear image of the corporate logo[1], clearly identifying our organisation and linking back to our official website and all policies that apply. Some social media tools allow for a branded channel (eg. Historypin – State Library of NSW Channel) while others allow for a minimal description and links (eg. Pinterest – State Library of NSW Channel and Twitter – State Library of NSW Channel).

In social media spaces our ‘brand’ is also indicated by our tone. For example, Twitter uses a more playful, abbreviated style of communication. Our team follow those norms but ensure our links are accurate and nothing we say or link to is out of step with our brand. Our colleagues at the National Library of New Zealand demonstrate this really well with their quirky and fun #tbreaktweets to highlight some of the more unusual items in their photographic collections, while we join in the weekly challenge of #collectionfishing with other collecting institutions and photographic archives.

The key for Library staff to keep in mind is fairly simple … “Remember who you are” by which we mean remember that you are:

a Government employee:

be honest, polite and considerate
be apolitical and impartial when using social media for official purposes
demonstrate public sector values (respect, integrity, fairness and responsibility)[2]

a Library professional:

clarify the query if necessary
check sources and links
cite sources and link to the permanent link or persistent identifier wherever possible
update when new information becomes available
understand the application of copyright and Creative Commons online

a Library employee:

responsible for representing the Library within the scope of your role
use sound judgement in social media spaces as you do in other aspects of your work
refer to the subject experts in the Library when a topic is beyond your knowledge and area of expertise
know the correct protocols for responding and reporting an online incident
understand the importance of a quick response in online environments
be aware of media embargoes that apply to upcoming events and promotions

Library staff have a wealth of experience and expertise interacting with clients to draw on when interacting in the online environment. With some guidance, learning to implement policies and procedures in cooperation with colleagues in the media and communications team allows us to manage our brand in the social media space across multiple social media channels.

For further information contact:

Mylee Joseph, Innovation Project mjoseph@sl.nsw.gov.au or Vanessa Bond, Media and Communications vbond@sl.nsw.gov.au

[1] Wilkerson, D (2012, November 12) The Ultimate Complete Final Social Media Sizing Cheat Sheet http://www.lunametrics.com/blog/2012/11/12/final-social-media-sizing-cheat-sheet/

[2] NSW Department of Trade and Investment – Social Media Policy http://www.trade.nsw.gov.au/policy/TI-A-124 [Accessed 3 December 2012]

Not so light reading!

Fri, 26 Oct 2012 14:37:35 +1000

Most of the interesting discoveries during the eRecords Project pass through the hands of the teams working on original materials – the pictures, manuscripts and realia collections.

So how lucky was one of our newest team members, creating records for the heritage Mitchell Printed Book Collection when he picked up No-white by Francis Osowski.

The book cover is metal and the pages aluminium – definitely not something to carry around in your pocket for light reading on the train or bus.

Photos courtesy of Sue Thomas

The social life of photographs: where, when and what happened?

Mon, 15 Oct 2012 15:51:00 +1000

The State Library of NSW has more than 1 million photographs in our collection, including the earliest known photograph taken in Australia (1845). The Library also has a Flickr Commons account where many of our images can be viewed. In the process of testing social media tools for delivering library services we thought Historypin offered something different. The Historypin interface is built on Google maps and features a timeline, allowing the viewer to explore photographs from a variety of sources geographically and to travel through time.

EXPLORE:

State Library joined many other libraries, archives and museums on Historypin in August 2012 and a small team of staff set out to explore all of the features it had to offer:

Photos pinned on location (eg. images of the Library and the Sydney Harbour Bridge)
Photos pinned onto Street View
Experiencing Historypin on location via smartphone apps, walking in the shoes of our clients
“then and now” images known as repeats (eg. the Sydney GPO)
creating virtual walking tours through locations (eg. Historic Pubs of Sydney, building the Sydney Harbour Bridge)
Collections draw together photographs around a theme (eg. Theatres in NSW, ships and harbours, an alternate view of Sydney through the buildings that never were)

ENGAGE:

We have engaged with other institutions via Historypin by including some of their images in tours and collections but the most elusive aspect of the project has proved to be generating online engagement with the wider community. We still hope that the community will add their stories, memories and experiences to our images.

EVALUATE:

The data we will be considering in our evaluation includes:

Library inputs - staff time and collection items pinned
Historypin measures of engagement - views, fans, repeats, stories
Google analytics - click throughs to the State Library's official website
Qualitative feedback from the working group members and other stakeholders

HISTORYPIN HIGHLIGHTS:

Throughout the project a number of images were flagged as #PINOFTHEDAY other highlights are featured in these slides.

Historypin highlights October 2012 from SLNSW_Innovation_Project

For further information contact Mylee Joseph.

200,000 more eRecords ... and what we're doing with them

Fri, 13 Jul 2012 15:28:53 +1000

The 200,000 eRecords we created in 2011/12 takes the overall total to over 1 million records - a major milestone which we celebrated in April.

Nearly all the Library's pictures and more than 90% of the Mitchell Library's heritage books now have electronic records. This year we've begun to tackle the Library's small but significant oral history collection and are continuing with records for the manuscripts. With so much of the collection now electronically accessible, we're turning our attention to making the most of the eRecords.

The Innovation Project is building on the records being created within the eRecords project and piloting new social-media based services. The new services will sit alongside our Facebook, Twitter and Flickr presences, and may be available either via the State Library website or through online communities where Library clients spend time. Our first pilot will be with Historypin.

Project Leader Mylee Joseph will be posting regularly about new services as they are launched so watch this space - you can also follow Mylee on Twitter.

Cook books with more

Thu, 05 Jul 2012 15:47:04 +1000

Cook books are enduring favourites in library collections even though, as the Sydney Morning Herald reported, 21st century cooks are certainly experimenting with other ways of getting their recipe fixes.

The eRecords team has been working with some fascinating cookbooks from the early 1900s. Titles such as The Keeyuga cookery book show how old cook books deliver so much more than recipes. Inside the eye catching cover we find out what people ate, how they cooked it and the kind of foods available at the time.

But the cook books also include ads about the types of technology that people were using to prepare their food ...

and of course the recipes … this particular book will set you straight on how to turn a sheep’s head into a tasty dish to be served hot or cold.

NSW Parish Maps

Fri, 13 Jan 2012 15:58:21 +1000

Over 14,000 New South Wales parish maps are now electronically accessible via eRecords. Produced by the NSW Lands Department between approximately 1860 and 1990, parish maps contain details of land ownership in New South Wales and are a very useful resource for local historians and genealogists. You can find them by searching with the phrase Parish maps of New South Wales.

Some 400 of the parish maps are already available in digital form. Catalogue records contain links to the digital versions either at the State Library of NSW or at the National Library of Australia – for example, see maps for Parish of Jugiong, county of Harden, 1906 and Parish of Wolgan, county of Cook, 1930.

Next up for the eRecords Maps team are 528 NSW county maps and 2300 town maps. The county maps show land holdings at a smaller scale than parish maps – a great tool for research into rural properties stretching back to the 1850s – whereas the town maps detail land ownership in town centres at a larger scale than that shown on parish maps.