The topic for the final blog posting for this course concerns digitization and its benefits to libraries. Wikipedia contains a listing of digital library projects from accross the globe (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_digital_library_projects).
Digitization refers to the act of making unique and rare collections of information available to patrons on the Internet. Libraries use vendors to obtain published electronic materials. Archival materials such as manuscripts, photographs, personal letters, pamphlets, historical documents and maps are generally only accessible by physcially visiting an archive but there has been a signifcant increase in the past few years to digitize this information in turn making it accessible for years to come. It is a way of preserving rare and uniqure information before the documents reach a stage of disrepair. Digital collections are great for foreign researchers who cannot visit the location but can browse freely on the World Wide Web.
I am currently working in a contractual position at The Rooms Provincial Archives so I decided to use The Rooms website (http://www.therooms.ca/) for this blog. The Rooms houses three organizations: The Provicial Archives, The Provincial Art Gallery, and The Provincial Museum. Each of these divisions have a section on their homepage for digital exhibits. For example the The Provincial Art Gallery has two searchable exhibits: The Shepherds: Two Lives in Art and Christopher Pratt: Drawing From Memory. These digital exhibits are exceptionally well put together and organized with textual documents, photographs, timelines, glossaries, links and a contact section.
Where I work in the Archives we use an electronic database called Web GenCat to compile all of our files. Patrons can browse our collections online using this great database.
In conclusion, I truly believe that digitization is a fascinating tool for libraries to use to preserve and maintain original documents in a safe storage space on the Internet. Original documents can become very worn out after being handled so often that digitizing materials makes them accessible for generations to come.
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November 19, 2010
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