Coalition for Networked Information 2008 - kickoff
I attended the kickoff session of this year's fall CNI meeting in Washington D.C.. Some of what follows are direct quotes from Cliff Lynch's comments, other comments are my own. If what you read is brilliant, it is right from Cliff's mouth. Anything questionable is my paraphrasing.
Cliff separated his comments into two categories: advances in information and advances in information technology infrastructure.
Cliff commented on the emphasis placed upon areas such as escience and cyberscience - embodied in the U.S. by the NSF Datanet solicitation. It was recognized that what is proposed by Datanet must be met by equal investments at the campus level. Datanet might expose a "last mile" set of challenges at the campus level. We were challenged to think about and act on those gaps. It was recognized that federated identity management would be a linchpin upon which the success of such endeavors depends. The future of InCommon is of critical importance to these kinds of initiatives.
At the lowest layers of the stack, it was recognized that a 10Gb backbone seems so "last year." Backbones are pressing into the 100Gb level - with some applications requiring the capabilities of dedicated waves to facilitate the type of sharing and movement necessary for discovery.
There was a recognition of advancement in object reuse, which will enable us to move from repository as stovepipe to an ecosystem of repositories. These advances are important for integration into eresearch and authoring workflows.
New policy issues are taking on a growing emphasis. Ownership of information by nations, tribes, churches - sometimes with an orientation towards reparation and restoration of cultural heritage is taking on a new intensity and will have an impact and come from a different place than traditional copyright discussions.
Mandates for access to information that are both campus based and agency based will shape our services and policies. These conversations all move forward steadily and require some observation by campus leaders. This begs the broader issue of faculty working together in advancement of the common good, sometimes institutional, sometimes national or beyond.
There was time spend thinking about activities "below the surface."
Everyone recognizes and is even tired about the web2.0 buzz (interactivity, user generated content). Yet this has great impact in how we host dialogue about sharing collections. Where is that conversation to be hosted? The Library of Congress' Flickr hosted projects were cited as an example of moving that hosting in hopes of greater fidelity of information. Interestingly, oral historians might be a resource for learning what's right and wrong here. What do public access interfaces look like? Text mining trends raise interesting access and policy issues. What does it mean to have someone compute on a collection as well as read it? Libraries need to be thinking about this.
It was recognized that cyberlearning is more than "just" the conversation about open educational resources. Where are the boundaries between access and learning? This line will stand to get more confusing than clearer in the near term. Large scale lecture capture can be a driver as there are unclear goals in doing this capture, but there are real outcomes we don't yet fully understand.
The nature of the digital library is changing. In the beginning, digital libraries were mostly in the digitization of existing collections. Critical mass and scholarly demand begs for "re-unification" of themes, discipline specific themes. The can of worms lies in sustainability and responsibility. The scientific sphere is a place where this happening too. Both mergers and fragmentation are being observed here.
We're at a time that it would be fair to look at the institutional repository. Have they succeeded? have they fallen short? Now is probably a fair point in time to take a look at them in this manner.
Cloud storage is something to pay attention to. The hype:reality ratio needs to be understood, however, when thinking about this solution.
Lastly, the current economic climate was discussed. Networked information can make a difference in these difficult times. Maybe we should think about fund raising for the building of access, not just buildings (here here!). Belt tightening should inspire us to collaborate, not withdrawal and protect. We also need to do thoughtful and do tough triage on what's to be preserved. It is a a time to think about doing things radically less expensively, as well. Cliff has spent a lot of time thinking about sustainability as has NSF, Mellon, JISC, etc. Bottom line is that institutional passion for preservation is a requirement going forward. In a related line of thinking, the new administration should consider knowledge, educational and cultural infrastructure as a way to help stimulate recovery as much as it is thinking about civic infrastructures. What would the Civilian Conservation Corps look like for knowledge, educational and cultural infrastructure improvement?
This is only my second CNI meeting, but I find myself enjoying how it is it forces me to think differently about data, in all aspects.
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