The Year of Blogging Vigorously:

Digital Preservation and Social Media Outreach

William G. LeFurgyJune 2012

@blefurgy

17th Brazilian Conference of Archival Science

XVII Congresso Brasileiro de Arquivologia

STANDARD DISCLAIMER NOTICE

These are my personal opinions only!

Archives and Other Cultural Heritage Institutions Are Concerned about the Future

The Very Nature of Information Has Changed

All around us

Cheap or free

Shaped and controlled by consumers and networks

Designed for sharing, participation and feedback

Immediate

Embedded in our worlds

Scarce

Expensive

Shaped and controlled by elites

Designed for one-way, mass consumption

Slow moving

External to our worlds

Information was…

Information is…

Challenge of Preserving Digital Information

From ALA:

Confronting the Future

Strategic Visions for

the 21st Century

Public Library

Available at

www.ala.org

The Library of the Not-Too-Distant

Future

“Traditional” Archival Work

Positivist in approach:

• The archivist is impartial

• The archival record is objective, “merely” descriptive, an empirical fact

• “Respect des fonds”: provenance is the ‘authentic’ and authoritative archival context

‘Archivist…’ Archives of Ontariohttp://www.archives.gov.on.ca/english/exhibits/archives/big/big_47a_photo_stacks.htm

Archive 2.0

• Neither archivist or user is neutral in relation to the archive

• The archival context is not more authentic or authoritative

• Participants are more knowledgeable than an archivist alone

--Joy Palmer, Archives HubArchive 2.0 project makes the front

page, above the fold!, By billhd, on Flickr

It seems clear that cultural heritage institutions must…

Concepts about future users drive institutional anxiety

Today and tomorrow’s generations have grown up in a world designed around them… there is a basic expectation of being empowered to do what they want to do. Any aspect of life that doesn’t fit that model will be ignored.

--Paraphrased from Nick Poole, UK Collections Trust

“With the heavy competition for attention from all forms of media, libraries must work to market their value and services as much as any organization.”

--Survey of Voters, Cromaine District Library, Hartland, MI

It’s just unevenly distributed.

Web/social media are tools to help move into the future now.

“At the National Archives and Records Administration, social media tools have the potential to transform our agency and the way we serve our customers and American citizens... Social media tools will help us accomplish our mission as the nation's record keeper to preserve government records and make them more accessible to you.”

--NARA website

Social Media Goals and How to Measure Them

Goals– Inform– Engage– Influence– Activate

Measures– Numbers– Trends– Mentions– Shares

Content is designed for social sharing• Create content that people want to share

• Create content that will work well once shared

Why is content production important?

People are consuming information in different ways. You need to keep up with them. Skimming Video Visual

With the right content, you have the potential to reach more people. Social content Search engine optimized content

Audience

Audience 1: Information Professionals

Audience 2: Students, Researchers

Preserving Your Personal Digital Photos

Hosted by ALCTS, the Association for Library Collections & Technical Services

Bill LeFurgy

Audience 3: The General Public

YouTube

LoC/NDIIPP: Why Digital Preservation is Important for You LOC/NDIIPP: Archiving Digital Photos

Wepreserve: Team Digital Preservation and the Arctic Mountain Adventure

Archipelproject: Introduction

Twitter

Twitter Tweeps

Blogs

Measuring Results

• Quantitative– Views\unique visits– Subscribers\followers– Frequency of retransmission

• Qualitative– Who notices what– Testimonials– Engagement (comments, likes, guest

bloggers)

NDIIPP Videos on YouTube

Top 5 Most Popular Blog Posts on The Signal

1. Four Easy Tips for Preserving your Digital Photographs

2. What Skills Does a Digital Archivist or Librarian Need?

3. Digital Preservation File Formats for Scanned Images

4. Mission Possible: Add Descriptions to Digital Photos

5. When I Go Away: Getting Your Digital Affairs in Order

U.S. National Archives Social Media Statistics Dashboard, June 2011 Summary

Qualitative Measures 1

• Blog mentioned on some high-traffic sites:– Huffingtonpost.com– Grammy.com– Federal Computer Week (noted as one of the

“best in the federal blogosphere”)– Several appearances in daily count of “Top

U.S. Government Links”

Qualitative Measures 2

• Blog mentioned on rich diversity of sites– Genealogy and family history– Art and museums– Theatrical– Photography– Estate planning– Public, academic and special libraries– State legislature– Many, many personal blogs

How do we improve what we do?

Thank You

Bill LeFurgy

www.digitalpreservation.gov

@ndiipp

@blefurgy

References 1Slide 1: tendencias, by juanmarketing, on Flickr

Slide 3: Confronting the Future: Strategic Directions for 21st Century Libraries; Digital archive services of the future; The Museum of the future is…; A National Archives of the Future; The Future of Archives in the digital Age

Slide 4: Libraries 2020, Imagining the Library of the not too distant future

Slide 5: Kid and floppy disk, by wlef70, on Flickr

Slide 6: Confronting the Future: Strategic Directions for 21st Century Libraries

Slide 7: Museums, Libraries, and 21st Century Skills

Slide 8: Archivist, Archives of Ontario

Slide 9: Archive 2.0 project makes the front page, above the fold!, by billhd, on Flickr; Archives 2.0: If We Build It, Will They Come?

Slide 10: change, by busy.pochi, on Flickr

Slide 11: Person of the year: Time Person of the Year: You, by David FraAz, on Flickr

Slide 12: CIDOC2012 Keynote: Powering the Museum of Tomorrow

Slide 13: Photostream, by Humber Hillman Car Club of NZ car club, on Flickr

Slide 14: PowerPoint Presentation - Cromaine Library

Slide 15: National Archives Hosts Forum on Communications, Technology, and Government November 4

Slide 16: The future is here, by madhavaji, on Flickr

Slide 17: Social Commerce for the Cultural Sector

Slide 18: Social Media and Web 2.0 at the National Archives

Slide 20: engage can make it so, 1110111518, by cdedbdme, on Flickr

Slide 21: Content Production and Your Communications Program

Slide 22: Content Production and Your Communications Program

Slide 23: Social Commerce for the Cultural Sector

Slide 24: Brand building online

Slide 25: Crowd, by James Criland, on Flickr

Slide 26: Internview with an SCAPEr, Open Planets Foundation on Twitter, theorycast 55 :: retro media exhibit @ UB, by inju, on Flickr

Slide 27: Digital Natives Explore Digital Preservation, America’s Young Archivists: the K-12 Web Archiving Program, NYPL Labs on Twitter,

Slide 28: Preserving Your Personal Digital Photos

Slide 29: Preserving Your Personal Digital Photos

Slide 30: Be aware of visibility, by edmiiance, on Flickr

Slide 31: value proposition, by tantek, on Flickr

Slide 32: This is the first rev of Conversation Prism (1.0). 3.0 is Now Available - www.theconversationprism.com, by b_d_solis, on Flickr

Slide 33: Wepreserve: Team Digital Preservation and the Arctic Mountain Adventure; Archipelproject: Introduction; Why Digital Preservation is Important for You; Archiving Digital Photos

Slide 34: NDIIPP on Twitter

Slide 36: The Signal blog, The National Archives blog, Open Planets Foundation blog, Practical E-Records blog

Slide 37: Leveraging Social Media and the Crowd for Digital Preservation

Slide 41: Social Media Statistics Dashboard: June FY 2011 Summary

Slide 42: Lenzr Stats April May 2011, by Roberrific, on Flickr

Slide 43: 20110315-NodeXL-Twitter-pawcon, by Marc Smith, on Flickr

Slide 46: TheFutureSign, by srqpix, on Flickr

References 2