Digital Collections and Local History Survey Results

To collect more information about present condition of coexistence of digital collections and local history, Public Library Čačak created an online survey of nine questions, to reflect domestic theory and practice on this topic. Survey claimed that main purpose of it was to collect data on how local history practitioners utilize digital collections to develop their research. Total of 72 participants took part in the survey in March and April 2009, of which 52 finished survey answering to all questions. Although relatively small number of individuals participated, it must not be forgotten that survey was in Serbian, with emphasis on quite narrow fields of research and practice, away from dominant academic disciplines. That is why we could conclude that this survey is relevant for topics it deals with.

Most of the participants came from librarianship (69%), than research institutes (12.5%) and faculties (5.6%). Only two participants work in the museums and there was none from the archives, which possibly emphasizes the level of digital initiatives in those cultural institutions. The majority of participants (77.6%) work in institutions with less than 50 employees, which is usual size of public libraries in Serbia also. Some form of digitization activities in their institutions reported 73.4% participants. The survey has shown that 39.3% of participants responded that their institution started digitization project, while 19.7% claimed development of long term digitization program inside institution. Identical percent reported creation of centers or departments for digitization in their institutions. Among those participants who reported work in the field of historiography (65.6%), local history is the most represented research field with 36.4%, followed by research on the history of institution (32.7%) and the history of science (21.8%). Dominant majority of participants answered that digitization of collections will improve research and collaboration among scientists (92.7%), while only three responses expressed concerns about lower quality of research and overwhelming production which can not be followed by researchers.

When participants were asked to select three digitization priorities among nine offered, most of them as the first choice selected photos, postcards and maps (54.7%), than old newspapers and magazines (52.8%), and finally archival materials (47.2%). This result stem from current practice among public libraries in Serbia, where most of them starts their projects with digitization of old photos and postcards from local history collections. Oral history received only 15.1% answers, with digitization of old journals and papers dealing with local history in front of it, which clearly emphasizes current condition of oral history in Serbia. Considering services participants would like to see proceeding from digitization (participants were able to select three options), two services recoil from the others: connection of digital collections with OPACs and other online databases (73.1%) and full text search of collections (69.2%). It is interesting to see that much appreciated option of downloadable PDF documents (Public Library Čačak experience) came only third in the survey (voted by 50% percent of the participants). Characteristic Web 2.0 option, tagging documents by users (seen in the Library of Congress Flickr initiative called The Commons*) placed last in this survey (7.7%), even behind already established and quite usual service “Ask a Librarian” (13.5%). This suggests that overall level of the Internet development in Serbia is in direct connection with users' anticipations.

Final question in the survey refers to paying for digital services, namely we asked participants to express their opinion about financial background of digitization projects. Most of the answers (38.4%) reflect anticipation that those services should be free of cost to all, which was expected. A little bit of surprise is the number of participants suggesting that some kind of payment should be established: membership (19.2%), limited access and services to all users but advanced to those willing to pay (19.2%), payment model constructed on type and quantity of the service (17.3%). We do not want to imply that this suggests information managers and colleagues involved in organization of digital services should consider introduction of some payment model to users (because Public Library Čačak, for now, stands firmly behind idea that those services should be free, already paid by tax-payers' money), but in some cases this could be a topic for discussion.

We are able to summarize the results of this survey in several lines and they could be regarded as general conclusions:
- libraries lead activities in digitization among cultural institutions in Serbia,
- promoting local history collections and research in digital way is still underdeveloped field of work, although local history is the most frequent historiography research activity among cultural institutions,
- dominant majority of participants firmly believe that digitization of collections will improve research and collaboration among scientists,
- digitization of local history collections mostly involved paper materials (photos, postcards, maps, newspapers, journals), which are regarded as priorities, while some characteristic local history sources, like oral history or personal biographies, are treated as of lesser importance,
- users expect to see digital collections included inside larger online databases, with full search options at their disposal,
- digitization services do not have to be free of cost by default, considering introduction of some advanced features and users’ willingness to pay for high quality service.

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* http://www.flickr.com/commons?PHPSESSID=ea7b4da468f5935f24b65f41dbfc356f

30.04.2009. 07:58