On Tue, 2006-13-06 at 09:55 +0100, Juan Garces wrote:
> Starting with small archives could be a good way to start...
>
> One set of arguments is usually overseen by archival institutions: making
> lower quality images available hightens the demand for higher quality images
> of the same ms, images of other mss, and autopsies of the ms. While the
> latter might not be desired that much, I think the the first two arguments
> can be convincingly made. It would be good for libraries, even if (or
> particularly if) they use income generated from the imaging department for
> further imaging and conservation.
I very much like this idea and with Google Books, book imaging is
certainly in the air at the moment. However, my experience is that MS
libraries are very conservative about this kind of thing, and they might
be happier if there were some kind of formal initiative rather than a
bunch of scholars with cell phones.
Not quite sure how to develop this but it seems like an excellent idea.
>
> J
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Dr Juan Garcés
> Centre for Computing in the Humanities, King's College London
> Kay House, 7 Arundel Street
> London WC2R 3DX
> T: +44 (0)20 7848 1393
> F: +44 (0)20 7848 2980
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: The Digital Classicist List [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
> On Behalf Of James Cummings
> Sent: 13 June 2006 08:42
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: Getting images of manuscript pages online
>
> Juan Garces wrote:
> > May I get back at my one suggestion: If (1) libraries generally do not
> make
> > any money on imaging services and (2) there are many sub-publication
> quality
> > images (from, e.g., microfiche, who are usually sufficient for
> transcription
> > etc.) already in the hands of researchers who already paid for them, in
> > theory it should be possible to approach libraries and ask whether we
> could
> > make them available for easier access and use to a wider audience (free of
> > charge). They would not loose any money, neither would we not make any
> money
> > at their cost, since any further publication and reimaging in higher
> quality
> > would still have to go via the IPR holders. Would anybody be interested in
> > such a project?
>
> I think it would be great, why not use existing services, like Flickr, and
> simply agree a tagging scheme?
>
> However, I don't think that the libraries would agree that they are not
> losing
> any money. While it depends on the charging policy at individual
> institutions,
> they may view it as a loss of income if no one is paying them for their
> (existing, already taken at much greater cost) digital images. Sometimes
> institutions use a flat pricing scheme of X amount per folio and when the
> image
> has already been taken (or is easy to take) this subsidises the creation of
> new
> images or those image which were more expensive to capture. (For example
> from
> more delicate objects which require more time by the photographer.) In
> addition, the income from image sales might also pay for the preservation of
> existing images (server space, maintenance, etc.). I'm just playing devil's
> advocate that this scheme might not receive a warm welcome at certain
> institutions which have a lot invested in their own digitisation programmes.
> (It will be more welcomed by small archives which are unable to afford to do
> this themselves.)
>
> > J
>
> -J
>
--
Daniel Paul O'Donnell, PhD
Acting Chair and Associate Professor of English
Director, Digital Medievalist Project
<http://www.digitalmedievalist.org/>
University of Lethbridge
Lethbridge AB T1K 3M4
Canada
Vox: +1 (403) 329-2378/-2377
Fax: +1 (403) 382-7191
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