NDSA:Meeting Minutes 12-7-10

NDSA Innovation Working Group, First Conference Call Tuesday, December 7, 2010

In attendance:

• Micah Beck, University of Tennessee (working group co-chair)
• Trevor Owens, Library of Congress (interim working group co-chair)
• John Spencer, BMS/Chace
• Michelle Gallinger, Library of Congress
• Dean Farrel, State Library of North Carolina
• George Oates, Internet Archive
• Dan Cohen, George Mason University
• Dan Dodge, Thomson Reuters
• Jimi Jones, Library of Congress
• Steve Morris, North Carolina State University

Overview:

Those present on the call talked through the group charter/scope statement circulated by Micah. The bulk of the conversation focused on defining the groups’ current scope of work. Individual next actions are identified under individual topics of discussion

Statement of Purpose Discussion:

The meeting first focused on the proposed statement of purpose. Those participating generally did not think that “conducting research” fit well with the kinds of things we were proposing in the scope of work. Suggestions for terms like surveying, presenting, harvesting, or sharing were proposed.

Next Action: Dan Dodge volunteered, or was volunteered, to put together a few sentences to this effect which he would circulate to the discussion list for further comment and which would in turn be considered when part of the working group meets at the face-to-face meeting next week.

Practices:

The group then briefly considered the practices section of the document. John expressed interest in adding mention of the NDSA Wiki to the list of practices. Micah asked if this would be part of a coherent NDSA web presence or a specific working group presence. Trevor suggested that the website would be part of the general website set up for the NDSA writ large. George mentioned that it would be helpful to have a better sense of what participants in the Innovation groups background and interests are. It was suggested that this would be great material to solicit for the wiki which should be set up in the next few weeks. Next Action: Trevor will add the wiki to the charter for consideration at the meeting. Once the wiki is up, Trevor will solicit the list to add short bio notes to the wiki.

Products:

During the discussion of practices George asked what kinds of things the group would be producing. Micah suggested that we add a section to the charter called products, which would list the types of products which would result from the groups work. Suggestions included white papers, awards, synopses of current research and web seminars where researchers shared findings with NDSA members.

Next Action: Micah will add this section to the charter for consideration at the meeting.

Participation

The participation section was briefly considered and accepted as is.

Current Scope of Work

The bulk of the call focused on discussing the current scope of work. Much of the discussion hinged on how specific the statements in the current scope of work should be. George suggested that the five items listed sounded more like themes than jobs. Through conversation the group refined items 1 and 4 into more manageable concepts which garnered enough preliminary interest to form the core of a statement of work. For reference items 1 and 4 are, 1) Defining goals and principles, presenting new approaches and topic 4) Digital preservation X-challenges. The other three topics were generally deemed to be interesting but were thought to be too broad to spec out into specific tasks or action groups. At least for the time being, it was suggested that the three broader items be moved to a section for future scope of work, or thematic areas for work.

It was suggested that ideas 1 and 4 be further defined to serve as the basis of two action groups. As a next step we need to identify who is interested in participating in these groups.

Defining goals and principles, presenting new approaches: The focus here was on developing a clear statement on the goals and purposes of data stewardship. The group felt that this was a daunting task but came up with two potential ways to approach it. Trevor suggested asking for short position papers from members about how they, or their organizations, identify the goals and purposes of data stewardship with the intention of then setting those institution and organization specific statements against each other as the basis to develop a broader perspective. Alternatively, Micah and others suggested that an action group could develop a provocative statement on goals and purposes as a first step and then use that statement to move others to comment and discuss. George Oats and Micah Beck expressed interest in being involved with an action committee for this project.

Digital Preservation X-Challenges: John expressed excitement about this idea. This project would require a system or procedure where group members collaborated to identify a range of digital preservation challenges and then select particular challenges for which prizes could then be awarded. The group briefly discussed looking to industry or other institutions as potential prize sponsors. The specifics of this project would need to be defined by the action group.