NDSA:Outreach Meeting Minutes 11-30-10

NDSA Outreach Conference Call November 30, 2010

On Call: Lisa Gregory, Eugene Mopsik, Pam Greenburg, Katherine Skinner, Nancy McGovern, Helen Tibbo, Pete Watters, Deborah Rossum, Tom Scheinfeldt, Andy Maltz, John Spencer, Druscie Simpson, Jared Lyle, Daniel Cornwall, Matt Peters, Diacorda Amosapa, Barrett Jones, Carol Minton Morris (co-chair), Michelle Gallinger, Kat Hagedorn, Abbey Potter, Jaime Stoltenberg, Sue Manus, Butch Lazorchak (co-chair)

The first order of business was confirming the draft mission statement

The Outreach Working Group of the National Digital Stewardship Alliance will focus on building relationships with stakeholder communities and preparing and sharing digital preservation information resources. This includes: Identifying and assessing tools the NDSA community needs for communication; Identifying and promoting key digital preservation information resources; Defining opportunities for outreach within the NDSA and to the community beyond.

as an accurate representation of the proposed scope for the group.

Co-chair Carol Minton Morris then offered for discussion the development of a broad-based public awareness campaign for digital preservation as the first work item for the group. This campaign would have two “prongs”: a high-level, national effort such as that undertaken by organizations such as the Ad Council, and a series of more hands-on marketing efforts. Discussion centered on these twin ideas, with participants providing examples of outlets and methods for disseminating information.

The conversation eventually coalesced around the need to do further work on specific aspects of building a public awareness campaign. Each of these aspects would be explored in greater detail by an Action Team:

• Mission
• Audience
• Outreach Resources

The “Mission” Action Team will explore the high-level mission that drives a digital preservation awareness campaign. What is the dominant message that the NDSA hopes to propagate regarding the preservation of digital information? Are different messages (or variations on a single message) necessary to reach different audiences?

The “Audience” Action Team will explore the different audiences for digital preservation information, working to paint a clearer picture of the issues facing each audience, and considering ways that the mission of the NDSA can be presented to each audience. Audiences include the general public, practitioners, funders, legislators, etc.

The “Outreach Resources” Action Team will look at existing outlets for disseminating information, concentrating on those that are already successfully providing information about digital preservation, but also exploring interesting, creative venues for spreading the message. Several excellent examples included partnering with storage device providers to get an “NDSA-approved” message included with each drive; targeting non-professional photographers by extending the dpBestFlow.org web site; etc. This could involve the creation of something like a “Contacts” database to keep track of potential outlets for future engagement such as the Ad Council and other non-profit marketing entities.

These groups will be highly interactive, and their work will naturally evolve to the point that the WG will take their recommendations and begin to implement them, likely through the creation of further Action teams.

Information about each of these action teams will be posted on the Ideascale site (http://ndsa.ideascale.com/) shortly in the “Outreach Working Group” section. Outreach Working Group members are encouraged contact Butch Lazorchak (wlaz@loc.gov) or Carol Minton Morris (cmmorris@DURASPACE.ORG) for information about joining a particular Action Team.

A regular day of the week and time of day will be determined for ongoing Outreach WG conference calls. Members should make their preference known by visiting the Doodle poll at http://www.doodle.com/rap4qii26sy883r2. Please respond to this poll by COB on Dec. 17, 2010.