RunCoCo stand

RunCoCo is attending the AHRC MOOT on November 19. The theme of the meeting is ‘digital transformations’ and the event website describes it as:  ” The Digital Transformations Moot aims to bring together the Arts and Humanities community with other disciplines to explore the possibilities of the Digital Transformations theme for new and exciting ways of working: to hack, to make, to break. ”

We are looking forward to a day full of interesting meetings and exchanges. For those who cannot attend in person, it is possible to follow some of the activities through the live streaming website

This year, the Festival theme was ‘Citizen 2.0′ and an aim was to look at citizenship in culture, explore social aspect of culture connected to technological progress and discuss how a community can get involved in creating and creative use of its own cultural resources.

The event was well attended, and participants were treated to a range of activities, from lectures and seminars to workshops, art installations and exhibitions. The Community Archives strand offered a great line-up. In the first plenary, representatives from INA (French national audiovisual institute http://www.ina.fr/ ) talked about, among other things, a great project for sharing memories. People are invited to upload their moving images – home videos and films – to an archive of shared memories. The films are viewed by INA experts and some are selected for their online exhibition. The project also offers a link to a partner who will digitize material at a discount for those wanting to contribute to the project. See http://www.ina.fr/memoires-partagees for details

Simon Tanner (Director of King’s Digital Consultancy Services at King’s College London) talked about how to measure the value of impact of digital resources and presented a report that he has written: The Balanced Value Impact Model (available at http://www.kdcs.kcl.ac.uk/innovation/impact.html).

In the afternoon, RunCoCo led a seminar on Community Collections, presenting some examples of crowdsourcing and community collection initiatives we have been involved in and discussing how they have been used to successfully create collections of value and enrich our understanding of our history and heritage. The seminar concluded with a general discussion about community collection projects and issues and opportunities these face.

The venue for the event was the Polish Audiovisual Institute (NINA) which had been completely handed over to the festival. The building is about to be refurbished shortly, and the organisers had taken this as an opportunity to allow people to express their creativity freely across the walls. Buckets of paint with brushes and rollers were available for anyone who felt thus inclined, and it was interesting to see how the walls changed over the period of the event. New impressions were added and old ones painted over. Those who did not want to splash paint on the walls could take part in the great wall weaving experiment. Hundreds of screws were inserted into the walls, and we could string yarns of all colours between them, creating a wide wall web on the stairs.

The festival offered a series of sessions in different rooms where the audience could sit on swings and see-saw benches while listening to the talks. One floor was filled with art installations and exhibitions, with a great buzz about it, and participants did not only have the opportunity to watch what others have done but could also take part in a series of hands-on activities. On the whole a very interesting and engaging event of which NINA should be proud.

See the meeting announcement in the Institute of Historial Research events listing

Future activities of the London Digital Humanities Group are anounced on their mailing list. Anyone interested in joining can contact Simon Dixon at snd6@leicester.ac.uk.

About the group (by Simon Dixon et al):

The London Digital Humanities Group aims to provide a forum to discuss the
ways in which digital technologies are opening up new avenues of research
in the arts and humanities, and the opportunities for wider engagement and
dissemination that these methodologies can bring. The group aims to
showcase a range of digital projects, such as the creation of online
databases, electronic editions, and topographical resources. It will also
serve a practical function by enabling its members to discuss the planning,
funding, progress, and afterlife of such projects. Undertaking research in
this rapidly changing area can be daunting; we hope the group will provide
inspiration and support by allowing its members an opportunity to share
their experiences and support each other’s projects.

We will meet twice per term to hear an informal seminar-like presentation
about a given project, followed by questions and discussion. Information
about each project will be circulated in advance of the meeting. Anyone
with an interest in digital humanities is welcome to attend. We hope to
attract participants from across a range of disciplines and involved in the
different aspects of digital humanities production (content development,
web design, database programming, etc). Researchers at any stage of their
career currently involved in the implementation of digital projects are
particularly welcome, as are librarians, archivists and museum
professionals engaged in the use of new technologies to widen access to
their collections.

Yesterday we held our free one-day conference at OUCS, University of Oxford (26th May 2011). This year the ‘Beyond’ conference celebrated the joys and challenges of community collections. It was hosted by the RunCoco project and sponsored by JISC.

Online you can search for blog posts, tweets, and photos of the Beyond Conference #beyond2011, e.g. on Twitter. Also the project team blogged throughout the day, and the University podcasting team put video online within minutes of the end of each presentation!

The conference website will update over the next few weeks to pull this information together. In the meantime we would like to record our appreciation to the speakers, the delegates and our team for an inspirational day.

Dave Ferriero, the Archivist of the United States

The RunCoCo project has been diverted from this blog with our own community collections: Woruldhord, Erster Weltkrieg in Alltagsdokumenten – and with preparing for our forthcoming conference Beyond 2011: Crowdsourcing for public engagement. However I felt RunCoCo must briefly point to this excellent programme from David S. Ferriero the Archivist of the United States: ‘Are you in? Crowdsourcing and Citizen Archivist’ who is joined by the panel:

• Jessica Zelt, the North American Bird Phenology Program from the US Geological Survey,
• Matthew Knutzen, the Map Warper Project from the New York Public Library,,
• Darla Adams, the Ancestry.com World Archives Project.

The discussion is chaired by Meredith Stewart (National Archives).

The full hour is available to watch on YouTube, and on the blog of the Archivist – ‘AOTUS: the Collector in Chief’.

We look forward to more inspiration from Beyond 2011…

So in the meantime here is a transcript of an interview with Piers Scott from The Sociable http://sociable.co/:

Piers Scott, The Sociable: To begin, how did the RunCoCo project begin?

Alun Edwards, University of Oxford: RunCoCo began as a result of The Great War Archive. This was part of a JISC-funded project in the UK led by Oxford University to primarily focus on the poets of WW1. As part of that wider project, in 2008, we created a community collection of material owned by the public in the UK relating to the First World War. From scratch we designed software to collect material (called CoCoCo), we worked out how to run a submission day, the marketing campaigns, and so on. The success of this led JISC to fund RunCoCo. This funding has allowed us during 2010 to lead workshops to introduce the concepts of crowdsourcing and community collections. Delegates are from universities and local authorities and voluntary organisations, as well as consultants working with these. The presentations from these workshops are available from our website (audio, slides and some video), as well as guides and software created by RunCoCo. We’ve also run an online helpdesk, email runcoco@oucs.ox.ac.uk In addition we’re using Twitter and our blog to enter into conversations about this work and to maintain momentum.

You are in Germany running a digitisation roadshow with Europeana – how is this going?

We’re blogging about the project’s Germany trip, so you can keep up with our progress.

As of 11 April 2011 (when writing this) we are still travelling round Germany. RunCoCo has helped the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek (DNB) to run days where the public can come in and we can digitise their WW1 material, and hopefully tell them a little more about what they have. Tomorrow is our last submissions day – at the Württembergische Landesbibliothek / Bibliothek für Zeitgeschichte (12 April). When we started this we did not really know what to expect. We had run The Great War Archive in the UK, where the public’s knowledge about and reverence for the First World War is a way of life. In Germany we could not make the same assumptions. However, we have attracted between 50-120 members of the public to each event. Events were held in the DNB, Frankfurt on 31 March; Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin / Preußischer Kulturbesitz on 2 April; and in Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Munich on 6 April. It is difficult to talk about figures until we have done some post-processing and started cataloguing, but for example, in one day in Frankfurt we took more photographs than in all the six submissions roadshows we ran in the UK; then in Berlin we took more photos than in Frankfurt. In Munich we took more photos than in Frankfurt and Berlin combined! Exhausting for the team – but extremely rewarding! When we’re ready the material we collect will be displayed on the website of the The Europeana project “Erster Weltkrieg in Alltagsdokumenten” (The First World War in everyday documents) http://www.europeana1914-1918.eu

How was the German response to the roadshow and project?

Very positive. The project is led by the DNB. The German librarians and historians are very knowledgeable about their audience and interested in the concept of a community collection, and the running of these submissions days. These days are attracting people who would never normally visit the venues, so the librarians are pleased with this foot-fall. The library managers are pleased with the incredible press response – when they normally battle for a column inch in the newspaper the “Erster Weltkrieg in Alltagsdokumenten” project has generated half-page colour photo stories in their local rag, all pointing to the fascinating stories being unearthed in this library. The local people are very happy to talk to the British team as well. I think that for the public the First World War is mainly seen as a tragedy and part of the long story of Germany starting in 1871, and still resonating after the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989.

What are the challenges of collecting this information so long after the war?

Briefly, I should note we have just run a similar collection about the Anglo-Saxons (Woruldhord) so that was material over 1,000 years old! But for the First World War in Germany the main challenge is mobilising the community which is why Europeana and the DNB put so much effort into publicity. Then the challenge is selecting the useful material from the whole hoard we have unearthed in the public’s own collections.

The public contributed over 6,500 items for The Great War Archive in 2008, how did you manage this immense amount of data?

If you mean manage the data? Then we back-up and archive this in a university-service based in Oxford – so it is guaranteed safe storage. The metadata and the files were collected using standards therefore we are thinking about sustainability issues such as digital preservation and further interoperability, and potential for future mash-ups. The material was collected and is displayed under a JISC-HEFCE licence, roughly equivalent to CC BY-NC-SA. We display images etc. as low res, to keep file sizes under control. We deliberately kept the cataloguing simple – so that the public did over 50% of that job.

The Flickr account is still collecting images as part of the project, how useful have social networking sites been?

Flickr is an invaluable tool for networking with people who are interested in our subject. Not only do they contribute material to our Flickr pool, but they comment and add invaluable insight to the contributions of others. We will use Flickr to contact the wide range of people who have already digitised their own collections of material relating to WW1. We have used YouTube, Amazon, iTunes, Facebook (Old English; WW1 Poetry), and Twitter for The Great War Archive and the Anglo-Saxon project, and for RunCoCo I find I follow-up and read more material linked to from Twitter than from any other source (including email discussion lists).

Jonathan Purday, Europeana (interviewed by The Sociable in March) said that such efforts bring academics and individuals together, can this lead to new understandings of historical events?

Potentially yes. It also brings the public into a research project, and we have noted the wealth of expertise out there.

What resources can an organisation such as Europeana bring to this form of archiving?

Enthusiasm, and funding – and networking. We mention we would be pleased to work with Europeana in Germany – and Europeana know immediately 3-4 potential partners to approach. Jon Purday and his team provided the expertise for successfully marketing our project. Then Europeana have vast experience in multi-lingual cataloguing and aggregating metadata, as well as experience in digitisation and digital libraries.

One criticism of digital archives is that they remove the “authentic and the real connection” viewers get from museums with history, what would you say to this point-of-view?

The items we have collected were not on display! So this has to be counterbalanced against the fact that nobody could see this stuff and it was in danger of being lost, so we are opening access. I would also strongly question whether any museum is ‘authentic’ – it’s always a selection based on the curator’s ideas of what is representative, but it often consists of displays that show the same material again and again. We are exposing the new.

How can people or organisations work with RunCoCo?

In the short-term – please come to our conference – ‘Beyond Collections: Crowdsourcing for public engagement’, University of Oxford 26 May 2011. The conference website is available now for registration at: http://www.oucs.ox.ac.uk/ltg/events/beyond2011/

Also read our blog, talk to us on Twitter. Look at the guides we will be publishing online soon, and read about our previous presentations and workshops. Finally, we may be able to help any project on a consultancy basis – in the same way that we have helped the DNB and Europeana. We have experience of and contact with crowdsourcing and community collections projects on every conceivable academic topic – some using extremely high tech engagement tools to work with hundreds of thousands of volunteers, some engaging face-to-face with their small community.

What would you say to people or organisations who wish to take part in, or set up a similar project?

Do it, crowdsourcing can work! Be prepared but don’t over-think the problem.

What is next for RunCoCo and the europeana1914-1918 project?

For RunCoCo who knows… There is our conference in May, there are a wide variety of community projects funded by the JISC 2010-2012 who may contact us for assistance. And we are passionate about involving the public in the forthcoming events surrounding the commemoration of the centenary of the First World War.

The www.europeana1914-1918.eu project has generated a lot of interest in many countries across Europe, and we trust that keeping the collection open online in Germany, means that we are confident that we can roll out the same collection mechanism and run similar public submissions days in any countries involved in that conflict.

Is there anything else you would like to add?

Please visit the project website www.europeana1914-1918.eu, enter in to a conversation with RunCoCo, and look at our funders for this current work – Europeana, and our UK funders JISC.

Everett reading the project's press notices on the train, Frankfurt-Berlin

Although a long train journey, we did have time to meet colleagues from the DNB and Europeana for a de-brief about what went well at the DNB, Frankfurt, (blog about the first submissions day).

On arrival at the venue in Berlin, some of the team wait for the caretaker to open up (left-right: Alun Edwards, Everett Sharp, Dr Stuart Lee, Dr Stephen Bull, and Jon Purday)

And the rest of Friday 1 April was spent preparing the venue at Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin – Preußischer Kulturbesitz.

More stories and photos follow! We’re updating our progress on this blog and on Twitter, follow #Europeana and @RunCoCo!

As mentioned in the last photo from the last blog, one man’s effects were brought in right at the end of the day. In this photo Alun Edwards, RunCoCo, University of Oxford handles an artefact with gravity and respect:

Frankfurt, Spring 2011

This treatment contrasts with the way in which Alun’s family played with another such helmet, when they were boys:

Autumn 1914, Llandrindod

These photos were submitted to The Great War Archive, the pilot project in the UK which inspired Europeana’s interest in community collections. More stories and photos follow! We’re updating our progress on this blog and on Twitter, follow #Europeana and @RunCoCo!

A damp day in Frankfurt

Posters and signs directed the participants to the submissions day venue

The interior glass walls of the venue provide excellent line of sight to draw in participants (and the curious)

The training day (blog here) gave an indication of what to expect, but the hands-on experience gained by the librarians able to stay on and help the DNB run their submissions day will have been invaluable.

Everett Sharp (seated) and Dr Stuart Lee (both Oxford University) help German librarians and historians prioritise and prepare a private collection for digitisation

Dr Christian Horn and Dr Britta Woldering (both from DNB), in control of the welcome desk, meeting the participants and introducing the work-flow

Frank Drauschke, historian (Facts & Files), manages the press

Participants discuss their family's papers with Jon Purday (centre-right), Europeana and Dr Max Schreiber (right), of the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Munich

A participant (centre) is interviewed and recorded by Michael Kassube of the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Munich (left) and Dr Stephen Bull (military historian, from the RunCoCo team)

A participant is interviewed and recorded by Aisulu Aldasheva (left), Europeana

Another view of the venue as Valentine Charles (left) and Jon Purday (right) - both Europeana - head off on separate missions

Dr Stuart Lee (Oxford) shows the digitisation processes to Max Schreiber, rear, (from Bayerische Staatsbibliothek) and Benjamin Hirschfeld, a historian from Württembergische Landesbibliothek / Bibliothek für Zeitgeschichte

Submissions forms are catalogued by George (from Württembergische Landesbibliothek / Bibliothek für Zeitgeschichte)

As the event draws to a close the whole team receive a lift as a contributor staggers in bearing the helmets, medals, bayonet and other mementoes from his grandfather

More stories and photos follow! We’re updating our progress on this blog and on Twitter, follow #Europeana and @RunCoCo!