July 12, 2011 BHL Executive Committee notes

• Topics:

• Global BHL meeting issues: Henning would like to bring several people to the global meeting; we should have decisionmakers or key stakeholders; ACTION: Tom and William will draft some guidelines and send to execs for comment to be sent by next week. Graham made the point that without an agenda, it is difficult to know who to send so Tom will draft a brief agenda for comment.
• Have not heard from Alexandria or Brazil; China, Australia and Europe have confirmed
• Closeout of subawards for project year 4: NYBG just about spent out; AMNH has some unspent money because shipping is prohibitive to Princeton (IA's new site). Will be transferred back to BHL; CAS requested a no-cost extension on scanning money; MBL has a little money and they would also like a no-cost extension.
• Status update: Should be able to cover MOBOT. Bianca received a message from Kew they want to start scanning. Great news. Kew might want to contact Jane Smith at NHM to see if there is spare capacity on their IA setup. Upload local files and metadata to IA--documentation is on the Wiki.
• Chris is working on the NEH proposal (due in 8 days); draft should be available tonight. Lack of revenue other than Grant funding for BHL is becoming a big problem. Can't do program development on these grants. It is a lot of work and it is very difficult to find funding to keep things going.
• Martin noted that the only real answer is an institutional line item commitment although several noted that a line item in perpetuity may not be realistic for many of the institutions. Martin will follow up on the donate button idea. How about "kickstarter" as a possibility.Would need coordination and careful execution--http://www.kickstarter.com/ Will discuss further at next meeting.
• Other: Schema.org is a new effort to embrace linked data concepts.
• Harvard now has a scribe which it has modified a bit--LED lights and new camera lenses should improve image quality.