September 13, 2011 BHL Executive Committee notes

Executive Committee Conference Call September 13, 2011
On call: Tom Garnett, Martin Kalfatovic, Chris Freeland, Connie Rinaldo

TOPICS
A. CiteBank and designated copyright agent: There was a call with EFF Council about Citebank and how to post user uploaded content without opening ourselves to lawsuits--safe harbor. Spoke with Corinne McSherry and Abigail. We need a designated copyright agent to whom complaints can be addressed and this person must be registered at the Library of Congress. Should this agent be at the Smithsonian or MOBOT or somewhere else because BHL is not a legal entity? Smithsonian Council thought it made sense to do this at Smithsonian Council. Or does it make more sense to be at MOBOT because of funding stream? Chris noted that funding stream is not important and that it makes sense to be at Smithsonian. Martin will explore because it may be more complicated than described. ACTION: Martin and Tom will investigate Smithsonian options.

B. Usability testing / comparisons between BHL-AUS & -US portals: 2011+Usability+Test
Need to do this. Call with Bianca and MOBOT development team. Annecdotal, on the ground study. What is the timing--when do we want to change the US code. EOL wants to see the best interface possible as soon as we can--Dec 2011? IC members have commented that UI needs improvement. Several people like the Australian interface. Before the new year is a good time for changes. How long would it take to change UI if we start now? Australian interface doesn't have Darwin LIbrary or collections capability. So there will be a hybrid interface that adds value. So we will test and make both better. Chris noted that this should happen as soon as makes sense (as opposed to ASAP). We are limited by having a single developer who has other projects so this has to be planned and we need to manage expectations. We will leverage Life and Literature to get wider input. ACTION: Tom will draft a letter to Bob Corrigan and Erik Matta about soliciting input from as large a group as possible so we need to push back the schedule a bit. EOL received a big increase in Spanish speaking countries.

C. EOL interface--drop in usage of BHL. Looking at usage, all other BHL referrers have increased but EOL has gone down 25%. It requires extra clicks to get to BHL and this probably explains it. Chris requested times of releases from Bob so comparisons with actual rollout dates can be made. ACTION: Tom should bring this up on the components call.

D. Smithsonian is tasked with putting together a job creation proposal, possibly with results for BHL activities.
ACTION: Martin will send an email to the IC with details.
ACTION: Once election is over, Tom will schedule an IC call.

• *BHL is successful, scalable and valuable.*

E. DISH proposal: Tom and Martin are interested in being involved in discussions for these proposals. Need some focused emails/skype. The exercise can pull together a lot of raw documents and extract broad topics and especially a business plan. ACTION: Connie will organize.

F. Nomenclatural acts and reprints: ICZN will now accept electronic publications. Can BHL or BHL Libraries print off these descriptions. Not BHL but possibly BHL partners. "The changing role of libraries... The library or libraries would receive a list of all articles and then print them out and maintain. Trusted print repository--is microfilm an option? Need to raise this at the IC. Should have a working group to iron this out.

G. Harvard can host the March meeting.