StaffCallMeetingNotes_03182010

March 10, 2010 BHL conference call report
About 12 people signed in.
The meeting began at 11:05 and ended at 12:05, and was led by Matthew Bolin (AMNH)


1. How to make conference Calls?
We need to find an alternative to the current situation of piggy-backing on the Smithsonian Institution’s conference call system, mainly because that is shared by the whole Institution and cannot be relied upon to provide a dedicated time slot for our monthly calls. Some of the proposed choices are InterCall (Becky from CalAcad will investigate costs) and Skype. Currently it looks like SI does not bill BHL for the calls. InterCall provides capabilities for videoconferencing, but not all participating members may to have access to such high tech gear.

2. ILL Slush Fund update (short!)-Christine will contribute

3. Survey Status - Out - Live and Linked!
The email with a link to the survey (http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/BHLsurvey) was sent out 2 days ago, and generated “only” about 103 responses so far. Please forward that email to all potential BHL users in your institution and elsewhere.

4. Collections Group Update
Members of that group (Bianca, Don, Connie, Judy, Becky, Christine, Grace, Matt, Robin Everly?) discussed whether those titles that are out of scope should be removed from BHL. These were primarily ingested from IA; included are, for example, many works dealing on “physiology” (such as the aerobic capabilities of hockey players). This issue arose from a comment posted on Gemini. Removing those will not affect the accessibility of the items via other portals. The group decided to examine these on a case-by-case basis as they are brought up by users rather that do a sweep though BHL. The group also discussed the definition of “biodiversity” and “biodiversity heritage.”
The group’s next meeting is scheduled for 3/29 @ 2pm EST. Feel free to join.

5. Ingest Group forming and review
Members (Bianca, Suzanne, Connie, Erin, Bess, Christine, Don) will attend the Collections Group’s next meeting 3/29 @ 2pm

6. Feedback we receive on archive.org - uh, should we be checking every once and a while? Sometimes there is useful feedback, or requests... might we also want to include IA download stats in our yearly (?) stats reporting. Also, n.b. Keri can correct egregious metadata errors found on IA now, if those were bothering you.
Keri will seek a way to run reports on how many have comments.
Joe reported on the poor quality of images in an MCZ memoir that was scanned in house then sent to MoBot to ingest into Botanicus. Seems to be a problem with processing JP2s.
Another problem that cropped up again recently deals with diacritics in bib records: the corresponding letters are dropped from the bib records, thereby snafu-ing keyword searching. Seems to be a local problem at the Boston Center.
Keri can correct metadata errors now, such as bib records assigned to wrong scans. Mike

7. Bound With discussion
Suzanne said that the scans cannot be split, and there is no way currently to alert users that they have to look at the 2nd part of a scan to get the bound-with item. Users think that there is a mismatch between the bib record and the scan. The problems have to be resolved individually as they are identified

8. IC meeting coming up on Monday
The SWOT analysis does not include any digital preservation plan. Other weakness is (lack of) staff resources.
There is also a dire need for improved communication between IT people and librarians; it should provide regular updates beyond wikis.

The next call will be hosted by Diana Duncan (Field) and is scheduled for April 15th. She needs a note taker. If noone volunteers, the meeting will be postponed until Friday the 16h. [NB: Diana, I volunteer to take the notes again. Diana Shih]


DShih3/19/10