Video Recording: “Book Digitisation, Online Access and Lending: What Infrastructure is Needed for Success?”

The video recording from Knowledge Rights 21 shared below was recorded on October 26, 2022.

From the Description:

This webinar brought together practitioners from the California Institute of Technology, Boston Public Library and Project ReShare, focusing on the library workflows, software and infrastructures involved in digitising books and providing access to patrons.

The internet has revolutionised how libraries and their users can access books. Project Gutenberg, started in 1971 is one of the world’s largest online repositories of public domain eBooks. 2019 copyright reforms in Europe now allow for the mass digitisation and access to out-of-commerce and never-in-commerce works including books. Libraries in North America in particular are digitising titles in their collections to create eBooks for lending.

While much of the discussion in America is around digital lending currently and the Internet Archive’s Open Library, a more immediate question for many libraries in Europe is the practicality of digitising books and giving access. These may be public domain materials or in-copyright titles, and involve reforms around out of commerce works or lending under national laws in the light of the Court of Justice of the European Union eBook ruling VOB v Stichting Leenrecht.

Amongst other things, the webinar included discussion of secure digital lending technologies that ensure no more copies of copyrighted works are provided to library patrons than are owned by the library in physical form.

Speakers

Tommy Keswick
Digital Technologies Development Librarian. California Institute of Technology

David Leonard
President. Boston Public Library.

Allen Jones
Director of Digital Libraries & Technical Services. The New School.

Filed under: Libraries, News, Open Access, Patrons and Users, Public Libraries, Video Recordings