1. - by Sarah McCarthy

2. “Everyone has a history to share, some of it
stretching back over decades, passed down and
added to over many generations. We have seen
again and again what can be achieved when
people come together around their family
histories and the history of their streets… when
a whole town participates in creating a shared
communal history.”
--Nick Stanhope (CEO of Historypin)

3. What Is It?
• Developed by the not-for-profit We Are What We Do, in partnership
with Google, Historypin is a way for people to come together, from
across generations, cultures and places, to share small glimpses of
the past and to build up the story of human history.
• Users can upload photos, videos, audio recordings, and recollections
and pin them to a date/time on the Historypin map of the world.
• Over 50,000 photos, videos, audio and stories from over 20,000
users from all over the world have already been shared.
• Their goal is to become the largest global archive of human history.

5. How It Works: Desert of Maine Test Case

6. First you upload your photo

7. Then, you add your photo details

8. Next, you find it on the map
(if it’s been taken outdoors)

9. Finally, you position it on the street view
(this is just an example, as the spring house is not really on this street)

10. And voila!
Now, visitors to the Desert of Maine 20 years from now can see if even the measuring pole
becomes buried... Or someone who visited in the 1950’s can add a photo of the spring house
in its unburied splendor.

11. Site Features
Watch Videos Play Audio Clips
Satellite View

12. Use the timeline to browse through history

13. Read the stories surrounding each image

14. Browse photos nearby

15. Compare street view now, and then

16. Fade in/out to see how the area changes

17. View multiple photos in street view

18. Take a tour through time or space

19. View collections of images on one subject

20. Historypin app
• Hold your phone up to the street-- the app uses your camera
view to display nearby images.
• Select the image to overlay it onto the modern view and create
a historical comparison.
• Immediately add images from your travels to Historypin or use
your phone to photograph old images and pin them to the map.
• Shake the app to view a random image from around the world.

21. Capturing the History of a Community
Case Study: Reading, UK
• Whole community gathered photos and
memories of the area.
• Volunteers spoke with individuals and
groups to capture their
stories/memories.
• Partnership with local museums, libraries
and record offices to add to the
collection.
• A special Reading Museum exhibition
based on the images and stories that
have been pinned, running from
September 2011 - January 2012.
• Upcoming projects in Harlem, New York
and East Palo Alto, California.

22. Over 100 Museum and Library Partners
Smithsonian
Sent a group of photographs from their archives showing the growth of the
National Mall from 1865 to today.
National Archives
As a pilot, they posted a selection of photographs from the Women's Bureau
and the Environmental Protection Agency covering a range of subjects
documented in the work of the United States government.
Museum of the City of New York
They added about 1,500 photos from their 50,000-picture online archive.
Others
Include PhillyHistory.org, the New York Public Library, the Dallas Public
Library, Boston Public Library, and the Los Angeles Public Library.

23. Brooklyn Museum Mystery Photos
Museum employees noticed a deficit of
Brooklyn images on Historypin.
They had archives of over 3,500 late 19th
century images, many of which were
unidentified.
“We couldn’t get a team to sit here and
catalog this, with this variety of
knowledge, in a million years,” Deborah
Wythe, head of digital collections.
Historypin posted the images on Flickr
Commons– more than half have now
been identified and pinned.

24. Just a few applications for your library
From Nick Stanhope (CEO, Historypin)
There was one particularly inspiring event recently at a school in a bit of Essex called Billericay.
They invited older people from within the community ,and students interviewed them about their
photographs, filmed and recorded their stories and made comparisons between what the area
looked like then and now. It became obvious to us how these small, lovely examples can become
replicated over and over again.
From Justin Hoenke, Tame the Web Contributor
What if I got a handful of teens interested in photography, a few digital cameras or iPod
touches, and we had a program where we headed out into the city for a half hour taking pictures.
We could then come back into the library and, using the library’s wifi and the Historypin
app, upload the photos and catalog our city at that moment in time.
Say that your library has an extensive local history collection. Wouldn’t it be great to mobilize
some volunteers to digitize photos and upload them to Historypin? The library could even partner
with local tourism organizations to give people with mobile phones a walking history tour of the
city.

25. POTENTIAL DRAWBACKS
• User Interface is somewhat clunky and not all features are
straightforward to use.
• Some patrons may need training.
• Not all patrons will have access to the internet at home, so terminals
in the library will have to be provided.
• Copyright issues are a concern, though Historypin does allow
institutions to choose what copyright options to offer when they add
material.

26. OUTWEIGHED BY THE BENEFITS
• Perfect for building community, especially in small public libraries.
• Make your content available for people to interact with in new ways.
• Start conversations shared between people who perhaps didn’t think
that had anything in common.
• Enable students/teachers from around the world to explore content.
• Use crowdsourcing to aid you with unidentified images.
• Create tours of your library, or of your community.
• Possibly even earn new income from your collection through a opt-in
digital-to-print service for users (starting in 2012).

27. C'est Fini!
Any Questions or Comments?