presentation with Jane Smith at LIBER 2015, London More than the Sum of its Parts: Biodiversity Heritage Library

1. MORE THAN THE SUM OF ITS PARTS:
THE BIODIVERSITY HERITAGE
LIBRARY
Connie Rinaldo & Jane Smith
+ +
=?

2. “The cultivation of
natural science
cannot be efficiently
carried on without
reference to an
extensive library”
Charles Darwin, et al
(1847)
The Wherefore of BHL

3. What is BHL?
• “The BHL works collaboratively to make biodiversity
literature openly available to the world”
• Biodiversity and its literature is global
– Repatriation
– Accessibility of local information
• Global talent, resources & content
• Collaborations on funding & technological
advancements
• Developing standards

4. Por se global?
• Biodiversity is global
• The literature is global
– Repatriation
– Accessibility of local information
• “The BHL works collaboratively to make biodiversity
literature openly available to the world”
• Leverage global talent, resources & content
• Collaborations on funding & technological
advancements
• Developing standards

5. • Scientific descriptions of
animals, insects, plants,
(Taxonomic literature)
• Type in a taxon name and
find all detected
occurrences in the text
corpus.
• Systematic biology is
easier for scientists—the
taxonomic impediment is
resolved.
BHL=Open + Linked +Libraries,
Technology & Science

6. Specimen collections
Databases
Publications
Observations
‘Gray’ literature
Index cards
Field notebooks
Taxonomic Impediment

8. Supporting open science research
Science Gossip
Collaboration between Zooniverse,
University of Oxford (AHRC funding –
Constructing Scientific Communities),
Missouri Botanical Gardens, BHL
Ryan Schenk, Synonyms

9. http://mczbase.mcz.harvard.edu/guid/MCZ:Bird:230252
Connecting Content

10. Use
“Why use Google when you have BHL”
(Dr. Matthew von Konrat, Head of
Botanical Collections, Field Museum)
“The Biodiversity Heritage Library
is the richest, fully open resource
for original species descriptions.”
(@dpsSpiders, Biodiversity
Informatics Manager
Comment on announcement November 2014 – BHL
milestone 45 million pages+ online
J just to follow up - I have just come back
from Brazil and I cannot tell you how
important BHL is in changing the way people
do taxonomy, especially in the so-called
developing world; combined with Global
Plants it makes it a totally different world to
the one I began my career in!! The playing
field levelled..... congratulations.... Sandy

11. Facebook
Page Likes: 11449
BHL Social Media 2015
Twitter @ BioDivLibrary
Total Followers: 6597 Blog
Total Visits: 10,407
Flickr
97,754 images

12. • US/UK (#1 & #2):
385,684/99,629
• Germany (#3): 93,161
• Brazil (#5): 73,224
• France, Australia (# 7), Canada,
Italy, Spain, Mexico (#11), Japan,
Netherlands, Russia, China
(#15), South Africa (#26), Czech
Republic (#24), Singapore (#38)
• Total Annual Use: 1,565,405

13. 8518 (#4)
46,985
10,635
Google Analytics: Most recent month accesses by country. (225 countries total)
5852 (#7)
1165
430
744
4965
2450

14. Collaborations
Internet
Archive
• Extensive
• Open
• Global
• Linked

15. Challenges
• Sustainability
– Mixed funding model
• Virtual Organization
• Collaboration
– Communication: language, culture
• Content aggregation
By working towards the same goal: Open access to
biodiversity literature for the world; we achieve
more even though there are challenges.

16. 1 PM
Noon
5 PM
How we work: Communication challenges
2 AM + 1 day
6 PM
6 PM
12 AM +1 day
11 AM
12 AM + 1 day
6 pm
9 AM

17. • Public Domain
• Publisher Agreements
• US Titles: 249
• UK Titles: 70
– TOTAL TITLES: 318
• US Licensors: 92
• UK Licensors: 41
– TOTAL LICENSORS: 134

18. Scale and Problems of Mass Digitization of Library Materials

19. Funding
• MacArthur & Sloane grants via EOL
• Membership dues
• Connecting Content: A Collaboration to Link Field Notes &
Published Literature
• The Art of Life: Data Mining & Crowdsourcing the
Identification & Description of Natural History Illustrations
from the Biodiversity Heritage Library
• Purposeful Gaming & BHL: engaging the public in
improving & enhancing access to digital texts
• Digging into Data: Mining Biodiversity Project

21. Links
BHL website: http://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/
BHL Blog: http://blog.biodiversitylibrary.org/
BHL content on Flicker: http://www.flickr.com/photos/biodivlibrary/sets/
Encyclopedia of Life: http://eol.org/
Speaker contacts:
Connie Rinaldo: crinaldo@oeb.harvard.edu
Jane Smith: Jane.Smith@nhm.ac.uk

22. ?
Watch this!
https://youtu.be/wFWHA8nlj1Mlist=FLWw_N9aXGoFzuEAH
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