Created Content Committee Meeting: November 8, 2016

Conference Call

Members present:  Ian Collins (University of Illinois at Chicago), Ellen Corrigan (Eastern Illinois University), Alice Creason (Lewis University), Margaret Heller, Chair (Loyola University Chicago), Sarah Prindle (Southern Illinois University Carbondale), Matt Short (Northern Illinois University), Rebecca Skirvin (North Central College)

Members absent: Adam Strohm (Illinois Institute of Technology), Jen Wolfe (Newberry Library)

CARLI staff present: Elizabeth Clarage, Amy Maroso

Minutes

• Alice Creason was confirmed to take minutes.
• The October 11, 2016 meeting minutes were approved with corrections.

Ongoing Project Status Reports

• Tumblr
  • We discussed moving away from using a weekly theme as a guideline for Tumblr posts. Jen (in absentia) recommended having fewer rules governing Tumblr posts regarding themes. Margaret provided examples of how she had very loosely applied a theme to her recent posts. Alice and Ian agreed with moving away from having a weekly theme for posts. Alice pointed out that other libraries and institutions on Tumblr do not do this but instead follow different trends. Margaret warned that trying to keep up with trends could require more planning for contributors but also pointed out that moving away from weekly themes would make the approach to posting to Tumblr more like the approach the featured image and digitized book posts on the CARLI website.
  • We also discussed the format of the posts, including the metadata. Rebecca noted that she included the name of the digital collection in her post that the images came from. Ellen added that adding tags for #CARLI and the name of the institution helps with discoverability but she thought the tag #history might be unnecessary. Margaret encouraged posters to find and utilize popular tags on Tumblr to boost the popularity of the posts and we discussed how to find trending posts and tags on Tumblr.
  • Alice will update the Google doc of Tumblr best practices with the changes and recommendations.
• Digitized Book/Featured Image
  • The committee will be changing the way the featured image posts will be scheduled. Margaret will establish a calendar with the posting dates for spring, and, rather than assigning people to dates, posters will be able to select the date(s) that work best for them. She will also send out monthly reminders.
  • We discussed how the featured image/book posts will sync with the schedule for posting to Tumblr. We decided if the person posting to Tumblr for the week was also writing the featured image/book post for that week, then the featured image/book post could also serve as the Friday post for the Tumblr. But, if the Tumblr poster and featured image/book writer were not the same person for a given week, then featured image writer would be responsible for cross-posting to the Tumblr, and it would be acceptable to have two Tumblr posts on the same date.
  • Ellen asked featured image/book contributors to review the posting guidelines and suggest changes and updates. She also reminded contributors to update the posting spreadsheet to track images featured.
• Google Analytics
  • TSV files are no longer coming through on the email list, so reports will be in Excel format. Amy will update the instructions for creating Google Analytics files on the CARLI website with the change. Margaret will send out the reports soon.
• Impact of CARLI CCC Promotional Efforts
  • Matt reported that they will be using CARLI data to examine traffic, including comparing Tumblr statistics with CONTENTdm statistics to determine if Tumblr is driving traffic to the collections. They will also be looking at the data to determine what kinds of materials are likely to drive traffic.

2016-17 Annual Project on Shareable Metadata

• Margaret informed the committee that she had created a section on the committee webpage with documents related to the annual project.
• DPLA Metadata Training Module document
  • Amy let the committee know that the ‎Metadata Services Specialist for DPLA is completing her documentation. Since the final document will be available soon, the committee decided to table the discussion of the documentation until next month’s call.
• CARLI Annual Meeting Presentation
  • Rebecca and Alice shared the slides and outline for the committee’s presentation at the CARLI Annual Meeting on November 18. If other institutions have questions about participating in the Tumblr, those questions will be referred to CARLI. The committee agreed we would share documentation with other libraries upon request. No changes were suggested, so Alice will submit the slides to CARLI.
• Fall Case Study
  • Matt shared his case study draft with the committee. Margaret suggested he move one paragraph to the end of the document, but otherwise there were no substantial edits or changes. The committee discussed ways to promote the case studies and provide context for them, including writing an introduction for the case studies, putting the documents on the CARLI website, writing it up for the CARLI Announce email newsletter, and sending it to the Digital Collections Interest Group email list.
• Margaret reminded the committee that we need to write two more case studies, and she urged committee members to submit ideas.

Next Meeting

The next committee conference call will occur on December 13, 2016, from 11:00am to 12:00pm.