[BOAI] UC News: UC Libraries expand access to orphan works

[Peter Suber]

[Forwarding from Leslie Sepuka.  --Peter Suber.]


 To view online: http://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/news/article/26172***
*

* *

*FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE*

Wednesday, August 24, 2011****

UC Office of the President****

Laine Farley
(510) 987-0552
laine.farley at ucop.edu****

** **

*UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARIES EXPAND ACCESS TO ORPHAN WORKS*

* *

The University of California Libraries will join with the University of
Michigan, University of Wisconsin and University of Florida in a
groundbreaking initiative to identify and make available digital versions of
“orphan works” <http://www.lib.umich.edu/orphan-works> within the holdings
of the HathiTrust Digital Library.****

** **

HathiTrust is a partnership of major research institutions and libraries
working to ensure that the cultural record is preserved and accessible long
into the future. The majority of HathiTrust holdings are in-copyright works,
of which an unknown but likely large proportion are so-called “orphans” —
works whose owners cannot be identified or located. The University of
California will join the effort to identify orphan works and publicize
information about them in order to give rights holders an opportunity to
claim them and make informed decisions about their availability within
HathiTrust. It is likely that many people with these rights wish to make the
books fully viewable.****

** **

The majority of orphans probably are just that — lacking anyone to claim
ownership. If the orphan works are not claimed by rights holders, the
digital volumes will be made available in full view to HathiTrust partner
library patrons if their libraries hold those works in their print
collections.  ****

** **

“This effort promises to expand access to a great number of digitized
scholarly works in the UC Libraries’ collections that have previously been
hidden from view,” said Laine Farley, executive director of the California
Digital Library. “In addition to the more than 2.5 million public domain
volumes already available within HathiTrust, this important project will
bring a larger percentage of our digitized works directly to our students
and faculty in support of their work.”  The text of all of the works
contained within HathiTrust is fully searchable today, but currently only
works in the public domain or works whose copyright holders have given
explicit permission can be consulted online in their entirety.  The bulk of
public domain works are pre-1923 books from the U.S. and government
publications.****

* *

*About the University of California libraries **
*More than 100 libraries on the 10 University of California campuses support
the university's research, learning, patient care and public service
missions. Collectively, they make up the largest research/academic library
in the world and, with the California Digital Library, have taken the lead
to harness technology in support of innovative forms of scholarly
communication. To date, the UC Libraries have digitized more than 3.5
million volumes in their collections. For more information, visit
http://libraries.universityofcalifornia.edu.****

* *

*About HathiTrust*

Launched in 2008, HathiTrust has a growing membership, currently comprising
more than 50 partner libraries. Over the last three years, the partners have
contributed more than 9 million volumes to the digital library, digitized
from their library collections through various means, including Google and
Internet Archive digitization and in-house initiatives. More than 2.5
million of the contributed volumes are in the public domain and freely
available on the Web.  For more information, visit
http://www.hathitrust.org/about.****

** **

** **

** **
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mailman.ecs.soton.ac.uk/pipermail/boai-forum/attachments/20110824/1427c9f3/attachment.html