MIT Libraries to Build
$1.8-Million Digital Archive
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology Libraries and Hewlett-Packard have announced plans to build a digital archive to house the approximately 10,000 articles produced by the university’s authors each year. The holdings will include text, images, audio, video, and datasets.
“The purpose of this project is to develop a scalable digital archive with storage, submission, retrieval, searching, access control, rights management, and publishing capabilities,” said Ann Wolpert, director of the libraries. “As MIT’s intellectual heritage makes its way into electronic form, the library must take responsibility for capturing those documents that will form the foundation of tomorrow’s scholarship.”
“The digital archive will supplement, rather than replace, commercial publication by the MIT community,” noted Eric Celeste, the libraries’ assistant director for technology planning and administration. Its advantages over Web publication include stable, long-term storage; support for formats beyond HTML; access control; and rights management.
Hewlett-Packard will establish its own research team at the university and provide $1.8 million to cover staff, equipment, and space. The system is expected to begin accepting submissions in late 2001.
Posted April 3, 2000.
|
