Leadership and Digital Curation

               This week I was lucky enough to attend a Smithsonian lecture called “What is Digital Curation and What Does It Mean for Cultural Heritage Institutions?”  After working on digitizing for a cultural heritage institution the lecture was the perfect way to see how other people at the Smithsonian- and in the general museum world- viewed digital curation.  Changing the title of digitizing to digital curation is one step towards making the importance of digitization known.  There are many things that are overlooked and, while digitization may be the talk of the town in some respects, it is also taking its time to get off the ground.  

               This can be seen not only when looking at Smithsonian Institutions, but also any museum or archival collection.  There is no set of guidelines that everyone uses.  In certain circumstances it is perfectly understandable to want to be unique.  However, when it comes to data management it helps on a number of levels if there is a system that everyone is using.  Coming from the library world OCLC and the Marc record are just a few examples.  Though I have come to learn, while looking at records from all around the world, that even with a seemingly uniform system there is some variety.

               Working to digitally curate the Moses Asch Collection has shown me even more variation.  The systems we are using, besides the DAMS, are different than other Smithsonian digitization efforts.  There is no one set of keywords to choose from nor specific software and hardware to use for every project.  Each project has a different way to do things and different tools to help them complete their projects.  The guidelines that were created and edited so well for this project apply only to this project.  There is no set recipe or book that we can look at if there are questions.  Digital curation calls for leadership in every project that is created under its wing.  They are using each project as a case study, as with most new programs.  

               Working on one of these case studies I have seen the need for leadership for the individual projects.  I have also seen that there needs to be a consortium of leaders to discuss the future of digital projects and create a system for digital curators to use.