2023-02-22

Introductions, housekeeping

 Paloma

• New to the group: Mary Alice Harper! No need to do introductions, everybody knows everybody.

• Wiki updates to make it easier to navigate

  • home page is inviting, described group and includes how to join/stay connected,

  • meeting notes organized by year, 

  • Resources page added

  • LD Informal Learning series accessible with note highlighting Itza's work coordinating the group 

  • Wikidata Workshop January 2023 page - what it was, how it went, next steps

Wikidata Workshop summary & next steps

All

• 36 registrants (mostly UTL, but also HRC, Tarlton, ect...)

• Mary Alice – thought the workshop was pretty good, and would love to see a new more advanced workshop building up on this one. But it is also good to have one on the basics, for beginners. Hopes to convince some of her co-workers to attend next time if we do it again

  • Using wikidata is a game changer for authority control. Overpass the limitations of LCNAF

• Ann – really enjoyed. Learnt a lot. She knows of people that she works with wanted to keep on updating wikidata items after the workshop

• Katie – Aware that it was intimidating, next iteration she plans to go slower and give more time for hands-on

  • Ann – SPARQL was too hard. If wanted to do it again for beginners, we might want to leave it out. Interested in seeing what you can do with SPARQL, but not necessarily how to write the SPARQL query

• Elliot – what about the pace of the workshop (2 days in a row)?

  • Ann – was good. One day would be too much. People gets tired. On the other hand, you don't want to put two many days between a multi day workshop

• Mary Alice - would like supervisors supporting this work, understanding this is part of our jobs. Right now does not feel very supported

  • Paloma - yes, how can we create a report that shows what we have done, what value is to this?

• Ann - has opposite problem, lots of support for this but in addition to existing workload

• Yogita - hear about linked data as future of libraries (in classes, readings, etc.), is there some way to explain to as we work toward the future that we need this to get there?

• Paloma - there was a series of workshops related to Mellon grant, where did conversations end up? strategic plan for UTL, shared portal? The key is to link this work with the organization' strategic plan

• Ann - not sure how quickly any of this will actually happen in UTL - lots of workflows, systems, etc. that change slowly (I hope I characterized this right-kpm); definitely a lot of value in catalogers learning this, but it is a matter of not a lot staff, NACO authorities not sustainable; need to do things in an entirely different way

• Paloma - we are experimenting, other institutions are implementing

Texas Conference on Digital Libraries, CFP

Paloma, all

Last year we held a birds of a feather session where we met with folks from other institutions

Do we want to propose something: https://www.tdl.org/tdl-events/tcdl/tcdl-2023/tcdl-2023-cfp/ - we have until March 6

• Second birds of a feather - leaning towards - Paloma will start document

• Wikidata workshop 

• Presentation on our Wikidata workshop

How much is Wikidata / Linked data happening across TDL institutions?

• A & M is doing stuff: as much or more than UT 

Linked Data webinar round-up

Paloma, all

Resources 

• For shared resources - webinars, readings, etc.

• Katie will populate resources page with readings and such from earlier linked data informal learning group, so that the resources page can be a one-stop easy to point to place for resources

Planning for 2023

Paloma, all

Where do we want to be at end of 2023? What do we want to accomplish?

• Paloma - get concrete about systems in use and the linked data possibilities within those systems (+1 Elliot)

• Yogita - like the strategic plan idea, communication to stakeholders

• Paloma - we don't have agency within our institutions to write the strategic plans, but we have agency to make recommendations. Making recommendations to UTL Leadership?

• Katie - we could look at strategic plans/missions, etc. 

• Paloma - would like to invite Linked data Community of Practices for ExLibris user groups (https://igelu.org/products-and-initiatives/communities-of-practice/linked-open-data/) to talk to us about capabilities in Alma/Primo

  • Ann - would like lorraine to come to presentation (+1 Paloma)

• Katie - are there places that are doing a great job implementing?

• Paloma - with BIBFRAME, archival description, or digital collections? Different communities might have different ways of getting there. Yale recently implementing a discovery layer (LUX) based on LinkedArt that brings together all collections across campus

• Yogita Stanford (https://igelu.org/products-and-initiatives/communities-of-practice/linked-open-data/) AND Smithsonian (https://igelu.org/products-and-initiatives/communities-of-practice/linked-open-data/)

• Paloma - in position to ask people in PCC community - the sky is the limit! Tim Berners-Lee? (this was a joke )

• Mary Alice - we can create a shared doc where everyone can contribute ideas about people or institutions doing good stuff

• Katie -  I want to know how implementation has worked - concerns about only increasing workloads or reliance on contingent workers

• Paloma - really like idea of report with recommendations about how we can leverage linked data in... various systems