William Henry Holmes, Chief, Bureau of American Ethnology, ca. 1905

Smithsonian Libraries, Natural History Main Library, ca. 2013

COLLECTIONS SERVICES

PRESERVATION DIGITIZATION

The cultivation of natural science cannot be efficiently carried on without reference to an extensive library Charles Darwin, et al ‏(1847)

The Wherefore of BHL

Mass digitization of Smithsonian Libraries collections aligns with the overall Smithsonian digitization strategy and remains a

center of excellence for rapid digitization at the Smithsonian

Members‏…‏BHL‏Singapore‏is#14‏

14 Members • American Museum of Natural History • BHL Singapore • California Academy of Sciences Library • Cornell University Library • Harvard University Botany Libraries • Ernst Mayr Library of the Museum of Comparative Zoology • Library of Congress • Marine Biological Laboratory and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Library • Missouri Botanical Garden Library • Natural History Museum, London • The New York Botanical Garden • Royal Botanic Garden, Kew • Smithsonian Institution Libraries • United States Geological Survey Libraries • Washington University of St. Louis

Affiliates

Affiliates Academy of Natural Sciences Philadelphia at Drexel University The Field Museum Library Newest Affiliate:

Technology Library Science

Biodiversity Heritage Library

Specimen collections

Databases

Publications

Observations

‘Gray’‏literature

Index cards

Field notebooks

Taxonomic Impediment

Problems of Mass Digitization of Library Materials

42,498,407 pages 130,484 volumes 71,945 titles

4 February 2014

Content Growth 2007-2014

Mass digitization of Smithsonian Libraries collections aligns with the overall Smithsonian digitization strategy and remains a

center of excellence for rapid digitization at the SI

Problems of Library Metadata

User Statistics: 2007 - 2013

Visitors: 3,628,088 Page Views: 17,604,395 New vs. Returning: 50.06% vs. 49.04%

2007

2013 146,798 visitors | November 2012

233 countries Users in 233 Countries

TheMachineIsUs/ingUs <Response

xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-

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<Status>ok</Status>

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<ItemID>16800</ItemID>

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<Contributor>MBLWHOI Library</Contributor>

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Awards

2013 ComputerWorld Award 2013 Council of Botanical and

Horticulture Libraries 2011 Thackray Medal by the Society for

the History of Natural History 2010 ALCTS award for outstanding

collaboration

I am thrilled with what I have been able to find re: archaic mammary embryology some of which I had been hoping to find at the National Library of Medicine, and to get it through your program was a huge advantage. Last night I believe I requested and received 11 PDFs, all of which are essential to a review paper* I am completing. Olav T. Oftedal PhD Smithsonian Environmental Research Center .al‏et‏,Oftedal‏by‏”Gland‏Mammary‏the‏of‏Evo-Devo“‏*Journal of Mammary Gland Biology and Neoplasia (May 2013)

Looking Forward

In any well-appointed Natural History Library there should be found every book and every edition of every book dealing in the remotest way with the subjects concerned.

Charles Davies Sherborn Epilogue to Index Animalium, March 1922

Web Services | Digital Library

Not just Biodiversity … The Cultural Heritage Library: Over 5,000 items The Catholic Sioux Herald (very fragile and unique) Dibner Heralds of Science Upcott scrapbook of Aeronautica & Aeronautical sheet music Rare materials from the Cooper-Hewitt NDM Library AnthroNotes Smithsonian Budget Books & Congressional Hearings

SMITHSONIAN LIBRARIES CULTURAL HERITAGE LIBRARY

Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q1 Q2

2012 2013 2014

Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q1 Q2

2012 2013 2014

Digitization is still increasing, too

37,283 total items digitized

130,375 total items digitized

SMITHSONIAN RESEARCH ONLINE (SRO)

Smithsonian Transcription Center - BETA

The current item being transcribed is‏William‏Upcott’s‏scrapbook‏of‏early aeronautica, which documents some of the earliest ballooning experiments and aerial voyages, with items dating back to 1783 and the birth of ballooning. The scrapbook is 324 pages and is currently 43 % transcribed (138 pages completed) with 35 contributing volunteers working on it. The scrapbook is a good example of an item representing world culture, and is held in the NASM Ramsey rare book collection.

The worth and importance of the Institution is not to be estimated by

what it accumulates within the walls of its building, but by what it sends forth to the

world.

Joseph Henry, 1853

Followership is GROWING!

7709

17754

5508

10784

TWITTER FACEBOOK FY2013

FY2012

⇧65% growth

⇧40% growth

AS OF TODAY…

20,411 followers on TWITTER

8,208 likes on FACEBOOK

12% GROWTH

FY2013

PAGEVIEWS, Oct 1 2012 to Present

198235

146764

FY2013 FY2012

⇧35%

increase

Google featured Maria Sibylla Merian as their Doodle.

Second result was the Libraries!

Pageview Growth on

blog.library.si.edu

More people are coming to our blog

AS OF TODAY…

12% GROWTH

Expanding into New Platforms

Created official guidelines this

month

Officially launched the

start of FY2013

Gaining 30,000+ New Followers on Tumblr

A microblog with a social component & big visual emphasis, i.e. GIFS!

While Gaining 30,000 New Followers

360

16983

20123

31756

OCT NOV DEC JAN FEB MAR APR MAY JUN JUL AUG SEP OCT NOV DEC JAN FEB

First feature on Radar: Gif

Featured Blog

18K

5.5K

2.9K

1.5K

4.8K

Radar = Exposure

5.2K

• Companies can $25,000 to be featured

• Tumblr curated & widely viewed

• We’ve been featured 8 times!

Thank you!