As a library community, we continue to struggle to find scalable approaches to offering open, shared, sustainable scholarly infrastructure. This is especially true in the data publishing and research data management space where institution-focused approaches to capturing and curating data may be hindering our ability to grow adoption by our researchers.
To alleviate this impasse and jumpstart a new community-led approach, California Digital Library is formally partnering with Dryad to build a globally-accessible, transparent, and low-cost data publishing and curation service. The goal of this partnership is to completely reimagine the potential for Dryad, acting as an open, free community hub for collecting and curating data for researchers. It is not intended to compete with existing institution-based services, but to complement and amplify each of our campus’ efforts.
We hope that we can start a global discussion with institutions worldwide on better ways to support institutions and researchers in the face of rapid commercialization of the research data space. We cannot do this alone. For our collective action to effectively leverage institutional knowledge and serve researchers as end users, we need a diverse group of institutions to participate in defining the goals and values of this activity.
What does this look like?
We are putting the finishing touches on the migration of the Dryad service onto CDL’s technical platform. Dryad is a trusted name in the researcher community and, with this technical shift, it will be a space where institutional members will have transparent reporting features and the ability to join a global data curation community. Dryad will also be positioned to enhance technical integrations (via API) with publishing partners to seamlessly capture data publications at the time of article publishing. This means that we will be able to simultaneously drive adoption of data publishing and offer digital curation and stewardship in one space.
CDL Awarded IMLS Grant for Community-Owned Data Publishing Infrastructure
Supporting shared scholarly infrastructure must be done by the community and for the community. To help jumpstart this process, California Digital Library and Dryad will facilitating several one-on-one discussions and community workshops in the coming months to determine the features and services most needed in our community.
Our first community workshop will be held in December after CNI in Washington, DC. With funding from an IMLS National Infrastructure grant, we will host a facilitated discussion on institutional values, needs, and potential community-based business models that meet our collective goals, support our researchers, and create a sustainable, attractive new Dryad service offering. Our goal is to chart a path forward for this movement and gain concrete institutional commitments to joining the Dryad community.
How do you get involved?
Please read the latest blog post from Melissanne Scheld, Dryad’s Executive Director, about the next steps for Dryad.
Institutions: If a member of senior leadership would be interested in participating in our one-day workshop on December 12, 2018, please contact the UC Curation Center (UC3) at CDL for more information.
Don’t Worry: There will be additional workshops planned in the US and abroad. We will keep you posted on future opportunities to get involved in this important initiative. Please contact contact the UC Curation Center (UC3) at CDL for more information for more information.
The blog is cross-posted at CDLinfo: https://www.cdlib.org/cdlinfo/2018/10/24/community-owned-data-publishing-infrastructure/
