Information Scotland The Journal of the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals in Scotland ISSN 1743-5471 Issue contents | Journal contents | About the online edition of the journal June 2008 Volume 6(3)

Aiming Higher

Context

The annual Electric Connections was formerly organised by the COSMIC group which represents the archives, libraries and museums sectors in Scotland. A new group has been launched called Digital Access Scotland and two of the organisations represented, SCURL and SLIC, assisted with co-ordinating the programme for the 2008 event. Lisa McLaren, a CILIP Chartership candidate at Napier University Library, volunteered to assist at the event held at the Scottish Storytelling Centre on 11 March and also to submit this report. Jill Evans, SCURL.

Electric Connections, organised by SCURL and SLIC, was billed as a collaborative venture between Museums, Libraries and Archives, with speakers from each sector highlighting their current projects.

Sheila Cannell of Edinburgh University Library and Alma Swan gave an overview of IRIScotland, a digital repository for the nation, and looked at its forthcoming evaluation before leading a lively debate on the future of open access.

Kevin Wilbramson, from Edinburgh City Council spoke about the Scottish Archive Network, which provides “internet access to the written history of Scotland”.

East Renfrewshire Council won the British Library’s Hidden Treasures Brought to Life competition and Cathy Gormal described the work of digitising the Arbuthnott manuscript. The audience was also treated to a view of the manuscript using Turning the Pages software.

Emma Beer introduced the work of the Strategic Content Alliance, a JISC-funded cross-sectoral project aimed at bringing publicly funded e-content together. The project encourages public sector organisations to collaborate and coordinate their online activities to make the most of limited budgets.

The highlight of the programme was the Culture Minister, Linda Fabiani, launching Digital Access Scotland, a new strategic group that will be responsible for championing information environment initiatives.

Wendy Turner, from the National Museum of Scotland, examined recent museum projects, including NMS Online and Scotland’s Images. The final talk by Kate Lindsay gave details of the World War One Poetry Digital Library. Kate spoke about the ways in which the project had harnessed Web 2.0 to reach out to users and publicised the Great War Archive, where members of the public can digitise their own artefacts.

The day was a great success, bringing together people from a number of institutions and showcasing exciting projects. There were good opportunities for networking, at registration and during lunch, but what was particularly inspiring was the number of organisations that are already working together on projects and the scope for future collaboration.

Information Scotland Vol. 6(3) June 2008

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