Are you being served? How knowing digital users can help you improve access to your alderman and notary archives and loads of other stuff (Südwestdeutscher Archivtag, Konstanz, Germany, 24 May 2014)
1. Are You Being Served?Are You Being Served?
How knowing digital users can help you improve access to
your alderman and notary archives and loads of other stuff
Südwestdeutscher Archivtag | Konstanz, Germany | May 24, 2014
2. Meet ChristianMeet Christian
Works at BHIC, Netherlands
Coördinates reference
services & digital innovation
Founder of Archief 2.0
Blogger/speaker/writer
www.digitalearchivaris.nl
@cvanderven
3. A great idea!A great idea!
“Let’s scan our alderman* archives and let
volunteers make them accessible in the best
way possible”
*) Stadträte until 1811
6. ResultsResults
Best index ever?
No, in about 10 years of hard work a group of
volunteers completed about 1% of the index…
…and the project was halted
7. The following 12 slides
contain screenshots that
even archivists may find
too old, outdated & boring
(Also all of them are in Dutch)
25. The old daysThe old days
Meeting users in our study halls
Knowing users over many years of visits
Basis for providing services
Basis for successful collaboration
And then the Internet came
and it changed everything…
26. Meet digital usersMeet digital users
IP addresses
Visits and pageviews
Click paths, session duration,
exit pages, browser type etc.
Difficult collaborating with
users who are difficult to meet
and difficult to know
(Difficult giving them flowers!)
35. Meet TheoMeet Theo
"I only participate in the
Amsterdam population
registry project, and yes,
as someone from
Amsterdam you hope to
meet some of your
ancestors this way"
36. Meet MaartenMeet Maarten
"Each time when I have
finished a scan and push
the ‘send’ button,
I experience a moment of
happiness"
37. Meet DitekeMeet Diteke
"Reading the old
handwritings offers
challenging puzzles which
improve my paleography
skills"
Could she check on other
people’s transcripts?
Contact her!
38. Meet another TheoMeet another Theo
"Personally I enjoy the
many discussions on the
forum, because you might
be doing the data entry on
your own, but you're not
alone"
40. Meet DorethéMeet Dorethé
"I find it to be a bit of a
sport to try and find info on
the internet or, when it
concerns digital archives,
from databases"
41. Meet DorethéMeet Dorethé
Got to know her via forum
Posted 1.147 messages
Many people even believe
she’s staff of the BHIC
She got flowers for helping
us doing ‘our’ reference work
42. Meet PaulineMeet Pauline
Enthusiastic historian
Lives in Nuenen, Brabant
Has an interest in
archeology, monuments,
Vincent van Gogh,
recreation, tourism, village
marketing and poetry
46. Profiles for us(e)Profiles for us(e)
Our digital users provide us with an amazing
amount of quality information about
themselves, their interests, motivation etc.
But how do you use this information?
And do you?
47. Meet BenMeet Ben
Independent software
developer
Blogs about crowdsourced
transcription projects
Developed FromThePage
A free collaborative
transcription platform
49. Meet Ben’s volunteerMeet Ben’s volunteer
“You're going to laugh, but…
I have been transcribing just
a few pages at a time lately
because I didn't want to
finish before the next diary is
posted! I didn't want to run
out of diary, in other words.”
50. Statistics for us(e)Statistics for us(e)
Statistics
Websites, applications, social media etc.
Who are they?
What do they search for?
What collections do they use?
What way do they participate?
Etc.
51. Meet MarissaMeet Marissa
CEO at Yahoo!
Previously vice president
of user experice at Google
Oversaw layout of
Google’s search page
“Focus on the user”
52. The one blue is more
greenish than the other
blue (really!)
53. A/B testing pointed out
that in fact the blue-blue
was more clicked on
than the green-blue
(really!)
54. Let data decideLet data decide
What you can’t learn from the info of one user,
but can learn from the statistics of a crowd
“Let the data decide”
--Marissa Mayer
61. Second chance?Second chance?
What do users need, what do they tell us?
What do data tell us users really use?
Where can we meet these users?
Can we collaborate with them?
64. Users willing to
scan and index
archives meet
each other on
our forum,
where we can
also meet them
65. We may import these indexes in our system, linked to our
inventories and scans, if scans are already available
66. We even link to photographed resources on other
websites, not worrying too much about quality and such
67. ResultsResults
Users helped us to make 225.000 deeds
accessible through our website within 2 years
User community provides us with a steady stream
of fresh records
This database quickly became our most popular
one for non specific genealogical research
68. What’s next?What’s next?
Acquire photos of the archives from users and
import them into the database
Let software extract names of people and places
from the summary text into separate fields
Make archives accessible on a basic level, and let
indexes be enriched through crowdsourcing
69. Call for actionCall for action
Meet your digital users & know them better
Use various channels & sources of information
Improve your services in collaboration with users
(And less is often more!)
70. Thank you!Thank you!
Any questions?
Thank you for staying with me!
Please meet me after my talk, and online