D. Long-range plan for selection

The Library does not have a formal, long-range planning document listing what materials and topics or how many items will be digitized and cataloged. We do know that between 2003 and 2004 we will add:

• Additional photographs documenting railroads in the West
• Edward Sheriff Curtis Native American photograph collection
• 2,000 western maps
  
• Items from our western art collection, such as prints by James Otto Lewis, McKinney Hall, Caitlin and Bodmer

E. Experience gained

Based on our experience and comments from our users, the following advice is offered to other institutions selecting material for digitization projects:

• Be highly selective. Digitization projects are expensive to start up and expensive to maintain. It is disappointing for users to bring up hundreds of poor quality or boring images.  Concentrate on processing your high-quality originals.  Select samples from collections rather than processing every image.  If we could go back in time, we would eliminate many images of railroad tracks, tree stumps, and blurry Christmas trees.

• Decide how you will respond to offers from people who want to loan material for digitization or make donations with digital strings attached. The high profile of our digital collection has resulted in several donations of photograph collections.  Many owners have approached the Library who want the material digitized and cataloged as a condition of donation. With our grant obligations, our processing schedule often makes it impossible to drop everything to process a new collection.  Often, the new materials meet fewer of the selection criteria than other items in the collection.
• Decide how you will handle donations with "digital strings attached." The high profile of our digital collection has resulted in several donations of photograph collections. Many owners have approached the Library who want the material digitized and cataloged as a condition of donation. With our grant obligations, our processing schedule often makes it impossible to drop everything to process a new collection. Digitization and cataloging is expensive, and without a significant cash donation along wit the materials, processing the material may not be possible. In addition, the new material may meet fewer of the selection criteria than other items in the collection.

Other donors have approached the Library with an offer to loan material for digitization without transferring the original material. In the third case, we have had to seriously weigh the goals our program – to preserve and make accessible our collection – against the desire to make copies of items in private collections.  The Denver Public Library has become highly selective about materials that are loaned for digitization and cataloging.  The processing is expensive and the end result is a digital file – not possession of an original artifact.