[open-bibliography] Cologne-based Libraries publish their data under CC0

[Jonathan Gray]

Excellent news! Any chance you'd be up for doing a guest blog post
about this on OKF blog?

All the best,

Jonathan

On Fri, Mar 12, 2010 at 8:45 PM, Adrian Pohl <pohl at hbz-nrw.de> wrote:
> Dear open data friends,
>
> we did it! (Partially, the second round will come on monday but the news
> is already going around.)
>
> You'll find the joint statement below or on
> http://www.hbz-nrw.de/dokumentencenter/presse/pm/datenfreigabe_engl
>
> The link mentioned at the bottom of the statement won't work until
> monday. But you already can have a look at the data dump the Cologne
> University Library made from their local data:
> http://opendata.ub.uni-koeln.de/ (There you get access to more than 3
> Million records.)
>
> So, the first step is taken. We now need more open bibliographic data
> and an open-data-practice similar to that Nat Torkington is envisioning
> in this post: http://radar.oreilly.com/2010/03/truly-open-data.html
>
> And we did this in only 9 days with just on meeting between the
> libraries and the hbz!
>
> Adrian
>
>
> Joint statement of the North Rhine-Westphalian Library ServiceCenter,
> the University and Public Library of Cologne, the UniversityLibrary of
> the University of Applied Science of Cologne, the Library ofthe Academy
> of Media Arts Cologne and Library Centre
> ofRhineland-Palatinate.Releasing catalogue data: Cologne-based libraries
> to pioneer Open Data practicesCologne-based libraries and the Library
> Centre ofRhineland-Palatinate (LBZ) in cooperation with the
> NorthRhine-Westphalian Library Service Center (hbz) are the first
> Germanlibraries to adopt the idea of Open Access for bibliographic data
> bypublishing their catalog data for free public use. The University
> andPublic Library of Cologne (USB), the Library of the Academy of
> MediaArts Cologne, the University Library of the University of
> AppliedScience of Cologne and the LBZ are taking the lead by releasing
> theirdata. The Public Library of Cologne has announced to follow
> shortly.The release of bibliographic data forms a basis for linking that
> datawith data from other domains in the Semantic Web.
> Libraries have been involved with the Open Access movement for along
> time. The objective of this movement is to provide free access
> toknowledge to everybody via the internet. Until now, only few
> librarieshave done so with their own data. Rolf Thiele, deputy director
> of theUSB Cologne, states: "Libraries appreciate the Open Access
> movementbecause they themselves feel obliged to provide access to
> knowledgewithout barriers. Providing this kind of access for
> bibliographic data,thus applying the idea of Open Access to their own
> products, has beendisregarded until now. Up to this point, it was not
> possible todownload library catalogues as a whole. This will now be
> possible. Weare taking a first step towards a worldwide visibility of
> libraryholdings on the internet." The library of the European
> Organization forNuclear Research (CERN) has already published its data
> under a publicdomain license in January.
> Public data is placed in the public domainThe publication of the data
> enables anybody to download, modify anduse it for any purpose. "In times
> in which publishers and some libraryorganisations see data primarily as
> a source of capital, it isimportant to stick up for the traditional duty
> of libraries andlibrarians. Libraries have always strived to make large
> amounts ofknowledge accessible to as many people as possible, with the
> lowestrestrictions possible," said Silke Schomburg, deputy director of
> thehbz. "Furthermore libraries are funded by the public. And what
> ispublicly financed should be made available to the public
> withoutrestrictions," she continued.
> Cooperation and data exchangie between libraries have been
> firmlyestablished in the library world for more than 100 years.
> Freelysupplying bibliographic data should not only further
> enhancecooperation among libraries but enable subsequent use by
> non-libraryinstitutions. "In the course of the internet's development it
> becameclear that many services can be greatly enhanced by catalog data.
> TheGerman Wikipedia for example has been enriched with German
> NationalLibrary data for a long time. Such enrichment is often hindered
> andconstricted by the data's half open characterData for the Semantic WebThe North Rhine-Westphalian Library Service
> Center has recentlybegun evaluating the possibilities to transform data
> from librarycatalogs in such a way that it can become a part of the
> emergingSemantic Web. The liberalization of bibliographic data provides
> thelegal background to perform this transformation in a cooperative,
> open,and transparent way. Currently there are discussions with other
> memberlibraries of the hbz library network to publish their data.
> Moreover,"Open Data" and "Semantic Web" are topics that are gaining
> perceptionin the international library world.
> Further information and links to the published datasets are available at
> http://www.hbz-nrw.de/projekte/linked_open_data/
>
>
>
>
> Besuchen Sie das hbz auf dem 4. Leipziger Kongress für Information und
> Bibliothek an Stand +11 auf Ebene 1!
>
>
>
>
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>



-- 
Jonathan Gray

Community Coordinator
The Open Knowledge Foundation
http://blog.okfn.org

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