 | This article needs to beupdated. Please help update this article to reflect recent events or newly available information.(May 2020) |
 | |
| Abbreviation | DPLA |
|---|---|
| Founded | April 18, 2013 |
| Type | Nonprofit |
| 46-1160948 | |
| Legal status | 501(c)(3) project |
| Headquarters | Boston,Massachusetts, U.S. |
Executive director | John Bracken |
| Website | dp |
TheDigital Public Library of America (DPLA) is a US project aimed at providing public access to digital holdings in order to create a large-scale publicdigital library. It officially launched on April 18, 2013, after two-and-a-half years of development.[1]
The DPLA is a discovery tool, orunion catalog, forpublic domain and openly licensed content held by the United States' archives, libraries, museums, and other cultural heritage institutions.[1] It was started byHarvard University'sBerkman Center for Internet & Society in 2010, with financial support from theAlfred P. Sloan Foundation,[2] and has subsequently received funding from several foundations and government agencies, including theNational Endowment for the Humanities and theBill & Melinda Gates Foundation.[3]
DPLA "aims to unify such disparate sources as theLibrary of Congress, theInternet Archive, various academic collections, and presumably any other collection that would be meaningful to include. ... They have yet to ... decide such issues as how near to the present theircatalog will come. There is an ongoing dispute regarding so-called 'orphan works' and other questions of copyright."[4][needs update]John Palfrey, co-director of the Berkman Center, stated in 2011: "We aspire to establish a system whereby all Americans can gain access to information and knowledge in digital formats in a manner that is 'free to all.' It is by no means a plan to replace libraries, but rather to create a common resource for libraries and patrons of all types.”[5]
The DPLA links service hubs, including twelve major state and regional digital libraries or library collaborations, as well as sixteen content hubs that maintain a one-to-one relationship with DPLA.[6][7]
In July 2023, in response to the considerable number ofbooks banned or challenged in the United States, the DPLA launched The Banned Book Club.[8] The online resource allows readers to check outbooks banned by local libraries. The service usesGPS to determine a user's location and allows them to freely access the exact books that have been banned in their local area.[9] In May 2024, The Banned Book Club started a new social media campaign called, The Banned Book of the Week, where their curation team will select a new title every week to post on various social media applications.[10] John S. Bracken, the executive director of the DPLA, said they created The Banned Book Club to ensure every American has access to books they want to read: "Today book bans are one of the greatest threats to our freedom".[11]
In September 2012, an inauguralBoard of Directors was appointed to guide the DPLA: Cathy Casserly, CEO ofCreative Commons;Paul Courant, Dean of Libraries and Professor of Information at theUniversity of Michigan; Laura DeBonis, Former Director of Library Partnerships forGoogle Book Search; Luis Herrera, City Librarian forSan Francisco; andJohn Palfrey, Head of School atPhillips Academy Andover, who served as board chairman.[12] In 2015, Palfrey was succeeded as chairman by Amy Ryan of theBoston Public Library andJennifer 8. Lee became a board member.[13]
Daniel J. Cohen was appointed as the founding Executive Director in March 2013.[14]
A steering committee led the planning phase of the DPLA initiative from inception through its launch in 2013. Members of the project's Steering Committee included Harvard University'sRobert Darnton, Maura Marx, andJohn Palfrey;Paul Courant ofUniversity of Michigan,Carla Hayden then of Baltimore'sEnoch Pratt Free Library and subsequently theLibrarian of Congress,Charles J. Henry of the USCouncil on Library and Information Resources, Luis Herrera ofSan Francisco Public Library,Susan Hildreth of the US governmentInstitute of Museum and Library Services (who stepped down from the Steering Committee to avoid a conflict of interest related to funding from IMLS),Brewster Kahle, Michael A. Keller of Stanford University,Carl Malamud, consultantDeanna B. Marcum,Jerome McGann, Dwight McInvaill ofGeorgetown County Library in South Carolina, Peggy Rudd of theTexas State Library and Archives Commission, Amy Ryan of theBoston Public Library,David Spadafora of theNewberry Library in Chicago, and Doron Weber of the Sloan Foundation.[15] Others working on the project includedHarvard University'sDavid Weinberger.[16]
Critiques of the project during its planning phase included its vagueness, lack of internal cohesion, potentially redundant overlap with similar efforts (such asProject Gutenberg), and potential to redirect financial support away from existingpublic libraries.[17] It has been suggested that in contrast to the brick-and-mortar public library, a digital public library may not be suitable for providing adultliteracy training or fostering youngchildren's cognitive development.[18]
Concern that the project would harm funding for traditional public libraries was acknowledged in the statement of Peggy Rudd, a member of the Steering Committee, that "the Chief Officers of State Library Agencies passed a resolution at their May 11, 2011 meeting asking the steering committee to reconsider the name Digital Public Library of America, fearing that the inclusion of the word 'public' would have the unintended consequence of giving local governments the excuse to reduce public library funding".[19]
Participants in the planning phase of the DPLA established a publicly accessiblewiki[20] which outlines "workstreams" ("Audience and Participation", "Content and Scope", "Financial/Business Models", "Governance", "Legal Issues," "Technical Aspects") and corresponding listserves. A proposed future project of the DPLA is the idea of theScannebago, a mobile scanning unit that would travel the United States in order to digitize and curate local historical materials.[21]Harvard University staff, led by project's managing director Maura Marx and principal investigatorJohn Palfrey, coordinated a broad-based team that built the DPLA's digital library platform, which launched on April 18, 2013.[22]
In June 2013, the DPLA announced a partnership withHathiTrust to provide access to the latter's digital materials.[23]
These are not the clientele for the DPLA
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |