Welsh Library Portal Project announced
We've spent a lot of time talking about the Talis Platform and the benefits it offers the library community in terms of the reuse and repurposing of data. But its always good to see concepts put into practice, and the announcement regarding the Welsh Portal Project demonstrates this.
There was no Welsh regional representation tasked with the maintenance of UnityWeb, a forerunner to Talis Source, when I product managed that service. As a consequence, there was no focal point in Wales tasked with updating and maintaining holdings in UnityWeb - unlike other regions - despite the fact that it represented the largest aggregation of library holdings in Wales at that time. To be fair, perhaps this was a reflection of the conflicting demands on the time and resources of many Welsh libraries, perhaps there needed to be more compelling reasons for participation?
Which is why this announcement is so important. Lets fast forward to today when contributions are to a Platform, and the Platform services not only Talis Source, a successor to UnityWeb, but other initiatives. Many libraries in Wales may not be in a position to contribute data purely for the purposes of interlending. But when there is an added incentive to contribution ie. participation in a Welsh portal project, as well as national interlending activity, the effort can be more easily countenanced.
So, I look forward to working with many more libraries in Wales in the future, in offering an opportunity to empower their data, not for singular, but multiple initiatives. And, given the many barriers that libraries face to liberating their data, this is a welcome prospect.
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