Maurice York
Associate University Librarian for Library Information Technology
University of Michigan
Debra Hanken Kurtz
Chief Executive Officer
DuraSpace
Mary Molinaro
Executive Director
Digital Preservation Network
Chip German
Program Director
APTrust
The University of Michigan Library is in the midst of a once-in-a-generation shift in all of its major digital collections, preservation, bibliographic, and information discovery platforms. Over the last two decades, the repositories and systems we have built have achieved surprising scale; across our web presence, we serve over 4 million users a year and provide an annual download stream of over 70 terabytes of data that supports research, teaching, and scholarship around the globe. While our tactics and choices over those two decades have proven successful, it is questionable how much further we can scale on a rather loose confederation of dozens of systems and hundreds of interfaces. A core part of our strategy for creating a coherent, adaptable, and scalable platform to serve the next 20 years is to shift significant resources (content, applications, dollars, hours, training, and intellectual effort) into building, supporting, and extending community infrastructure. In this presentation, we will outline Michigan’s strategy and bring together leaders of our foundational communities–which, combined, are hundreds of institutions strong–to hold a panel discussion about coherent action and collective direction.
