Starting a Project

Scope of the project

• How large is the project (number of files, length of video, etc.)?
• Are the materials already organized and described in some manner?

Value

• How does this project support the mission of the college?
• How will faculty and students benefit from this project?
• How does this project complement other projects?
• What is the value of the content? How rare or unique are the materials?
• What is the benefit of providing digital access?
• What is the enduring value of a digital version of the project?

Description of physical features and condition of source materials

• What impact will digitization processes likely have on the condition of the
• materials to be digitized?
• Does a copy exist elsewhere in either a physical or digital format?
• Is the item brittle? Torn? Faded?
• Is the material in an obsolete or near obsolete format?

Intellectual property consideration?

• Who owns the physical materials?
• Who owns the intellectual property rights for the material?
• Is the material in the public domain?
• Does the project fall within fair use guidelines?

Metadata

• Does administrative, technical, and descriptive metadata exist?
• Is the metadata consistent with the Dublin Core standards for metadata?
• How will the metadata be created?

Funding

• What existing college resources are needed to complete this project?
• What new equipment must be purchased to complete this project?
• What new personnel must be hired to complete this project?
• How will the costs of digitization and post-digitization processing be
• supported?
• What aspects of the digitization work can be outsourced? Is out-sourcing
• appropriate?
• What other departments or institutions could be partners in this project?

Storage and Preservation Plan

• How many and what kind of derivative files will be made from the master files?
• What are the file size estimates for the master file and all derivatives?
• What temporary and permanent storage needs does this project have?
• What additional content will be added at a later date?

Access plan

• What restrictions, if any, will there be to use this digital collection?
• How will users locate this digital collection?
• How will users navigate within this collection? Will there links to other
• collections?

Projected Timeline

• What is the timeline, including lead-time for project preparation?
• What other timelines – e.g. grant funding cycles – should be considered?
• What is the project completion date? Milestones and/or deliverables?
• How will the timeline be managed?

Evaluation

• How will the success of the project be evaluated?

Adapted with permission from the Washington University, St. Louis, Digital Gateway documentation, Dec. 2006.