Europeana

What I appreciated most about Katy's Europeana presentation is that it acknowledged the political motivation that can drive digital library development. Much of our class content has focused on technology, formats, specifications, etc., for good reason, but I think it's equally important to always keep in mind that any collection of material, digital or analog, entails a process of selection and interpretation. "Information" does not exist in a neutral vacuum; as information professionals, it's our job to maintain and disseminate an awareness of exactly this circumstance. As Americans, we likely have a tendency to see Google and its various projects outside of a national context and it was very interesting to consider the Europeana project as an interruption to this mentality. It is a very real and concrete effort to build a counter to Google and to an Americanized web.

The history of the project raises a very compelling set of questions, regarding the way we can consider concepts like "the future geography of knowledge." I don't think that anxiety over preservation and access to information is anything new in libraries, but the ability to digitize changes our sense of what we can control, what feels like chaos, and what we are afraid of losing to more talented internet denizens.

Information is political. Even despite our pronouncements that we are in an internet-facilitated global age with few barriers remaining, the story of the Europeana project reminds us that we may sometimes take this view precisely because we are Americans and we are privileged in our ability to access and disseminate information. In reality, this circumstance is not yet a global constant. In short, the political framework is essential and I'm very appreciative that Katy included it in her presentation.