Moving with the times

British Library announces 2007 commitments on new content strategy

Drawing on responses to the consultation on its new content strategy, which began last April, the British Library has announced a series of commitments to take the strategy forward in the New Year.

The 2006 consultation sought the views of stakeholders across the spectrum of research, higher education and the library world in order to refine further the UK national library's approach to meeting the needs of researchers in a hybrid world where print and digital information co-exist.

During the next 12 months, the British Library is committed to:

• Publishing a revised set of content strategies across the 38 Arts and Humanities (A&H) and Social Sciences (SocSci) research disciplines and the eight special formats of materials that were covered in the Content Strategy.
• Working towards the development of a strategy for Science, Technology and Medicine (STM), identifying the communities upon which the Library needs to focus, the services that should be offered and the content that ought to be collected or connected to;
• Taking forward the 'connecting' element of the Content Strategy in A&H/SocSci by determining criteria for selecting partners, developing existing partnerships and establishing new relationships in support of collaborative collecting, access and preservation;
• Planning the transition from collecting print only or print and electronic formats in parallel, to collecting digital copies only for

  a. purchased UK journals that duplicate print copies held under legal deposit, and
  b. purchased overseas journals,

  taking into account, in both instances, concerns raised over long-term preservation and access to digital content;

• Deciding moderate shifts in A&H/SocSci collecting that can be accommodated within existing resources.

"We were delighted with the level of response that greeted the consultation paper on the Library's Content Strategy," said Lynne Brindley, Chief Executive of the British Library. "Responses represented broad coverage of all Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences areas served by the Library and provided valuable insights into the main areas of concern shared by our readers and stakeholders."

She added: "The most rewarding aspect of the consultation was the strong endorsement we received for the Content Strategy. Our approach was described as 'the only sensible way forward' and several overseas respondents commented on how our work provided them with a model that could be applied to their own connecting and collecting strategies."

For further information please contact: Ben Sanderson at the British Library Press Office (telephone +44 (0)1937 546126, email: ben.sanderson@bl.uk) or Lawrence Christensen (telephone +44 (0)20 7412 7114, email: lawrence.christensen@bl.uk)

Notes for Editors

The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom. It provides world class information services to the academic, business, research and scientific communities and offers unparalleled access to the world's largest and most comprehensive research collection. The British Library's collections include 150 million items from every era of written human history beginning with Chinese oracle bones dating from 300 BC, right up to today's newspapers. Further information is available on the Library's website at www.bl.uk