Articles

The Pope and Open Access

by R.C. Miessler, Head Editor, INALJ Indiana

The Pope and Open Access

rcmprofileThe recent election of Pope Francis may not seem to have much to do with libraries, but in fact, it may play a major role in determining the future of open access to Vatican Library documents. But first, a bit of context.

EMC recently announced that it would partner with the Vatican to digitize the Vatican Apostolic Library’s materials that predate 1501, providing 2.8 petabytes of storage for the digital archival of the library’s documents. EMC isn’t a stranger to large-scale digitization projects, having been involved with other libraries’ efforts to archive their materials. What makes this project especially interesting is the scope of the materials being digitized, and the potential interest in the library’s archives around the world.

Given the library’s rather strict guidelines for admission, and the fact that it is a fixed library with only one location, the digitization could be a boon for scholars around the world, as well for interested parties who want to peruse the wealth of materials in the library. Unfortunately, nothing has been announced in regard to accessibility; we have yet to know if access to the digital collection will be open to all, or if the Vatican will go with a subscription or institution-based model, or if it will even be available accessible over the Internet in the first place. The amount of data and number of potentially interested parties will make preservation, hosting and maintenance a substantial task, and while open access would be ideal, I have doubts that this will be the road taken, at least for the entire collection. However, here’s to hoping my pessimism is unfounded, and this will truly be an open access archive, and there is one reason why I think this may be possible.

This is entirely pure speculation at this point, but Francis’s service in Argentina and his championing for the poor may play a role in maintaining an open access archive of the Vatican library’s documents.  The growth of the Roman Catholic Church in the global South, where academic resources are limited and opportunities to travel to the Vatican for research are less likely, may prompt the Vatican, under Francis’s leadership, to give open access to these resources in order to give opportunities to less fortunate scholars, clergy and laity. If  Francis is still Pope when the project is completed and takes an active interest in the digitization of the Vatican’s documents, then perhaps he may be moved to ensure an openly accessible archive for all. And what better advocate for open access than the Pope?

Again, pure speculation, as the digitization project hasn’t even started, and Francis just began his tenure, but it’s an interesting thought, and a good way to bring the importance and relevance of open access to a larger audience.

 

Naomi House

Naomi House, MLIS, is the founder and publisher of the popular webzine and jobs list INALJ.com (formerly I Need a Library Job) and former CMO (Chief Marketing Officer) of T160K.org, a crowdfunding platform focused on African patrimony, heritage and cultural projects. INALJ was founded in October 2010 with the assistance of her fellow Rutgers classmate, Elizabeth Leonard. Its social media presence has grown to include Facebook (retired in 2016), Twitter and a LinkedIn group, in addition to the interviews, articles and jobs found on INALJ. INALJ has had over 21 Million page hits and helped many, many thousands of librarians find employment! Through grassroots marketing, word of mouth and a real focus on exploring unconventional resources for job leads, INALJ grew from a subscription base of 20 friends to a website with over 500,000 visits in one month. Naomi believes that well-sourced quantity is quality in this narrow job market and INALJ reflects this with many new jobs published daily. She has also written for the 2011, 2012 and 2013 LexisNexis Government Info Pro and many other publications in the past decade. She presents whenever she can, including serving on three panels at the American Library Association's Annual Conference in Las Vegas; as breakout presenter at OCLC EMEA in Cape Town, South Africa; as a keynote speaker at the Virginia Library Association annual meeting; at the National Press Club in Washington DC; McGill University in Montreal, Canada; the University of the Emirates, Dubai, MLIS program and the University of Hawaii at Manoa. Naomi was a Reference, Marketing and Acquisitions Librarian for a contractor at a federal library outside Washington, DC, and has been living and working in Budapest, Hungary and Western New York State. She spent years running her husband’s moving labor website, fixed and sold old houses and assisted her husband cooking delicious Pakistani food. She is preparing to re-enter the workforce and is job hunting. Her husband is now the co-editor of INALJ, a true support!  She has heard of spare time but hasn’t encountered it lately. She pronounces INALJ as eye-na-elle-jay. 

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