The development of a digitising service centre for natural history collections

By

Tegelberg, Riitta
Haapala, Jaana
Mononen, Tero
Pajari, Mika
Saarenmaa, Hannu

Type

Article

Date of Publication

2012

Original Publication

ZooKeys

Volume

209

Pages

75-86

Subjects

automation , Costs , digitisation , imaging , IPR , logistics , mass-digitisation , Natural history collections , out-sourcing , service packages

Contributed by

Pensoft Publishers

Language

English

Published by

Sofia, Bulgaria Pensoft Publishers

Identifiers

DOI: https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.209.3119

 

Abstract

Digitarium is a joint initiative of the Finnish Museum of Natural History and the University of Eastern Finland. It was established in 2010 as a dedicated shop for the large-scale digitisation of natural history collections. Digitarium offers service packages based on the digitisation process, including tagging, imaging, data entry, georeferencing, filtering, and validation. During the process, all specimens are imaged, and distance workers take care of the data entry from the images. The customer receives the data in Darwin Core Archive format, as well as images of the specimens and their labels. Digitarium also offers the option of publishing images through Morphbank, sharing data through GBIF, and archiving data for long-term storage. Service packages can also be designed on demand to respond to the specific needs of the customer. The paper also discusses logistics, costs, and intellectual property rights (IPR) issues related to the work that Digitarium undertakes.<br>