The Digital Repository of Ireland (DRI) is supporting researchers to preserve their research data for long-term access and discovery through the Legacy Research Collection Deposit Pilot Scheme, run in collaboration with the Irish Data Stewardship Network (Sonraí). This Scheme offers researchers a route to deposit their research data for free in DRI’s CoreTrustSeal-certified trustworthy digital repository. Successful applicants will also benefit from free specialised data management and collection creation and ingest training. In this blog post, DRI’s Research Data Project Manager Beth Knazook answers researchers’ questions about the Scheme.
Q: What do you mean by ‘data’?
A: There are a wide range of potential resources that you may create or gather together in the course of a research project. These materials constitute the ‘data’ that you used to draw your conclusions. Some of these materials may be resources that you created to help organise your research, or they might be resources you acquired from public or private collections, places, events, etc. Research data in the Humanities and Social Sciences may include: research project websites, digitised texts, descriptive information about materials of study, recordings, photographs, resource lists (i.e. compilations of resources in a large number of distributed geographical/collection locations), interpretive information, labels or systems of organisation that reflect specific knowledge of the subject of inquiry.
Example datasets in DRI’s collections:
Ports Past and Present 10.7486/DRI.ht259b362 (633 images, 158 audio files, 86 videos, 241 textual records)
EMILI (Early Mediaeval Irish Latinate Inscriptions) 10.7486/DRI.5d872s02f (26 images, 30 textual records, 8 3D objects)
Farmers and their inventions 10.7486/DRI.ks65wx98x (4 textual records) Restricted Access
Q: I would like to preserve my project website. How will you capture my website?
A: There are two options for website preservation. The first option would be to capture the website as an interactive resource that can be played back in the browser and experienced as a website. This would be similar to how you would view websites in the Wayback Machine at Internet Archive. External links will not be captured and you’ll need to be careful that only content which you have permission to archive (i.e., that you hold the rights to) is included in the website capture. The other option is to ingest the content displayed on the website as individual records in the Repository. For instance, if you had an essay and a series of photos on a webpage, you might catalogue the photos individually and upload the essay as a PDF resource.
It really depends on what is important to you and how you think the data available on your website might be best accessed. If you expect other researchers may want to reuse content, then cataloguing the individual assets would be more beneficial as future researchers will have more precise metadata (or contextual information) about the content showcased on the website. On the other hand, if you think that audience interaction is a key component of your website, then archiving the website as a whole will help to preserve that experience.
Q: To be eligible for the pilot, all digital assets and associated metadata must have a rights statement and some form of reuse licence. What is a rights statement and reuse licence?
A: A rights statement describes whether or not materials are in copyright, whereas a reuse licence describes the permission that a rights holder has given for others to use copyrighted material. To participate in the pilot you must be able to confirm that you are either the rights holder for any material deposited or that you have permission to licence the material on behalf of the rights holder.
DRI produced a helpful factsheet on copyright and licensing to help demystify these two legal tools, Copyright, Licensing and Open Access. We are also available to answer specific questions if you have any concerns at pilot-applications@dri.ie.
Q: I’m not sure I can share all my data openly, can I still participate?
A: DRI is able to provide restricted access to collection objects where necessary. (See the restricted collection in the example datasets above.) If you think you might require this for your dataset to be deposited with DRI, please contact us before submitting your application at pilot-applications@dri.ie.
Q: Is there any grant money for the researcher through this Scheme?
A: No, unfortunately there is no grant money available for the researcher to help organise and ingest the data. DRI is contributing specialised research data management and collection ingest training, the space in the Repository, and guaranteeing the long-term preservation of the content once it is received, so that it can continue to be accessed and discovered in the future.
Q: I’m not a researcher in the Humanities or Social Sciences, can I still deposit?
A: While DRI has a remit to support research in those disciplines, if your content was generated in a different field of work but is related to Irish history, culture and society, it will still be considered for the pilot. If you have further questions, you can contact us with details and we can give you more tailored advice.
Q: What value would participating in this pilot add for me?
A: Many researchers have valuable information about important cultural and historical resources that is not available elsewhere, or which would be time-consuming for other researchers to recreate. Consider the reuse potential of your research notes. How much manual effort went into data collection? Would this work have to be redone by future researchers to build on your work? Could sharing this information open up collaboration opportunities with other researchers in different fields or disciplines?
In addition to the reuse benefits for others, sharing your data creates additional opportunities for you to be cited and recognised in your field of work. A research data citation acknowledges the effort as well as the conclusions. Encouragingly, studies of research data reuse are also starting to indicate that publications associated with open datasets are downloaded more often and by a wider range of scholars, increasing the broader accessibility and inclusivity of original research.
Q: What is the deadline and how do I apply?
A: The original deadline was 15 March, but it has been extended by two weeks until 29 March 2024. Successful applicants will be notified in April 2024. To apply, download the application form and send it to pilot-applications@dri.ie.
If you have any questions about the Legacy Research Collection Deposit Pilot Scheme not covered in this blog, then please email pilot-applications@dri.ie.
The Digital Repository of Ireland is a certified trustworthy digital repository that provides long-term preservation and access to Ireland’s humanities, cultural heritage, and social sciences data.
Is taisclann dhigiteach iontaofa í Taisclann Dhigiteach na hÉireann, a sholáthraíonn caomhnú fadtéarmach agus rochtain ar shonraí daonnachtaí, oidhreachta cultúrtha agus eolaíochtaí sóisialta na hÉireann.
