Online

Joy Cadwallader, Aberystwyth University (Aberystwyth Online User Group)

Please send your submissions for the next edition to jrc@aber.ac.uk .

Ancestry.co.uk http://www.ancestry.co.uk/ / The National Archives http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/

The World War I British Army service records 1914-1920 have been made available online to subscribers by Ancestry.co.uk, in partnership with the National Archives. Although incomplete due to a Luftwaffe bombing raid in September 1940, 2.8 million of over 7 million original records survive. The records provide such information as age, birthplace, occupation, marital status, next of kin and regiment number, and details of injuries, punishments, awards and discharge papers.

British History Online http://www.british-history.ac.uk/

Subscribers to premium content at British History Online will now have access to the Parliament Rolls of Medieval England (1275-1504) at no extra cost. The service includes full transcriptions of each roll, descriptions of each parliament (even where no roll exists) and a translation into modern English from the Latin, Anglo-Norman or Middle English originals. The British History Online partnership comprises the Institute of Historical Research and the Centre for Metropolitan History (University of London), the Parliamentary Trust and the Victoria County History.

Google Book Search http://books.google.com/ / Open Book Alliance http://www.openbookalliance.org/

US District Judge Denny Chin has set November 9 th as the deadline for Google and its partners to present a revised settlement of the Google Book Search class-action lawsuit. The Open Book Alliance who opposed the previous settlement have released a list of requirements they deem necessary for the new settlement to be viable, which address issues including non-exclusivity, author rights and access to content. Meanwhile the European Commission has adopted a “Communication on Copyright in the Knowledge Economy”, noting that the delay in the settlement provides an opportunity to engage on a programme of digitisation and dissemination under European copyright law (EC Press Release: IP/09/1544 19/10/2009), raising in particular the issues of orphan works and accessibility. In one of the weekly podcasts on her website (10/10/09) German Chancellor Angela Merkel has openly criticised Google's book-scanning activities and indicating her government's support for German authors. In another twist, the China Daily (21/10/09) reports that the China Written Works Copyright Society (CWWCS) have accused Google of infringing copyright by scanning works by Chinese authors.

On a different topic, a link to a browseable view of all the magazines in Google Book Search is now available.

HathiTrust http://www.hathitrust.org/

Full-text searching of the HathiTrust repository is due for launch in mid-November. HathiTrust, formed in October 2008, consists of the member libraries of the Committee on Institutional Cooperation (CIC), the University of California system, and the University of Virginia (and is open to further members). All are Google Book Search partners and HathiTrust will provide shared online access to digitised member library titles. There are currently more than four million books deposited.

JISC http://www.jisc.ac.uk/ / SCONUL http://www.sconul.ac.uk/

JISC and SCONUL (the Society of College, National and University Libraries) have entered a formal three-year partnership to explore a range of themes, “towards a vision of everyone having equal access to the widest range of resources supporting world class research, learning and teaching” in the UK. The themes include strategies for developing library systems, digital content, library infrastructure and communications. SCONUL promotes excellence in HE and national libraries in the UK and Ireland while JISC (Joint Information Systems Committee) works with HE and FE in the “innovative use of digital technologies across education and research”.

JISC http://www.jisc.ac.uk/ / BUFVC http://bufvc.ac.uk/

A JISC-funded project partnered by the Centre for Broadcasting History Research at Bournemouth University and the BUFVC (British Universities Film and Video Council) has produced about 3,000 hours of radio recordings online in the London Broadcasting Company/ Independent Radio News audio archive. Coverage is between 1973 and the mid-1990s, and content comprises news and current affairs including recordings during the Falklands War, the miners' strike and the Thatcher government. Content has been digitised from a selection of 7000 reel-to-reel tapes owned by Chrysalis, and is freely available online to HE and FE.

JURN http://jurn.org/

JURN is an academic search engine indexing more than 3,300 journals in the arts and humanities, which are either open- access, or which include some open content. Built by Dave Haden of the School of Theoretical and Historical Studies in Art and Design at Birmingham City University, who also works on Intute, and launched in February 2009, the initial content consisted of titles chosen from Intute and DOAJ plus 1900 titles found through four months of web-searching and checking. The title list is increasing rapidly. The JURN Directory indexes more than 2,000 of the journals titles by browseable subject categories.

OCLC http://www.oclc.org/

The South West Regional Library Service (SWRLS) are taking up WorldCat Local for their seven public library authorities, including Bournemouth, Bath and Bristol. Library users will be able to search and make reservations in collections in other libraries in their region, using a shared resource discovery interface. Searches in OCLC WorldCat.org will also indicate if items found are available in the member libraries.