RLUK and the Sheffield iSchool have launched RDM Insight, a collaborative blog that aims to keep track of new developments, emerging best practices, and insights relating to research data management.

Andrew Cox, Senior Lecturer at Sheffield iSchool said: “The Information School welcomes the opportunity the blog affords to engage with professional and scholarly communities as part of its research and teaching on RDM”.

John MacColl, RLUK Vice-Chair and Chair of RLUK’s working group on research data management commented: “The development of RDM services is perhaps the most difficult and uncomfortable area in which research libraries are currently working. Unlike most of the challenges we face, it threatens to overwhelm our existing containers and tools both in scale and in tractability. It is easy to see why data is often described as a ‘deluge’. Yet many libraries are already rising to the challenges with energy and skill. The lineaments of RDM service from research libraries are beginning to appear in a few pioneering institutions. Toes are being dipped in the water, but many of us are cautious, waiting for the shape of good practice to become clearer. And the collaborative responsibility for preservation remains uncharted.

Within the RLUK community, we are keen to advance and to share understanding of this newest and weightiest of challenges. We hope that this new blog will be a place that helps this to happen”.

The blog can be accessed at http://rdminsight.wordpress.com/

Full statement from John MacColl

 

About Research Libraries UK (RLUK)

Research Libraries UK is a consortium of 34 of the largest research organisations in the UK and Ireland, including the three UK national libraries. Founded more than 25 years ago, RLUK has directly and indirectly sponsored some of the major free online UK resources in support of research, including Copac, the de facto UK Union Catalogue. RLUK’s mission is to work with their members and partners, nationally and internationally, to shape and to realise the vision of the modern research library.

About Sheffield iSchool

The Information School at the University of Sheffield is the premier school of its kind in the UK.  The knowledge, professional values and skills of our graduates are highly prized by employers in the global employment market, and we are proud of our international reputation for the high quality of our teaching and research.

 

Top image courtesy of the Library at Queen Mary, University of London