Digital Library Futures: The Impact of E-Legal Deposit in the Academic Sector

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This research will answer the following main question: what is the impact of e-legal deposit changes upon UK academic deposit libraries and their users? The project's principal contribution will be to provide a detailed account of the impact of e-legal deposit, applied to the specific case of academic deposit libraries. Legal deposit plays a significant role in ensuring the systematic preservation of the world's published written heritage. In the UK, it provides a regulatory framework for a trusted group of national and academic libraries to collect published textual materials in print form. The 2013 introduction of electronic legal deposit incorporated digital materials for the first time, taking steps to secure the UK's "Digital Universe." Despite this expansion, legal deposit is still conceived primarily as a way to preserve collections for the long term, with restrictions on how the materials can be used by contemporary researchers. However, published research into legal deposit often focuses on its regulatory and long-term preservation aspects. There is relatively little research into how e-legal deposit has affected the UK academic institutions tasked with enacting the regulations, or indeed their users. As a result, there is a need for user-focused research which explores how legal deposit collections are accessed and used, and to what extent these collections should support contemporary research in academic libraries.We will produce two case studies, in collaboration with two major libraries: The Bodleian Libraries, and the Cambridge University Library. We will focus on two specific groups which are directly affected by the outlined changes: academic libraries with regulatory responsibilities for legal deposit; and the academic and non-academic users of these libraries. While both groups have been the focus of discussion during the conception and implementation of e-legal deposit, this research will shed light on the wider social, cultural and institutional implications of the legislation. It will provide insights into how researchers in academia uses electronic legal deposit collections, and apply these to wider social and cultural issues including digital inclusion, information democratisation, and the role of libraries in addressing the digital divide in access to knowledge. In doing so, it will interrogate the benefits and challenges of legal deposit in the digital age, and will address the tension between a regulatory framework designed with long-term preservation in mind, and developments in academia and society which have made digital scholarship and digital inclusion vital for full participation in civic life.The project will engage with key figures involved in policymaking, implementation and collection development, as well as including the voices of contemporary users whose information behaviour incorporates these important collections. We will produce a series of journal articles and conference papers, provide a strong online presence for non-expert audiences, and engaged with users and creators of digital resources. The research will culminate in a white paper, to be presented a public symposium, providing a forum to build momentum for further research into the use of legal deposit collections. A central aim is to provide insights into how e-legal deposit in its current form interacts with emerging trends in digital scholarship and digital inclusion, and with existing library services. The UK is one of the nations leading the way in e-legal deposit, and this research has the potential to provide a vital and timely intervention for the international community as they face similar challenges. It will contribute not only to understanding and developing digital collections for academic deposit libraries, but also to international debates on the future of libraries in the digital age.