Content Creators

In the beginning, there were content creators. All of this great stuff had to come from somewhere! NYPL's collections are comprised of the work of thousands of authors, artists, collectors and photographers.

The End

Unfortunately, though, all good things must come to an end. People are still mortal. They or their families decided what to do with their possessions and intellectual content after they are gone.

The Beginning

Fortunately, even after a person is gone, their creations may live on. Sometimes these items end up in memory institutions like archives, libraries and museums.

Librarians and Archivists

Items have been regularly accessioned, cared for and cataloged at NYPL for more than 120 years thanks to the hard work and research of archivists, curators and librarians.

Metadata Services Unit

Metadata creators give context to items in relation to each other and within the library. They also generate data about each item that can be used in cross-institutional or aggregational mapping, like to DPLA and OCLC.

Digital Imaging Unit

Through collection-based funding or individual public requests, images of content are brought to new digital life courtesy of the Digital Imaging Unit, where items are carefully scanned and migrated to long-term digital storage. Don't worry— we still keep the originals, too.

Systems Engineering

Foundational server support provided by the Systems Engineering team is the backbone behind all of the technology used within the library. This team monitors, protects, and ensures 24/7 access to all online applications, as well as data in storage.

Applications Developers

The Applications Development team works as the glue between data and the people that want to use it, whether it be the employees of NYPL that rely on it to do their jobs (like metadata creators and image scanners) or linking the data to the public via NYPL's API to websites like Digital Collections or Archives & Manuscripts.

Digital Experience Group

Provides context and content to the public about all of the great things that happen at the library on NYPL.org.

Labs

This interdisciplinary research and development team creates a bridge between the library's collections and its users through innovative platforms, collaboration frameworks, games, interactive web experiences and more.

YOU!

More than 180,000 of the items in NYPL's Digital Collections are in the public domain ready to be taken to the next level.

Go forth and reuse!

Summary and Credits

In summary, "it takes a village to raise a child." It takes the collaboration of many people across many teams (and across time) to produce great things.

[Credits here]