Vancouver Statement on Collections as Data

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Since the Santa Barbara Statement on Collections as Data (2017) was published, engagement with collections-as-data has grown internationally. Institutions large and small, individually and collectively, have invested in developing, providing access to, and supporting responsible computational use of collections as data. An updated statement was needed in light of increased community implementation of collections as data in context of an ever more complex data landscape. 

The Vancouver Statement suggests a set of principles for thinking through questions that collections-as-data work produces, as part of an expanding global, interprofessional, and interdisciplinary effort to empower memory, knowledge, and data stewards (e.g., practitioners and scholars) who aim to support responsible development and computational use of collections as data. This stewardship role only grows in importance as artificial intelligence applications, trained on vast amounts of data, including collections as data, impact our lives ever more pervasively.

The Vancouver Statement is the product of diverse contributions from the participants of the working event, Collections as Data: State of the Field and Future Directions, held April 25-26, 2023 at Internet Archive Canada in addition to asynchronous community feedback. Professional translation of the Vancouver Statement was provided by Transolution. Special thanks go to Gimena del Rio Riande and Gaëlle Béquet for additional review of statement translations.