PALINET organized a conference for librarians yesterday at Robert Morris University. A company called CDigix gave a presentation about their C-Labs program, aimed at academic libraries. C-Labs allows libraries to digitize their "rich media" holdings (videos, dvd's, podcasts, etc.) and make them available for academic usage online. Libraries that sign up for the program MUST send a hard copy of any media materials that they want to have digitized and an assurance that the library owns the hard copy. C-Labs then digitizes the material and provides academic libraries with everything they need to post and maintain this media online while complying with copyright laws. Digital rights management (DRM), encryption, licensing, distribution, authentication, and course management are all handled by the CDIGIX server provided to the library. Faculty and students can use the online media anytime, anywhere - as long as they are registered for the courses that use the media. Illegal downloading, copying, or emailing are prevented by the C-Labs software. It's a clever idea, and PALINET is negotiating consortium pricing with CDigix. Yale was the first user to test this product, and currently has over 1800 titles digitized; other schools, both large (the entire Univ. of MD system) and small (Mt. Holyoke) are signing on.
For more information about C-Labs, see the CDIGIX website, or ask Sallie or Susanna about the presentation.
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