Policies

Definitions

The Ohio State University Knowledge Bank consists of collections submitted by Ohio State communities. A Knowledge Bank “community” has an affiliation with The Ohio State University, a focused research interest, has a defined Ohio State manager/director, and has the ability to set community policies. A community can be an academic department, an administrative unit, or an interdisciplinary center. Groups wishing to establish a Knowledge Bank community that do not fall into these definitions will be considered on a case-by-case basis.

Community Responsibilities

  • arrange for selection, submission and description of content
  • make decisions about community and collection definitions
  • assign a coordinator who can work with Knowledge Bank staff
  • notify the Libraries of organizational changes affecting submissions
  • reply to periodic reconfirmation of community information
  • understand and observe university policies relevant to the Knowledge Bank, and educate community submitters regarding such policies
  • obtain permission for items submitted
  • decide upon a submission workflow for each collection

Community Rights

  • decide policy regarding content to be submitted
  • decide who may submit content
  • limit access to content for a limited time to specific individuals or groups as negotiated with Knowledge Bank staff in accordance with the Access Policy
  • approve addition of sub-communities
  • customize interfaces to community content

Knowledge Bank Responsibilities

  • retain and maintain content submitted to the Knowledge Bank
  • distribute content as negotiated with a community in accordance with the Access Policy
  • preserve content using accepted preservation techniques
  • provide access in accordance with community agreements
  • notify communities of significant changes to content, e.g. format migration
  • if The Ohio State University Libraries cease to support the Knowledge Bank, return collections to existing communities and transfer to Ohio State archives collections of communities that cease to exist
  • maintain appropriate technology infrastructure and security
  • comply with university policy on issues which affect the Knowledge Bank

Knowledge Bank Rights

  • redistribute, or amend metadata for items in the Knowledge Bank
  • refuse or remove from view items or Collections under certain circumstances - as outlined in the Withdrawal Policy
  • re-negotiate terms of original agreement with communities, if necessary
  • perform appraisal for long-term archiving when communities cease to exist
  • move collections to reflect current understanding between the Knowledge Bank and communities
  • migrate items if format is in danger of obsolescence, establish quotas (size of files, number of items) and determine fee structures, if necessary
  • establish a fee structure for activities requiring extensive centralized support from the Knowledge Bank (e.g. large amount of de-accessioning)

Content Guidelines

  • content should be of an educational nature or research oriented
  • content must be in a digital form
  • content should be ready for general distribution in a completed state
  • the author/creator should grant the Knowledge Bank the right to preserve and distribute the work
  • if part of a series, there should be a commitment that other works in that series are submitted to the Knowledge Bank

Withdrawal Policy

The Knowledge Bank strives to provide persistent access to all deposited items. However, it may be necessary under some circumstances (e.g. discovery of a copyright violation) to withdraw items from the Knowledge Bank.  

When an item is withdrawn from the Knowledge Bank, a copy will remain in an inaccessible archive. Since any item that has existed within the Knowledge Bank may have been cited via its persistent URL, the Knowledge Bank will supply a "tombstone" when the item is requested. Withdrawn items will not be available for harvesting or indexing by search engines.

To avoid loss of the historical record, the withdrawal transaction will be traced via a provenance statement. The content of the note will include who requested the withdrawal and the reason for the withdrawal.

It is also possible to restrict access to material within the Knowledge Bank, but withdrawal and access restriction should not be confused. Withdrawal of items should be considered a permanent action to remove access to an item in the Knowledge Bank, while items under restricted access are under embargo, i.e. access is blocked for a limited period of time.

Access Policy

All items in the Knowledge Bank will be considered free for all to view, in accordance with standard Open Access principals, unless otherwise negotiated with Knowledge Bank staff.

  • Under negotiated circumstances an item can fall under an “embargo” in which access is restricted, preventing the ability to view the item.
  • Items can be embargoed for one, three, or five years before defaulting to Open Access.
  • The metadata for an embargoed item, viewable by the public, will state the terms of embargo.

Knowledge Bank Privacy Policy

The Knowledge Bank is committed to preserving the privacy of those submitting material in to the repository. The personal information received is used solely for purposes of the functioning of the system, and for the specific research purposes described below.

  • The system collects personal information from “users” involved in the submission of content and metadata and “users” who subscribe to the “alerting” service.
  • Information about individual visits to the repository, or personal information that a community submitter provides, such as name, address, email address, telephone number, etc. is not disclosed to any outside parties except when required by law.