Abstract
PurposeThis paper aims to elucidate the value of opening up digital collections for end‐user development of mash‐ups and to evaluate the suitability of libraries' infrastructure for this purpose.Design/methodology/approachThe author surveyed ARL members' digital collection platforms to assess the terms of use statements and options for programmatic access.FindingsThe findings show that 17 per cent of the institutions surveyed offer some means for mashing up digital collections, and that, while more than half the collections surveyed have some form of terms of use or rights statements, they were not written to support this type of use case.Research limitations/implicationsResults of the research suggest that a mashable digital collection service is feasible for most libraries.Originality/valueThis paper will be of interest to librarians who are considering providing application programming interface (API) access to their digital collections.
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