White Paper Report Report ID: 107673 Application Number: HT-50059-12 Project Director: Joseph Scheinfeldt (tom.scheinfeldt@uconn.edu) Institution: George Mason University Reporting Period: 9/1/2012-3/31/2015 Report Due: 6/30/2015 Date Submitted: 8/13/2015 Another Week | Another Tool: A Digital Humanities Barn Raising In 2010, the Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media gathered twelve digital humanists of different stripes – developers, professors, designers, managers – for One Week | One Tool, A Digital Humanities Barn Raising. The goal was to conceive of, produce, and market a new digital humanities tool. The result was Anthologize, a WordPress plugin for publishing WordPress content to PDF, EPUB, and other forms. Following that success, RRCHNM attempted to recreate the experience with twelve different digital humanists, again from many different fields and backgrounds. Drawing on lessons learned from the first iteration, we put more emphasis on project management strategies and reduced the amount of time devoted to instruction in digital humanities tools and methods. The tool they produced is a Software as a Service application, Serendip-o-Matic, which allows users to enter text or their Zotero library and discover unexpectedly similar results in DPLA, Europeana, and other sources. In what follows, we hope that you will find insights and perspectives about the experience that will provide inspiration for other innovative programs, project management considerations, and digital humanities practices in general. The Another Week | Another Tool team was: Brian Croxall. Digital Humanities Specialist and Lecturer in English, Emory University Jack Dougherty. Associate Professor and Director of Educational Studies, Trinity College Meghan Frazer. Digital Resources Curator, The Ohio State University Scott Kleinman. Professor of English, California State University Rebecca Sutton Koeser. Software Engineer, Emory University Libraries Ray Palin. Teacher and Librarian, Sunapee Middle High School Amy Papaelias. Assistant Professor of Graphic Design and Foundation, SUNY Mia Ridge. Ph.D. candidate in Digital Humanities, Open University Eli Rose. Undergraduate student, Oberlin University Amanda Visconti. Ph.D. candidate in English, University of Maryland Scott Williams. Collections Database Adminsitrator, Univ of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology Amrys Williams. Postdoctoral Fellow, National Museum of American History The second iteration of One Week | One Tool was an extremely successful experience for the participants' professional development, instruction in digital humanities methods, and experience in collaboration with a variety of people in different roles. The results differ from the first iteration, very much following the changes RRCHNM implemented between the two events. In particular, this iteration's emphasis on a project management team led to several participants citing learning about project management structures as their most important takeaway from the experience. The product, the software-as-a-service application, Serendip-o-matic, continues online, though with fairly minimal traffic. The reach of the experience to affect other digital humanists' thinking has been extraordinary, taking the forms of a long session presentation at Digital Humanities 2014, and a post for ACRL's TechConnect series, among other successful informal and formal papers and presentations. Project Activities, Accomplishments, and Audiences The One Week | One Tool team coalesced into a group that quickly self-selected into distinct teams with clear leaders: the development team, the outreach team, and the project management team. This division, particularly within the development team, reflects the inroads that project management techniques, particularly Agile, have made into digital humanities. Mia Ridge became the “Scrum Master” of the development team, coordinating the teams activities and priorities. Meghan Frazer and Brian Croxall, the project management team, took on the role of coordinating between the the development and outreach teams. At times this was a controlled chaos, as sometimes within the course of a single day the realities of what could be built and the expectations of the outreach team would diverge. This was to be expected in such a condensed product launch time, and provided valuable experience for all participants, some of whom had not worked within anything analogous to the project management structures that developed. Indeed, the structure was noted by more than one participant as an important lesson in their professional lives and development. The adoption of those project management structures and gaining experience in learning and negotiating them is perhaps the most important lesson. Indeed, that management processes were extremely productive. Interestingly, this appears to have allow the participants to focus more on the 'playfulness' of both the event and ultimate product in their publications. Despite occasional frustrations and the somewhat more well-defined structure of the group, playfulness in research and tool-building became a major theme in their later presentations and reflection. The participants have produced many formal and informal presentations and documents. Many were avid bloggers about their experiences – most can be found in their Zotero group (https://www.zotero.org/groups/oneweekonetool2013/items). The range of presentations and publications speak to an extraordinarily wide audience, including the international Digital Humanities 2014 conference; Through Design, a popular design podcast; the Association of College and Research Libraries' TechConnect series; and regional technology and/or humanities conferences (see below for details, and Appendix I for a complete bibliography). https://www.zotero.org/groups/oneweekonetool2013/items Evaluation Evaluation of the participants' experiences was conducted via a survey in a Google form. Themes that can be seen in the survey include: • Collaboration Many participants cited lessons in team collaboration, particularly as part of project management. The importance of managing communication between all members of the team and the experience in doing so is described as producing important changes in their professional lives. • Structure Closely related to collaboration and communication, well-defined structure was noted as a factor in the success of the week. Interestingly, more structure, established both before and after the week itself, was noted as a suggestion for changing One Week | One Tool. • Time constraints after the week As discussed below, the most common reason cited for the cessation of development work on Serendip-o-matic is lack of available time in the year after the experience. This is consistent with the first iteration of One Week | One Tool. Continuation of the Project For most practical purposes development on Serendip-o-matic is at an end, though for the time being the application will be maintained. During our reunion at THATCamp in 2014, we discussed the possibility of active development continuing. The consensus was that continuing active development was an unrealistic goal. The lack of available time was consistently given as the primary reason for this. While enthusiasm for Serendip-o-matic remained high, the reality is that everyone's professional responsibilities left little opportunity to continue development and coordination. This is not surprising, as One Week | One Tool is by design an experience distinct from 'usual' professional life, and participants in the first iteration had much the same reaction. That said, the more fundamental part of One Week | One Tool – the development of professional skills that will be applied in working life and shared among others, appears destined to have a continuing effect on the participants and their colleagues. Occasional new presentations from the participants will expand the influence of their lessons learned. Hence, RRCHNM will continue to keep Serendip-o-matic up and running for as long as our technical infrastructure can reasonably support it. Grant Products Publications and Professional Development The One Week | One Tool team has been quite prolific in their ongoing professional development work about Serendip-o-matic and the experience of One Week | One Tool. Their Zotero library of their blog posts, presentations, papers, and other recognitions contains over seventy items. The most significant product is the long paper at Digital Humanities 2014 presented by Amy Papaelias, Brian Croxall, Mia Ridge, and Scott Kleinman. In the presentation, they reflect on the virtues of playfulness, both in the process of building Serendip-o-matic and in the product itself. They argued in favor of the benefits for incorporating more “playful work” in the context of academic research and scholarship. As current digital humanities work relies on collaborative environments (including hackathons, maker spaces, maker challenges, etc.), opportunities like One Week | One Tool provide a space for playful work to encourage more creative risk-taking and engaging user- experiences within the context of digital humanities scholarship and practice. Importantly, they included a considerations of the challenges of evaluation in their talk. Another notable and informative post is Meghan Frazer's post in the ACRL's TechConnect series (http://acrl.ala.org/techconnect/?p=3621), which provides an insightful summary of the lessons learned. Please see Appendix I for a full bibliography of resources related to One Week | One Tool. Serendip-o-matic The usage of Serendip-o-matic itself has been somewhat limited. The site usage statistics show that, after the initial release, visits declined sharply. That is not to say, however, that it does not continue to bear fruit. It is used as a demonstration tool not only for the One Week | One Tool process itself, but also as an example of using multiple APIs to produce research results. Overall, though, it is important to remember that One Week | One Tool is an exercise in rapid, immersive learning about technologies, tools, development, management, and outreach in digital humanities projects. What the twelve participants achieved, learned, and – most importantly – shared with their colleagues has been a significant success. http://acrl.ala.org/techconnect/?p=3621 Appendix I Bibliography of related presentations and publications [Generated from the Another Week | Another Tool Zotero Group https://www.zotero.org/groups/oneweekonetool2013/items] Andrew, Liam. “I’m Feeling Lucky: Can Algorithms Better Engineer Serendipity in Research — or in Journalism?” Nieman Journalism Lab, July 16, 2014. http://www.niemanlab.org/2014/07/im-feeling-lucky-can-algorithms-better-engineer- serendipity-in-research-or-in-journalism/. “Another Week | Another Tool Begins.” Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media, July 31, 2013. http://chnm.gmu.edu/news/another-week-another-tool/. Baker, James. “@HumaBirdProject + #inspiringwomen.” Digital Scholarship Blog, August 7, 2013. http://britishlibrary.typepad.co.uk/digital-scholarship/2013/08/humabirdproject- inspiringwomen.html. Benatti, Francesca. “Mia Ridge Leads Developement at One Week|One Tool.” Digital Humanities at The Open University, August 7, 2013. http://www.open.ac.uk/blogs/dighum/? p=613. carlspina. “Spark New Paths of Research with Serendip-O-Matic.” Novel Technology, August 8, 2013. http://carlispina.wordpress.com/2013/08/08/serendip-o-matic/. Croxall, Brian. “Day 1 of OWOT: Check Your Ego at the Door,” July 30, 2013. http://www.briancroxall.net/2013/07/30/day-1-of-owot-check-your-ego-at-the-door/. ———. “Day 2 of OWOT: Pick Your Poison,” July 31, 2013. http://www.briancroxall.net/2013/07/31/day-2-of-owot-pick-your-poison/. ———. “Day 3 of OWOT: Of Names and Stories and Gophers,” August 1, 2013. http://www.briancroxall.net/2013/08/01/day-3-of-owot-of-names-and-stories-and-gophers/. ———. “Day 4 of OWOT: Stay Gold, Ponyboy,” August 2, 2013. http://www.briancroxall.net/2013/08/02/day-4-of-owot-stay-gold-ponyboy/. ———. “Day 5 of OWOT: We Did It! (Can We Do It Again? Please??),” August 3, 2013. http://www.briancroxall.net/2013/08/03/day-5-of-owot-we-did-it-can-we-do-it-again-please/. ———. “‘If Hippos Be the Dude of Love…’: Serendip-O-Matic at Digital Humanities 2014.” Brian Croxall, July 22, 2014. http://www.briancroxall.net/2014/07/22/if-hippos-be-the-dude- of-love-serendip-o-matic-at-digital-humanities-2014/. https://www.zotero.org/groups/oneweekonetool2013/items ———. “One Week | One Tool: Introducing Serendip-O-Matic.” The Chronicle of Higher Education. ProfHacker, August 5, 2013. http://chronicle.com/blogs/profhacker/one-week- one-tool-introducing-serendip-o-matic/51449. Dorn, Sherman. “One Week, Better Tools (spoof).” Sherman Dorn, August 2, 2013. http://shermandorn.com/wordpress/?p=6288. ———. “Pictura Invisibilis Collegio Artium Digital.” Sherman Dorn, August 2, 2013. http://shermandorn.com/wordpress/?p=6296. Dougherty, Jack. “Final Reflections from One Week One Tool: The Blur of Days 4-5,” August 4, 2013. http://commons.trincoll.edu/jackdougherty/2013/08/04/owot-4-5/. ———. “Learning Moments at One Week One Tool 2013, Day 1,” July 30, 2013. http://commons.trincoll.edu/jackdougherty/2013/07/30/owot1/. ———. “Metaphorical Learning Moments at One Week One Tool, Day 3,” August 1, 2013. http://commons.trincoll.edu/jackdougherty/2013/08/01/owot-3/. ———. “My Peggy Olson Learning Moment at One Week One Tool, Day 2,” July 31, 2013. http://commons.trincoll.edu/jackdougherty/2013/07/31/owot-2/. “DPLA Welcomes Serendip-O-Matic to the App Library.” Digital Public Library of America, August 2, 2013. http://dp.la/info/2013/08/02/welcome-serendip-o-matic/. “Europeana API Used in One Week | One Tool’s Serendip-O-Matic!” Europeana, August 5, 2013. http://pro.europeana.eu/web/guest;jsessionid=B6A260586E6411EF20C0AFA2DC95D6DB. Frazer, Meghan. “One Week, One Tool, Many Lessons.” ACRL TechConnect Blog, August 7, 2013. http://acrl.ala.org/techconnect/?p=3621. Graham, Shawn. “A Quick Run with Serendip-O-Matic.” Electric Archaeology, August 2, 2013. http://electricarchaeology.ca/2013/08/02/a-quick-run-with-serendip-o-matic/. Grossman, Sara. “How to Build a Digital-Humanities Tool in a Week.” The Chronicle of Higher Education. Wired Campus, August 2, 2013. http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/how-to- build-a-digital-humanities-tool-in-a-week/45243. Heimburger, Franziska. “Vos Sources Vous Surprennent Avec Le Serendip-O-Matic.” La Boite à Outils Des Historiens, August 2, 2013. http://www.boiteaoutils.info/2013/08/vos-sources- vous-surprennent-avec-le.html. Hocking, Cameron. “Mining the Treasures of Trove.” Bright Ideas, August 8, 2013. http://slav.global2.vic.edu.au/2013/08/08/mining-the-treasures-of-trove/#.UgfcVmRAQls. Hovious, Amanda. “Serendip-O-Matic | Designer Librarian.” Designer Librarian, August 5, 2013. http://designerlibrarian.wordpress.com/tag/serendip-o-matic/. Hunt, Ryan. “Serendip-O-Matic as a Potential Model for Open Online Academic Work.” IVRYTWR, September 25, 2013. http://ivrytwr.com/2013/09/25/serendip-o-matic-as-a- potential-model-for-open-online-academic-work/. Kleinman, Scott. “Introducing Serendip-O-Matic,” August 5, 2013. http://scottkleinman.net/blog/2013/08/05/introducing-serendip-o-matic/. ———. “Play as Process and Product: On Making Serendip-O-Matic | Scottkleinman.net.” Accessed July 29, 2014. http://scottkleinman.net/blog/2014/07/10/play-as-process-and- product-on-making-serendip-o-matic/. ———. “Serendip-O-Matic (and Other Good News).” Digital Humanities - Southern California, August 12, 2013. http://dhsocal.blogspot.com/2013/08/serendip-o-matic-and-other-good- news.html. Machovec, George. “From Your Managing Editor: Fourteenth Annual Readers’ Choice Awards.” The Charleston Advisor 16, no. 2 (October 1, 2014): 3–10. Meacham, Rebecca. “‘Dear Lucky One’: The Westing Game Invites Us to Play.” The Ploughshares Blog, August 7, 2013. http://blog.pshares.org/index.php/dear-lucky-one-the- westing-game-invites-us-to-play/. Moravec, Michelle. “Serendip-O-Matic Seeks to Replicate Thrill of Archival Discovery Online.” History News Network, August 5, 2013. http://hnn.us/articles/serendip-o-matic-seeks- replicate-thrill-archival-discovery-online. “One Week | One Tool Has Built . . . Serendip-O-Matic.” One Week One Tool, August 2, 2013. http://oneweekonetool.org/. “One Week | One Tool Team Launches Serendip-O-Matic.” Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media, August 2, 2013. http://chnm.gmu.edu/news/one-week-one-tool- team-launches-serendip-o-matic/. Palin, Ray. “One Week | One Tool: Bit by Bit,” August 4, 2013. http://raypalin.info/blog/archives/1157. Peter. “Serendip-O-Matic: Der Automat Für Zufallsfunde...” Hatori Kibble, August 5, 2013. http://hatorikibble.wordpress.com/2013/08/05/serendip-o-matic-der-automat-fur- zufallsfunde/. “Presentations, Exhibitions.” News Pulse: Faculty/Staff Newsletter, August 12, 2013. http://newspulse.newpaltz.edu/2013/08/12/presentations-exhibitions-14/. “Professor Kleinman Helps Develop Search Tool Serendip-O-Matic.” Department of English, California State University-Northridge, August 3, 2013. http://www.csun.edu/engl/news.php? op=story&id=30. “RECOMMENDED: Serendip-O-Matic, From the One Week | One Tool Team.” Dh+lib, August 6, 2013. http://acrl.ala.org/dh/2013/08/06/recommended-serendip-o-matic-from-the-one- week-one-tool-team/. Retief, Esther. “Serendip-O-Matic Search Engine - Connects Your Sources to Digital Materials in Libraries, Museums and Archives Around the World.” LIS Trends, October 14, 2014. http://listrends.blogspot.com/2014/10/serendip-o-matic-search-engine-connects.html. Ridge, Mia. “And so It Begins: Day Two of OWOT.” Open Objects, July 31, 2013. http://openobjects.blogspot.com/2013/07/and-so-it-begins-day-two-of-owot.html. ———. “Conference Paper: Play as Process and Product: On Making Serendip-O-Matic.” Mia Ridge, July 2, 2014. http://www.miaridge.com/conference-paper-play-as-process-and- product-on-making-serendip-o-matic/. ———. “Halfway Through. Day Three of OWOT.” Open Objects, August 1, 2013. http://openobjects.blogspot.com/2013/08/halfway-through-day-three-of-owot.html. ———. “Highs and Lows, Day Four of OWOT.” Open Objects, August 2, 2013. http://openobjects.blogspot.com/2013/08/highs-and-lows-day-4-of-owot.html. ———. “So We Made a Thing. Announcing Serendip-O-Matic at One Week, One Tool.” Open Objects, August 2, 2013. http://openobjects.blogspot.com/2013/08/so-we-made-thing- announcing-serendip-o.html. ———. “Working out What We’re Doing: Day One of One Week, One Tool.” Open Objects, July 30, 2013. http://openobjects.blogspot.com/2013/07/working-out-what-were-doing-day- one-of.html. Rybak, Chuck. “DH Toe Dip: The Serendip-O-Matic.” Sad Iron, August 28, 2014. http://www.sadiron.com/dh-toe-dip-the-serendip-o-matic/. ———. “DH Toe Dip: The Serendip-O-Matic | Sad Iron.” Sad Iron, August 28, 2014. http://www.sadiron.com/dh-toe-dip-the-serendip-o-matic/. “Serendip-O-Matic.” Bamboo DiRT, August 2, 2013. http://dirt.projectbamboo.org/resources/serendip-o-matic. “Serendip-O-Matic.” Designer Librarian, August 5, 2013. http://designerlibrarian.wordpress.com/2013/08/05/serendip-o-matic/. “Serendip-O-Matic.” Europeana Labs, July 2014. http://preview.labs.eanadev.org/apps/serendip-o-matic/. “Serendip-O-Matic - Csodálkozz a Bibliográfiádra.” Kereső Világ: Keresés, Szövegbányászat, Big Data, August 8, 2013. http://kereses.blog.hu/2013/08/09/serendip-o- matic_csodalkozz_a_bibliografiadra. “Serendip-O-Matic: It’s Not Search, It’s Serendipity.” Danegeld, August 8, 2013. http://danegeld.dk/2013/08/08/serendip-o-matic-its-not-search-its-serendipity/. “Serendip-O-Matic Launched.” Mason News, August 9, 2013. http://newsdesk.gmu.edu/2013/08/serendip-o-matic-launched/. “Serendip-O-Matic: Let’s Your Sources Surprise You.” Digital Meets Culture, August 2013. http://www.digitalmeetsculture.net/article/serendip-o-matic-lets-your-sources-surprise-you/. “Serendip-O-Matic: Let Your Sources Surprise You.” Stuff You Missed in History Class, August 5, 2013. http://missedinhistory.tumblr.com/post/57428548818/serendip-o-matic-let-your- sources-surprise-you. Serendip-O-Matic - Post Mortal Songs. Switzerland, 2005. http://www.discogs.com/Serendip- o-matic-Post-Mortal-Songs/release/6984447. “Serendip-O-Matic Results Using 2012 SPU Library Annual Report.” Keeping Time, August 3, 2013. http://forkeepingtime.tumblr.com/post/57254758403/serendip-o-matic-results-using- 2012-spu-library-annual. Smale, Maura. “New at the DPLA: There’s an App for That.” ACRLog, August 15, 2013. http://acrlog.org/2013/08/15/new-at-the-dpla-theres-an-app-for-that/. “SMHS Connects with Serendip-O-Matic.” Sunapee School District, August 13, 2013. http://www.sunapeeschools.org/home/announcement/smhsconnectswithserendip-o-matic. “Stained Glass, Google, Serendip-O-Matic, More: Short Wednesday Buzz.” ResearchBuzz, August 14, 2013. http://researchbuzz.me/2013/08/14/stained-glass-google-serendip-o- matic-more-short-wednesday-buzz-august-14-2013/. Starr, Julie. “Serendip-O-Matic Led Me to These Gorgeous Images of Early NZ.” Evolving Newsroom, August 12, 2013. http://evolvingnewsroom.co.nz/serendip-o-matic-led-me-to- these-gorgeous-images-of-early-nz/. “Surprising Results: A Search Engine Designed by and for Digital Humanities.” Explored.tech, August 6, 2013. http://sophia.smith.edu/blog/exploredtech/category/digital- humanities/. Verhoeven, Deb, and Toby Burrows. “Crowdsourcing for Serendipity.” The Australian: Higher Education, December 10, 2014. http://www.theaustralian.com.au/higher- education/opinion/crowdsourcing-for-serendipity/story-e6frgcko-1227150244558. Visconti, Amanda. “Digital Projects from Start to Finish: DH Mentorship from One Week One Tool (OWOT).” Literature Geek, July 30, 2013. http://www.literaturegeek.com/owotdayone/. ———. “#OWOT a Week: Introducing Serendip-O-Matic, a Tool for Digital Humanities Discovery and Delight.” Literature Geek, August 2, 2013. http://www.literaturegeek.com/owot-a-week/. Williams, Amrys O. “One Week, One Tool.” AmShazam., July 28, 2013. http://amrys.wordpress.com/2013/07/28/one-week-one-tool/. ———. “OWOT, Day 2.” AmShazam., July 29, 2013. http://amrys.wordpress.com/2013/07/29/owot-day-2/. ———. “OWOT, Day 3.” AmShazam., July 30, 2013. http://amrys.wordpress.com/2013/07/30/owot-day-3/. ———. “OWOT, Day 4.” AmShazam., July 31, 2013. http://amrys.wordpress.com/2013/07/31/owot-day-4/. ———. “OWOT, Day 5.” AmShazam, August 1, 2013. http://amrys.wordpress.com/2013/08/01/owot-day-5/. ———. “OWOT, Day 6.” AmShazam., August 2, 2013. http://amrys.wordpress.com/2013/08/02/owot-day-6/. ———. “OWOT, Day 7.” AmShazam., August 3, 2013. http://amrys.wordpress.com/2013/08/03/owot-day-7/. ———. “What We Built at OWOT: Serendip-O-Matic.” History of Science, Medicine, and Technology at the University of Wisconsin, August 2, 2013. http://wisconsinhstm.blogspot.com/2013/08/what-we-built-at-owot-serendip-o-matic.html. “Сервис Serendip-O-Matic иллюстрирует тексты картинками из библиотек и музеев.” Edutainme, August 5, 2013. http://www.edutainme.ru/news/servis-serendip-o-matic- illyustriruet-teksty-kartinkami-iz-bibliotek-i-muzeev/.   Project Activities, Accomplishments, and Audiences Evaluation Continuation of the Project Grant Products Appendix I Bibliography of related presentations and publications