Hosted Collections

In partnership with the Boston Public Library, Digital Commonwealth maintains a digital repository that hosts digital objects along with their corresponding metadata records from member institutions. This service is open to any Massachusetts-based library, museum, historical society, archives, or other cultural heritage institution and is intended to provide a digital object management solution for institutions that lack the infrastructure to host and/or provide access to their own digital collections.

All items hosted in the Digital Commonwealth repository are accessible in the public search interface, and metadata records for the items are also available in the Digital Public Library of America (DPLA). Please note that all metadata records held by the Digital Commonwealth system and harvested into DPLA will be made available under a Creative Commons CC0 license.

Requirements

To have your digital objects hosted in the Digital Commonwealth repository:

• Your materials meet the criteria outlined in the Collection Development Policy.
• All objects must be accompanied by metadata records that meet the Digital Commonwealth metadata standards.

A review of your digital objects and metadata records will be conducted by a Digital Commonwealth representative after you submit your request.

If your records are not in a repository-ready format, or if your institution has not yet created records for your items, Digital Commonwealth may be able to offer you options for metadata editing, crosswalking, and/or creation. If your items have not yet been digitized, please see Digitization & Metadata Services.

Getting Started

To request to have your collections hosted by Digital Commonwealth, please submit the "Boston Public Library/Digital Commonwealth Digitization Request Form and Service Agreement". If your materials have already been digitized and/or described, please indicate the status of your items in the “Collection Information” section.