Canada’s National Heritage Digitization Strategy

Canada’s National Heritage Digitization Strategy

The National Heritage Digitisation Strategy (NHDS) is part of a long history of digitizing cultural heritage materials that has been ongoing in the Canadian scholarly and heritage communities since at least the 1960s, moving in step with developments in digital technologies, including the world wide web. This history includes digitization strategies developed by the Canadian Institute for Historical Microreproductions (CIHM) and the Canadian Association of Research Libraries (CARL) starting in the 1970s, the digital libraries initiative of the 1990s, and the Canadian Research Knowledge Network (CRKN) and Canadiana in the 2000s.

RDM Capacity Building in Canada and the Portage Insights Reports Series

RDM Capacity Building in Canada and the Portage Insights Reports Series

In May 2018, Canada’s Tri-Agency released a draft Research Data Management (RDM) Policy for Consultation, one of several policies related to data management, including the Tri-Agency Open Access Policy on Publications (2015) and the Tri-Agency Statement of Principles on Digital Data Management (2016) (see “Tri-Agency Research Data Management Policy”). The final Tri-Agency RDM Policy was released in March 2021 (see “Update: Research Data Management in Canada”).

The Fonds de Recherche du Québec Join cOAlition S

The Fonds de Recherche du Québec Join cOAlition S

In June 2021, the Fonds de recherche du Québec (FRQ) announced that they were joining cOAlition S and implementing the principles of Plan S, including full and immediate open access to the research it funds. 

The FRQ are the first Canadian funding organization and the first public funding organization in North America to join cOAlition S, which was founded in 2018 as a group of 11 European funding organizations committed to advancing open access, supported by the European Research Council (ERC) and the European Commission (see “Plan S and cOAlition S”). It has since expanded to include members from Africa, the Middle East, and the US (see “Plan S Update: The Expanding Membership of cOAlition S”).

The Current State of Research Data Management in Canada: A Report by the Digital Research Alliance of Canada

The Current State of Research Data Management in Canada: A Report by the Digital Research Alliance of Canada

In September 2021, the Digital Research Alliance of Canada (recently renamed from NDRIO, the New Digital Research Infrastructure Organization) released a report called The Current State of Research Data Management in Canada: An Update to the LCDRI Data Management Position Paper (2020). It was authored by the NDRIO Research Data Management Working Group: Shahira Khair, Rozita Dara, Susan Haigh, Mark Leggott, Ian Milligan, Jeff Moon, Karen Payne, Elodie Portales-Casamar, Ghilaine Roquet, and Lee Wilson.

Draft Report: Research Data Management Support in the Humanities: Challenges and Recommendations

Draft Report: Research Data Management Support in the Humanities: Challenges and Recommendations

The following draft report by Stefan Higgins, Lisa Goddard, and Shahira Khair outlines discussions and findings from Research Data Management for Digitally-Curious Humanists, an online event sponsored by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) and held on June 14, 2021 as a Digital Humanities Summer Institute (DHSI) 2021 –– Online Edition aligned event.

The Extension of Canada’s General Term of Copyright under CUSMA (USMCA)

The Extension of Canada’s General Term of Copyright under CUSMA (USMCA)

Under the Canada–United States–Mexico Agreement (CUSMA) (also called the US–Mexico–Canada Agreement or USMCA in the US and Tratado entre México, Estado Unidos y Canadá or T-MEC in Mexico), a trade agreement that includes a chapter on intellectual property, Canada has committed to extending its general term of copyright by 20 years, from the life of the author plus 50 years to the life of the author plus 70 years.