Shannon Davis
Digital Library Services Manager
Washington University in St. Louis
The August 2014 shooting death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, along with other recent police-involved shootings around the country have inspired demonstrations, conversation, debate and calls for systemic change in our society. Soon after Brown’s shooting, Washington University Libraries established the “Documenting Ferguson” repository to gather digital media captured in or inspired by Ferguson. This community-sourced repository now has more than 1,500 files of digital photographs, video recordings and other media contributed from all over the country. This presentation will cover experiences in setting up and running an online community archive, including making rapid technology decisions based on emerging events, copyright issues with contributed content, and building partnerships with related organizations in order to collaborate instead of compete, plus preliminary research on what motivated users to contribute content.