n.an online research environment in which the discoverability and/or downloading of materials is deliberately limited, and/or access is restricted to researchers who have created a limited-term account and agreed to terms of use similar to those that apply in a physical reading room of an archivesMiller 2013, 532Some type of virtual reading room where users request and receive access to specific collections, controlled by password and time limit, might also be possible.Miller 2013, 533A click-through nondisclosure agreement might even prove acceptable for collections posted online, or available through an archives-controlled virtual reading room, especially if archivists are somewhat selective about which collections they make available this way.Leetaru 2014The Internet Archive’s answer to this is a “virtual reading room” in which scholars can run their data mining algorithms directly on the archive’s servers using virtual machine software. Much like a reading room in a physical archive, scholars don’t borrow copies of large portions of the archive for study. They submit data mining algorithms to the virtual reading room where they run on the archive’s computers and can access all of the archive’s holdings—but the library’s holdings don’t leave the reading room. Only the patterns identified by the algorithms, akin to a scholar’s handwritten notes, are permitted to leave the confines of the reading room.Light 2014, 17The virtual reading room mitigated the risks involved in providing this kind of access to personal, archival materials with privacy and copyright issues by limiting the number of qualified users and by limiting the discoverability of full-text content on the open web.an online environment in which digital materials are made freely availableUS DOS 2020Virtual Reading Room Documents Search [title].NAA 2020VRROOM Virtual Reading Room: Archival records for teachers & students [title].
Notes
As applies to the first definition, discoverability may be deliberately limited through restrictions on search engine crawls of full-text content or limited to data mining while restricting researchers from downloading materials. The purpose of limiting access is to provide remote availability of research materials while protecting the repository by: limiting discoverability of potentially private or copyrighted content, shifting accountability for violating fair use to researchers, and demonstrating intent to provide access only for educational, personal, or research purposes.
