Boston, MA
Wednesday, March 10th 1999, 6:30 – 8:30 p.m.
Boston Marriott Copley Place (Simmons Room)

Present:

A.  INTRODUCTIONS

Each person introduced him or herself to the group at large.

B.  APPROVAL OF MINUTES OF 1998 MEETING

The minutes were approved pending any changes requested after the meeting by e-mail by the members.

C.  ELECTIONS

Robin Paynter served as chair of the nominating committee. SEAM also elected or approved a faculty representative to the group. Susan Go, from the University of Michigan contacted Dan Doeppers as a prospective faculty representative. He is on sabbatical this year but will be willing to serve as the faculty representative next year. The term for faculty members is two years. The chair of SEAM is elected for two years and the executive committee serves for three years. Judith Henchy asked if the committee could approve a change in the bylaws to have all members of the executive committee including the chair serve for three years each. This was passed unanimously.

It was also noted that CORMOSEA also elects a faculty representative to SEAM. This rep is Fredricks. The issue of who elects or appoints faculty representatives to SEAM will be discussed at a later point during the discussion on the CORMOSEA bylaws. SEAM unanimously elected Daniel Doeppers to be the faculty representative to SEAM. Ballots were passed out for the position of Chair. There were three candidates on the ballot; Yati Barnard, Susan Go and Carol Mitchell. After counting the votes Robin announced that Susan Go had been elected as the new incoming chair.

D.  FINANCIAL REPORT

James Simon from CRL gave the financial report for SEAM, discussing what had been spent or committed during the past year. Kent Mulliner requested that institutional memberships be lowered from their current $800 annual dues. Raymond Lum suggested that we keep them the same so that we would have funds set aside for larger projects. Fred Protopappas concurred noting that many microfilming projects can get quite expensive and that fund should be set aside for larger projects. Judith Henchy argued that the group had negotiated this dues level, and it might not be a good time to lower the dues. While SEAM has had a surplus for some years, the group decided to keep membership price at the current $800 level.

E.  CONTINUING PROJECTS

1. Indonesian Projects

SEAM is continuing to film at the National Library. Kent Mulliner reported that there isn't much more to film there. James Simon noted that CRL has received all the film except the Sundanese material. The Sundanese material was supposed to have been received by CRL 3 years ago. The material can not be located at CRL, even though the Library of Congress reports that the film was sent. The Ford Foundation should have some clout in getting a better price for duplicate copies. Yati asked where the master was for the Sunda material. FAO will be contacted to see if the negatives are there.

Alan Feinstein is no longer picking out this material in the National Library of Indonesia. Judith Henchy asked if the project should therefore be closed. James Simon mentioned that he had a reel guide for only part of the set. That was for the Sunda material that hasn't been received by CRL. The question was asked whether more funds should be put into the Indonesian Project funds to replace the missing Sundanese material. Susan Go offered to look into the cost of replacement and to report back to the group. Fred Protopappas attended the SEAM meeting as the representative of Will Tuchrello. Fred will serve as the contact with Will, Jennifer Lindsay and FAO.

Roger Tol’s report was sent to all participants. It was to come with one of the LC shipments. There was some discussion of the shipping lists from LC. The shipments come sequentially so if participants are missing one, then LC owes the participant a missing shipment.

2. Vietnam Project.

The Vietnam Report went up on the list. Vietnam Studies Conference was attended last summer by Judith Henchy. The purpose of the panel she attended at the conference was to discuss archival preservation. She visited the National Library. They have complete new leadership there. Mr Duc has left. Mr. Hoat is the new deputy director. Dung is the name of the director. He offered to continue filming things if we gave him a list. The management wasn't communicating with the guy in the filming room so he is filming whatever he likes. There has been some duplication. The camera operator hasn't been given any of the information provided by Judith. The camera operator was given the pre 1989 material that is a list of priorities for SEAM. Perhaps since the management is rather problematic, then perhaps the Embassy can get everything shipped out for us. Fred plans on visiting Hanoi this summer. LC needs to approve it. Helen Poe, attending the SEAM meeting, offered to reason with the people at the U.S. embassy.

Judith Henchy hoped to work directly with the camera operator who can get things to the embassy for shipment. David Marr is sending titles to film to Judith Henchy. SEAM will continue to supply film since there is $20,000 or $30,000 left in the Luce Fund. (Confirm this amount with Judith.) Judith Henchy suggested regional newspapers as a project for the next Vietnamese project.

Richard Richie asked Judith Henchy if the church records at Phat Diem were a possibility for filming. Judith said that records were not kept in the church. The project was dropped since without the proper political or familial ties to Vietnam, the church authorities won't let SEAM film the material.

An agreement with the General Sciences Library in Saigon was reached to film additional issues that had already been agreed to in the north. Judith shipped two reconditioned microfilm processors to the north. One will be for Hanoi, and one will be for the south. The latest list provided by George for Vietnam is included in the SEAM minutes.

One SEAM member asked why CRL doesn't have more of its material cataloged and online. Milton Wolf noted that there is a huge arrearage at CRL that isn't well cataloged. Kent Mulliner suggested that some of the SEAM material get set aside for cataloging on the arrearage. Carol Mitchell noted that provisional records in CRL's catalog are probably not being loaded onto library's opacs, since they are provisional. David Magier suggested that SEAM members go back to their individual institutions to find out whether they are downloading or extracting these provisional records to their own catalogs. James Simon from CRL said that SEAM members could negotiate with them to outsource material. SEAM members all agreed to look into outsourcing with ALS. James Simon offered to speak with the CRL catalogers to find out what kind of backlogs and priorities they are setting and where SEAM falls into the workflow.

James Simon said he would ask the cataloging staff at CRL following questions then share his answers with SEAM members: How long does it take to move material through the door? How much is coming from SEAM? James also offered to give SEAM members the percentage SEAM titles make up of the whole arrearage and which languages this material covers.

3. Cornell newspaper microfilming project.

Allen Riedy handed out a group of papers for everyone. Cornell has spent approximately $1,700 this year on the filming project. Cornell does have the material cataloged. There are 123 titles on Cornell's to do list. Allen asked about the budget. There isn't anything listed in CRL's financial report as being spent in 1996. Cornell thinks that they did spend some money in 1996. James Simon said he would check on it when he gets back to CRL [subsequent investigation revealed that $5000 was spent in 1996]. The $600 left over in Cornell's budget can be spent in the upcoming year. Allen Riedy said he would work on a new list for next year for what he might film.

Vietnamese newspapers were agreed upon by Cornell and LC to film. They have finished collating the film at Cornell. Viet Nam Gai Phong is going to be filmed for 1975-1986 by Cornell. 1987-1995 has been filmed as a cooperative project between Cornell and ANU. The material is being collated by Cornell and filmed by LC. It should be available through Photodup.

Helen Poe added that the meeting with Cornell was for all Southeast Asian newspapers. So the Library of Congress started a pilot project for Vietnamese newspapers, as a first priority. Korean papers are being sent by LC to a private filming country.

4. Documentation Center of Cambodia Project.

Richard Richie reported on the Cambodian microfilming project being conducted by the Documentation Center of Cambodia. There are approximately 150 reels of film already received by Yale, with 110 of those being processed. There were problems with the first 6 reels - they appear in reverse order. Positive copies will be made for Cornell at this time, and the SEAM copy will be made at the finish of the project. The Library of Congress and Michigan also expressed interest in copies.

5. Steve Heder Cambodian election materials.

Steve Heder has fallen through the cracks. The British Library has moved into its new quarters. Steve wanted to create a better finding aid and that may be part of his reluctance to get the filming done. David Magier mentioned a census done for UNTAC for the Cambodian Elections. But it can't be found. Several SEAM members thought that this information would be useful to have.

F.  NEW PROJECTS

Digital preservation of sound recordings

Carol suggested a digital preservation project for musical sound recordings. The material is at a risk. Collections at individual SEAM institutions probably do not overlap. We haven't really solved the problem of electronic reserves. Is making an electronic copy of something and using it for interlibrary loan or lending out in violation of copyright law. Can you make a preservation copy? Is CRL able to store this digital format? Raymund Lum asked if digitized music was in scope for SEAM? The group thought that it was, but decided that the topic was more important for the CORMOSEA collection development meeting. SEAM members agreed that addressing things already in individual institution's collections are of second importance to collections in Southeast Asia.

Hobart Balinese videos

It was reported that Hobart is going to break up his collection into separate genre groups so that it might be a better purchase on an institution by institution basis. At first the whole package was going to cost $75,000 and SEAM might be interested, but now that it is broken up, institutions could buy individual sections. SEAM will not purchase.

G.  OTHER BUSINESS

1.  PDII microfiche

LC picked it all up. They will also be a little more forthcoming in supplying material. This has been an ongoing problem. Not all has been resolved. Fred will work with PDII and Will to get things flowing.

2.  Proposed conference on evaluating projects in the region: Tol Report on Indonesia projects

A meeting in conjunction with IFLA was suggested. Judith Henchy has been in contact with IFLA, and they have agreed to make it a meeting in conjunction available to the group. It was asked if it would be possible to conduct this meeting before or after IFLA, since IFLA charges such high registration fees. Perhaps nothing would be lost by having IFLA sponsorship and having people other than a selected group attend. Yati Barnard and Kent Mulliner said they would to develop a core group of supporting institutions. Perhaps the meeting would bring in the Asian participants. The meeting would be held at the National Archives of Thailand. Judith Henchy hoped for 25 core participants.

Helen Poe and Will Tuchrello visited the National Library of Thailand last summer and the deputy head of the National Library was very interested in developing programs in conjunction with IFLA. Judith Henchy welcomed ideas on how to continue with this proposal. Perhaps IIAS could support this idea?

3. Relationship with commercial filmers

Announcement was made to please attend the ALL Roundtable "Saving Asia."

4. SEAM brochure

It was noted that a brochure had not yet been created to describe SEAM activities.

5. Update on ICON

Milton Wolf listed the participants of ICON (12 in all). NEH has been approached for a mega-grant. A million dollars has been asked for from NEH. SEAM members should check the CRL website and look at the charter for ICON to see if members should be joining the project. Carol Mitchell suggested that members keep their list updated for what newspapers are being collected or filmed by their institution. This list could feed into ICON’s project.

6. CRL Ballot suggestions.

SEAM Members were requested to continue to submit their ideas to CRL for new projects.

7. Business World

This was approved for purchase after finding out that the price had increased [will cost $5059].

8. Executive Committee discretionary approval

SEAM members decided to send a motion to ballot to allow the executive work with a discretionary $1000 when items were found to be more expensive than originally approved.

The meeting was adjourned.

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