Why contribute?

Exposure

Contributing to the Archives Hub allows you to become part of an internationally-recognised, high-profile cross-searching service. The Hub provides researchers with access to over 2 million  descriptions from over 350 institutions across the UK, and it is constnatly being updated with new descriptions. Increasingly it includes digital content, or links directly to digital content.

The Hub has good search engine rankings and receives well over half a million page views per month (excluding robots).

The diverse range of archive collections enables researchers to carry out broad-based subject searches and facilitates cross-disciplinary research, allowing disparate collections to be intellectually linked together, such as collections relating to the same person or organisation. The basic keyword search provides a simple approach to searching, and search options for collection titles, dates, subjects, people, places and organizations enable researchers to carry out sophisticated searching. Persistent URLs allow Hub descriptions to be bookmarked and used for education and research, and also exposed to search engines such as Google.

Data creation and standards

We believe that use of widely recognized standards is essential for fully realizing the potential of your descriptions in the Web environment. Archives Hub descriptions comply with ISAD(G) and indexing standards, and descriptions are stored in Encoded Archival Description (EAD), an international standard that promotes interoperability and sustainability.

Contributors to the Archives Hub are able to use the EAD Editor, which allows you to easily create and edit EAD descriptions. Contributors may download EAD versions of their descriptions for storage and reuse, and there are no fees associated with contributing to the Hub or use of the EAD Editor.

Community

You will be part of a community of contributors, providing a network of support. The Archives Hub blog and Twitter provide news, comment, and discussion on issue facing archives and archivists.

We provide training opportunities for archivists, particularly on the use of our EAD Editor, and we provide support for exporting your descriptions from archival software.

The Archives Hub is constantly growing and evolving, and you will benefit from the technical developments and innovations work of the Archives Hub team.

Take a look at our information on contributing to help you with creating and submitting descriptions. We provide information about standards, interoperability and the Archives Hub as part of the broader archives and heritage environment.