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How do I use…Scribd?
Scribd describes itself as the Flickr of documents. Instead of uploading photographs, however, users uploaddocuments. Scribd has created iPaper, which allows users to upload Word, Excel, Power Point, PDF, and other formatted documents and then read them in their original format. Rather than having to transcribe texts intohtml to make them readable and searchable on the web, users can simply upload documents they have alreadycreated. Best of all, iPaper maintains the format of the document as it was originally created. Documents look good on the web, and that’s why we recommend it.iPaper can easily be embedded into other web pages, like blogs. The Scribd community boasts 50,000,000readers and nearly 50,000 new documents uploaded daily. Although only a few museums and historicalsocieties have started to use Scribd, the Whitney Museum among them, many other organizations use it. Theyinclude NASA, the IRS, the
 Atlantic Monthly
magazine, and even Barack Obama’s campaign.
What can it do for you?
Scribd can be used in a variety of ways. Museums and historical societies can share past and presentnewsletters, brochures, and other literature such as meeting minutes or annual reports. Education departmentscan easily share lesson plans, pre- and post-visit materials, and registration forms. Collections departments canshare transcriptions or curatorial statements.Scribd is entirely free. Your organization can upload as many documents it likes, where they will be searchablewithin the Scribd community and via a normal web search in Google, Yahoo, or similar. These documents, asmentioned before, can also be embedded in your host site. Because all of the text on iPaper is indexed, userscan easily search for specific phrases or topics. This makes your collections more accessible. It also may behelpful internally, as one can easily find documents relating to a topic without an item’s full title or other metadata.
 How do users interact with it?
Depending on how you choose to use Scribd, your users will interact with in two different ways. We highlyrecommend directly embedding iPaper documents into your host blog (WordPress, Blogger, etc.). In this case,
Figure 13: Two examples of iPaper. On the left, a conservation trust has uploaded its brochure, originally in a PDFformat. On the right, a scholar's list of archival resources, originally in Word format.
 
users will remain on your webpage but be able to read the texts hosted in Scribd. Users can also go to your account, hosted at Scribd, and page through your posted documents. When you upload a document, you havethe option to provide a short description and any other metadata you think is pertinent. Users can flip throughall of the documents you have uploaded or search for documents on a related theme among others’ documents.As the administrator of the account, you can determine whether or not to allow users to download documentsdirectly to their computers. This may be a concern for copyrighted or other specially licensed materials, shouldyou have them. If you have enabled the ability to download documents, then users will download pertinent or meaningful documents.One of the most attractive features of Scribd is the ability of your readers to comment on and tag documents.Readers can also indicate whether they like a document (similar to the “Favorite” feature in Flickr).
 How do you do it?
Setting up an account and uploading documents is very straightforward. One can find a complete (and veryhelpful list) of frequently asked questions and directions athttp://www.scribd.com/faq. This set of directionsdraws heavily on Scribd’s directions.
1.Create an account.
As with Google Maps, Flickr, or one of the blog services, we recommend usingan email account that you have created especially for setting up and maintaining your online presence.
2.Upload documents.
You can upload many types of documents, including… When you haveselected documents to upload, you can indicate which ones, if any, you would like to mark as private. Private documents cannot be indexed by Google or searched for by the general public.They also cannot be embedded in your blog or other webpage.
3.Describe your document(s).
For each document, choose a title and add a short description. Here iswhere you can add metadata if the item is from your collection, or labeling text that helps orient thereader to the context of the document.
4.Categorize your document(s).
You can choose from a drop-down menu of topics and categories tohelp organize your document and make it more “findable.” Examples of topics include “AcademicWork,” “Brochures,” etc., andcategories include areas like“History” or “Essay.” Other Scribd users can searchdocuments by category and/or topic to find others like it.
5.Add tags.
As in Flickr, tags helpusers search for content. Tagsmay be related to content areaor format. For instance, atranscription of a World War IIveteran’s oral history may have the following tags: interview, World War II, WWII, veteran, soldier,oral history, transcription, history, local history. Users can view your profile and see what tags youcommonly use to get a sense of your collection or archive’s strengths.
6.Share document, if desired.
For each document you have uploaded you will have the option tonotify specific people that it is now available by filling in their email addresses. You also will see a
 
Figure 14: Sharing options include Wikipedia, the document's uniqueURL, and embedding code.
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