The domain of digital libraries is at the intersection of many disciplines and fields, including data management, information retrieval, library sciences, document management, information systems, the web, image processing, artificial intelligence, human-computer interaction, archiving and digital curation. The field of Digital Library has evolved and matured significantly since the early successes of the National Science Foundation (NSF), U.S. digital library programs – Digital Library Initiative-1 (DLI-1), Digital Library Initiative-2 (DLI-2) (http://www.nsf.gov/news/special_reports/cyber/digitallibraries.jsp), and the National Science Digital Library (NSDL) program (http://nsdl.org/). The European Commission funded DELOS Network of Excellence on Digital Libraries envisions a Digital Library as a tool at the center of intellectual activity having no logical, conceptual, physical, temporal, or personal borders or barriers to information. (http://www.delos.info/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=345). Following its birth in the mid 1990s, the digital library movement has spread and spawned three significant and vibrant international conferences series – the Joint Conference on Digital Libraries (JCDL, http://www.jcdl.org) in the US, the European Conference on Digital Libraries , now renamed the Theory and Practice of Digital Libraries (TPDL, http://www.tpdl.eu/) and the International Conference on Asian Digital Libraries (ICADL, http://www.icadl.org). The three conferences help create stimulating and collegial forums for reporting significant digital library research and development activities. The ICADL, which began in 1998 has rotated annually among the Asia-Pacific countries, and has become one of the premiere meetings in digital libraries. Since its humble beginnings in 1998 the meeting has been held in the following locations (http://www.icadl.org/):
ICADL 2013: Social Media and Community Networks ICADL 2013 follows the tradition of previous ICADL conferences and brings a truly interdisciplinary group of researchers and practitioners of digital libraries with a focus on the theme of “Social Media and Community Networks”. Powered by the intrinsic democratic principles and possibilities of the Web 2.0 technologies and tools such as social networking sites, blogging and micro-blogging sites; Social Media is believed to empower individuals in sharing their thoughts and opinions. Very precipitously growing platforms like Facebook (2004), YouTube (2005), and Twitter (2006) not only facilitate individuals to voice their views but make connections and exchange self-generated content. Everyone — from activists to academics, believes that social media has helped create a new “participatory” culture and the “public sphere” is back in the hands of ordinary citizens. While expanding access and enhancing interactions remain the primary focus: user engagement and community building are central to the domain of digital libraries. Tools, technologies and strategies for the same continue to draw the attention of the field. The emergence of social media and the availability of social networking platforms offer enormous opportunity to leverage them for ‘connecting with the user community’ and building a strong networked community of stakeholders across the life cycle of information creation to consumption.
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