Incorporating Physical and Digital Artifacts into Growing Personal Collections

We have produced a system that automatically incorporates syndicated materials from sources including library acquisition records and online news sites to form growing hypertextual structures. This system enables users to create personal and shared collections built upon growing collections. It also seeks to empower users through the use of information filters to create dynamic personal collections that can themselves grow over time to include materials added to the underlying collection as they appear. In addition, we are investigating particular benefits of intersecting hypertextual paths as a useful structure for representing such sub-collections and the resources extracted from the feeds themselves. We present our prototype system, the emerging standards for syndicating online content, and a discussion of the importance of supporting growth within digital libraries generally.