Information for prospective providers of new content

We welcome proposals for additional resources for inclusion in Connected Histories, irrespective of whether your resource is a dataset consisting of millions of pages or a small, focused body of material. This page explains our criteria for inclusion, the costs involved, and how to propose new content.

• Criteria for inclusion
• Terms and conditions
• How to propose new content

Criteria for inclusion

We will consider resources in a variety of formats, including free text transcriptions, databases and image catalogues, and both those which are available free of charge or which require subscription access. Our main criteria for inclusion are:

• Date range and geographical scope: for the present, Connected Histories is composed of sources whose primary content concerns British history between 1500 and 1900. Resources which extend beyond these boundaries are welcome as long as the chief focus falls within them. In the longer term we hope to extend both the chronological and geographical scope of Connected Histories. We welcome therefore suggestions for content which falls outside our current focus, but such proposals will take longer to implement.
• Content: resources should be principally composed of primary sources, and should comprise complete editions wherever possible. The quality of the transcription and/or data creation must meet normal academic standards.
• Accessibility: resources must be available on the web, irrespective of whether they are available to users free of charge or through subscription. CD-ROM publications and other media do not qualify. Connected Histories does not host entire resources. Rather, it indexes resources for inclusion in our search engine and then directs users to live websites to view the full texts of search results.

Terms and conditions

Inclusion within Connected Histories is subject to a licence agreement which sets out the terms of use, our responsibilities as a custodian and publisher of your data, and the procedures for renewing or terminating the agreement.

Inclusion within Connected Histories does not in any way infringe your rights as the owner of your data. While we need a copy of the data for indexing purposes, this is discarded once the index is completed and functioning correctly on our website (within a year). Connected Histories never directly gives full access to data; it only provides snippet results with live links to the full text held on owners' websites.

How to propose new content

Please send an email to Michael Pidd (m.pidd@sheffield.ac.uk) with the following information:

• a brief description of the resource, with the URL and an explanation of how the resource was created
• whether the data is unstructured or structured, and if structured, how
• its approximate size, in gigabytes (GB)
• whether the site is freely available or by subscription access, and if it is the latter who can acquire subscription access

If your resource is suitable for inclusion, we will then ask for some sample data and proceed to determine the cost involved. Once the fee is agreed, we will draft a licence agreement for review and signing.