change in access digitization navarrete borowiecki ewace

Change in access after digitization:

Ethnographic collections in Wikipedia

EWACE – Vienna 3-5 Sept 2015

Trilce Navarrete - @trilcenavarrete

Karol J. Borowiecki - @richesEU

The RICHES Consortium

Digital heritage consumption

https://www.google.nl/search?q=google&oq=google&aqs=chrome..69i57j69i60l5.656j0j4&sourceid=chrome&es_sm=91&ie=UTF-8#q=joseph+haydn

https://www.google.nl/search?q=google&oq=google&aqs=chrome..69i57j69i60l5.656j0j4&sourceid=chrome&es_sm=91&ie=UTF-8#q=joseph+haydn

Leading question:What is the change in use brought by digital (open data) publication of

heritage collections?

Use = access made possible by exhibits that enables consumption (e.g. re-use)

Key results:

- Greater understanding in user’s perspective

- Exponential increase access to collections (150,000 > 1.5 m / year)

- Wider access to collections (‘thicker’ long tail, 8% > 11% objects)

- Preference for 3D onsite and 2D online (limited by technology?)

- Preference for quality articles (= diversity)

- A brighter future complemented by 24/7 access + no geo barrier

In a nutshell


Museums, as other heritage institutions, are driven to give sustainable access to holdings. Access drives allocation of resources also into other core activities (exhibit, preserve, communicate, collect).

A small part of the collections (<10%) are exhibited to the public (Frey, 2004).

Digitization and online publication can broaden and deepen access (Bakhshiand Throsby, 2012). Key is the distribution channel (Benghozi and Benhamou, 2010).

A key channel for publication is Wikipedia (s. 2001), a social networked platform with 35m articles in +300 languages that receives ca. 17m views/mo (all Wikimedia project receive 17b views/mo).

A few heritage institutions are collaborating, many more watch curiously...

Background – why ?


Heritage collections are vast. Identifying the few objects to exhibit (i.e. consume) has generally been the task of the experts (ranking system).

Physical restrictions in the market (e.g. exhibition space) have lead to a long tail pattern of consumption which may potentially change as distribution channels improve (Benghozi and Benhamou, 2010).

Consumption of niche products relies heavily on active digital communities to share and recommend information (Zhang and Kamps, 2010), even more so than price signals (Potts, 2008). Too many official prizes may signal highbrow and deter consumers (Clement, 2007).

Developing and improving rich engaging distribution channels is costly, certainly with decreasing government subsidies. Tapping into existing communities of critics and users may result viable solution.

Background - theory


Wikipedia curates content through a global community of volunteers.

Little research on consumer behaviour: preference can be identified in language, subject, and period:

• The English version is the largest, accounting for almost half of all traffic.• Entertainment (e.g. music, films) and encyclopaedic topics (e.g. history, geography)

are most popular.• Summer and winter school break periods are less popular.

Consumer behaviour reflects views but also contributions by editors, which may present a different pattern (Reinoso, 2012).

Some articles are highly sensitive to critical events (Ratkiewicz, 2010), including successful films (Mayestyan, 2013) but also to being featured in the Wikipedia home page (Gyllstrom and Moens, 2012).

Background - theory


We selected a data set, based on the availability of data onsite and online.

– The Dutch National Museum of World Cultures (NMWC) has a collection of 600,000 objects. It is a national collection. Keeps excellent records !

– NMWC began collaboration with Wikipedia in 2009.– NMWC has published ±50,000 objects in Wikimedia.

We selected an online environment, based on sustainability of online access.

– Wikipedia is the quintessential space for inter-generational knowledge transfer in our information society, and growing since 2000 (Nupedia).

– Wiki tools (BaGLAMa2 and GLAMorous) ensure standard datasets across institutions > future research.

Data


Change in accessibility:• We compare access onsite (100yrs) and online (5yrs).

– Onsite peak: 300,000 visitors– Average per year: 94,500 visitors

– Online Wikipedia peak: 18 million clicks– Average per year: 1.7 million clicks– (Average per year on the NMWC website: 600,000)

• .

Data: object accessibility


NMWC onsite visitors 1911-2010



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Change in object mobility (long tail):• We compare onsite exhibits and online articles made.

– Onsite use of collection (100 years): 10% of objects.– Onsite peak (frequency): 10 exhibits.

– Online use of collection (5 years): 12% objects (of 1% of collection).– Online peak (frequency): 135 articles (May 2015).

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NMWC object mobility onsite and online



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135103 76 75 45 39 28 26 23 22 21 20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5

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Number of articles in Wikipedia

NMWC online consumption: edits and views

Data: behaviour


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English Wikipedia Indonesian Wikipedia German Wikipedia

Dutch Wikipedia French Wikipedia Spanish Wikipedia

Japanese Wikipedia

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English Wikipedia Indonesian Wikipedia German Wikipedia

Dutch Wikipedia French Wikipedia Spanish Wikipedia

Japanese Wikipedia

We selected the most popular objects onsite (with comparable data):

Model: object views

We selected the most popular objects online (with comparable data):

Model: object views

We developed 3 models to identify determinants for object views:• M1: object view as function of exhibits and a set of control variables. • M2: +website fixed effect (language version, multiple use).• M3: +type of object fixed effect (2D, 3D, video and text).

• Variables included: – Duration of exhibit / article– # images / # NMWC images as indication of article quality– Crowdsourcing– Language– Topic

• Data analyzed: 55 articles, ±130 observations

Model: object views


Object view

as funcion of exhibits

and inclusion

in Wikipedia articles

Model: object views


Object views and preferences:• Preference onsite for 3D and online for 2D.

• Onsite, object view increases with:– Time (when accounting for 3D).

• Online, object view increases with:– Time.– Quality of article (= greater number of images).– Diversity of images (related to quality).– English version, followed by Indonesian and Dutch.– Topic (geography).

Results: object views


Heritage institutions can increase access to collections through digitization and through online publication. Online can complement onsite.

Heritage institutions may benefit by tapping into existing platforms developed and maintained by a community of users (currently developing mobile, semantic, various Wikimedia projects). In turn, museums can contribute media and expert contextualization of objects and hence enrich diversity of articles.

Changes can be observed in:• Information signals: curation, ranking, and channel !• Content curation: onsite = experts / online = crowd.• Preference: onsite 2D / online 3D.• Tail broadens: onsite 10% / online 12%.• Audience reach: onsite 94,5000 / online 1.7 million per year.

Conclusions


Trilce Navarrete ([email protected])Karol J. Borowiecki ([email protected])

Thank you !


mailto:[email protected]

mailto:[email protected]

change in access digitization navarrete borowiecki ewace

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