Europe’s local cultural Europe’s local cultural institutions- institutions- co-operating in a digital co-operating in a digital environmentenvironment

Rob Davies

MDR, UK

e-Europe 2005: an Information Society e-Europe 2005: an Information Society for All: Action Planfor All: Action Plan

• Dynamic business environment, investment, jobs, productivity

• Modern public services– e-government, e-learning, e-health

• e-inclusion– digital skills, lifelong learning, public access points, special needs,

access in remote areas

• Applications and content

• Broadband infrastructure– widely available, competitively priced

• Secure information infrastructure

e-Europe: how to get there?e-Europe: how to get there?

• Exchange of experience

• Good practices, demonstration projects, share lessons from failures

• Accelerate roll-out of leading edge applications and infrastructure

• Connect public administrations to broadband

• Interactive public services

• Accessible for all, multiple platforms

• Benchmarking and co-ordination

Libraries, museums and archives: Libraries, museums and archives:

starting points and trends starting points and trends • Total registered public library members - 190 million

• Different traditions: variations in public library and archive usage– 2000 European average public libraries 24%; CEE 15%

– 13% Slovakia - 62% Denmark

• what performance level will attract funding?

• Competition - multi-channel tv, Internet

• In wealthier countries - purchasing replacing lending (books, CD-ROMS, DVDs , games)

• Remote usage increase - loans and visits decrease

• Museums universally popular ?

• Archives ‘statutory’ role?

Service expansion in local institutionsService expansion in local institutions

Virtual (Web-based) and ‘physical’• Digital divide - IT skills• Learning access and support• Employment skills• Socially excluded groups• Citizens information services• Family and local history• Reading promotion

DigitisationDigitisation

• Convergence of content in cyberspace

• Lund Principles

• Preservation and access

• Minerva– policies, standards and tools

• Smaller local institutions

Cooperation and partnershipCooperation and partnership

• Between cultural institutions (libraries, museums and archives)– national co-ordination [UK, Norway]

Cooperation and partnershipCooperation and partnership

• Between cultural institutions (libraries, museums and archives)– national co-ordination [UK, Norway]

• Within local authorities– Integration with other local authority services

– Virtual Service Environments?

Cooperation and partnershipCooperation and partnership

• Between cultural institutions (libraries, museums and archives)– national co-ordination [UK, Norway]

• Within local authorities– Integration with other local authority services

– Virtual Service Environments?

• Between public libraries and other libraries

Cooperation and partnershipCooperation and partnership

• Between cultural institutions (libraries, museums and archives)– national co-ordination [UK, Norway]

• Within local authorities– Integration with other local authority services

– Virtual Service Environments?

• Between public libraries and other libraries

• With NGOs

• With learning organisations

• With industry

Types of partnership Types of partnership

• Strategic/development partnerships – national, regional or local levels.

• Regional or location-based

• Domain-based (eg learning)

• Activity-based (eg for service delivery, preservation, training, IT development and purchasing)

Europe’s research and development Europe’s research and development agenda for local servicesagenda for local services

IST research programme

• 5th Framework Programme [cultural heritage applications]

– Minerva

– PULMAN (and PULMAN-XT)

• 6th Framework Programme

– Large IPs and NoEs

– CALIMERA • Co-ordination Action

– MinervaPLUS [candidate countries]

– Community Memory programme

PULMAN - ObjectivesPULMAN - Objectives

• Strengthen performance, help achieve potential of public libraries: new cultural, educational and social roles in eEurope

• Exchange knowledge, experience, good practice:encourage Centres of Excellence for digital services

• Spread strategic initiatives across Europe: sensitise national authorities and practitioners

• Develop cross-sectoral agendas for local services: starting from a public libraries standpoint

PULMANPULMAN

• Public libraries driven..but also linkages with museums and archives

• State of the Union– Benchmarking/country reports [38 countries]– Trends and forecasts

– Final Project Report

• Influence policy makers and professionals– Oeiras Conference - Manifesto, March 2003 – National and training workshops– NAPLE/Eblida– European Cross-domain meetings

• Monitoring the Oeiras Manifesto– 10 Point Action Plan

The PULMAN GuidelinesThe PULMAN Guidelines

• Identify best practice– guidelines [2 editions, 22 languages]

– new, digital services

– social policy, management , technical

– 20 topics

– 100,000 words

– 650 links to good practice across Europe

One Website www.pulmanweb.org

CALIMERA: main goalsCALIMERA: main goals

• Prepare Community Memory Research agenda for local services [call 2004]– Turn IST research outcomes into helpful digital services for ordinary people

– Digitally-based services which support policy agendas

• Mobilise public libraries, local museums and archives to make best use of existing technologies – Extend best practice/guidelines

– Sensitise decision makers

• Work with industry to improve delivery of solutions

• Policy work

• Focus on the needs of the end user– Usability roadmap for new technologies

– Impact

CALIMERA: basic factsCALIMERA: basic facts

• 18 months

– expected start December 2003

• 46 partners - local organisations, national authorities, research centres – financial coordinator Lisbon; scientific co-ordinator MDR – Oton Zupancic library, Ljubljana

• Three ‘reference networks’ from each country:– local authority-based professionals [builds on PULMAN country co-ordinators +

archives , museums] – national authorities – industrial partners - the suppliers of local institutions

CALIMERA in each countryCALIMERA in each country

• Country Co-ordination Groups – Active, innovative people

– Public Libraries, Museums and Archives

• Spread the news

• Supply information

• Interact with policymakers and industry

• Breda Karun

Community Memory: what’s in it for the Community Memory: what’s in it for the ordinary user?ordinary user?• Local identity in Europe + increased exploration of remote

resources

• Promotion of social and cultural inclusion – e.g. through access to local, ethnic and linguistic cultural heritage and

family history

• Comprehensive living archive of local activities, occupations, interests and cultural attractions

• Enhanced ability to link up present needs and interests with an awareness of their historical context

Community Memory: what’s in it for the Community Memory: what’s in it for the end user (2)?end user (2)?

• Concentrating on the contributions of ordinary people to development of the Information Society

• Addressing the digital divide by improving the delivery of services

• Tackling educational disadvantage and helping deal with demographic changes

• Ultimately, access from any home and any vehicle in Europe to local cultural content

Community Memory: what should it be Community Memory: what should it be support?support?

• Interactivity - information in both drections

• Motivation - fun for the user

• Creativity - the user can contribute in the form of stories, pictures, video - photos or art work, music or voice,

Types of cultural contentTypes of cultural content

• Existing resources of Cultural Memory Organisations– eg oral testimonies, memorabilia and cultural objects in the care of

individuals and communities

• Generation of new digital content by virtual communities and individuals– meet specific local information and learning needs:

• Culture is 'everything we do’– interfaces between culture and knowledge, learning, information for

everyday life

• Music

• Newer content forms e.g. Multimedia, VR/3D

Technologies? What for?Technologies? What for?

• Lower-cost and efficient digitisation

• Preservation and access to digital cultural objects

• Easy content authoring – quality management

• Creation of packaged resources eg for learning, tourism promotion

• Seamless, one-stop searching and discovery of distributed resources and services

• Promoting interactive communication and transactions with government

What technologies?What technologies?

• Personalisation of content creation and access

• Multimedia access and delivery

• Virtual and augmented reality/ simulation– 'virtual visits' to local cultural institutions

• Devices (digitv, mobiles, cameras) and infrastructure– (standalone, GSM, 3G, Wi-Fi, broadband)

• Location-based technologies eg GPS

• Terminologies (semantic web)– ontologies, controlled vocabularies, classification systems, etc to help local

professionals and ordinary end-users

• Developing ‘web services’ models – reduce the cost of service integration and delivery

• IPR and digital cultural asset management

Some questionsSome questions

• Standards – what can be done to make them easier to adopt for local institutions?

• What priority given to ensuring a critical mass of digitisation for local institutions - how to afford?

• Simplicity of use • Metadata or Google?• Technology can move on too fast for people

– sensibility, training for the end-user is needed.

• 'Downward scalability’• Business models -

– should you charge for digital services eg membership

Getting real money for innovationGetting real money for innovation

• Pilot services and roll-out

• National programmes needed– challenge funding/bidding culture

• ESF/ERDF – candidate states preparing

• EQUAL programme – Learning, social inclusion, employment skills

– 3 libraries projects out of 1300

– LearnEast

Conference outcome?Conference outcome?

What is the way forward for local services in Slovenia?