Improving Access to European Cultural Heritage 15 October 2009

Cross-domain collaboration: archives, libraries, museums, audiovisual institutions

Christophe DESSAUXMinistère de la Culture et de la Communication

Association MICHAEL Culture

Frédéric Chopin ?

Frédéric Chopin ?

Frédéric Chopin ?

Frédéric Chopin ?

Frédéric Chopin ?

Frédéric Chopin ?

Frédéric Chopin ?

Frédéric Chopin ?

Frédéric Chopin ?

Frédéric Chopin ?

Frédéric Chopin ?

Frédéric Chopin ?

Europeana Aggregators Round Table 14 October 2009

Frédéric Chopin ?

Frédéric Chopin ?

Cross-domain collaboration :Connecting cultural content in Europe

• Bridging together the diversity and the richness of European Culture and delivering it to the general public

• Since early 2000, Member States supported by the European Commission worked together to create the conditions to bring together their digitised resources (Lund principles, 2001)

• In the National Representatives Group (NRG) and the best practice network MINERVA, they identified the need for a way of promoting access to the richness and diversity of our collections

• This process was reinforced by a strong political commitment since 2006

Optimise the value and develop shared visions of European content, by developing criteria and a framework for an EU collaboration plan for digital cultural and scientific content, together with an appropriate implementation means (Charter, MoU etc). […]

Improve quality/usability of content, promote unified access for citizens and increase awareness of long-term preservation issues, through developing agreements on interoperability standards; guidelines for digital preservation and content longevity; and coherent models and good practices for rights and asset management together with the development of associated eculture businessmodels.

European content in global networksCoordination mechanisms for digitisation programmes

The lund principles – April 2001

The MINERVA networkwww.minervaeurope.org

Minerva/Minerva Plus/ Minerva EC (2002-2008)

It gathered the culture ministries of 20 EU countries.sustained by more than 150 cultural institutions.

Activities aligned with the Commission’s activities for the development of the European Digital Library

Action lines: Integration among the various sectors: libraries, museums, archives; Thematics of intellectual property rights, interoperability and

multilingualism; Sharing good practices in digitisation; Coordination inside and among Member States; Monitoring progresses

MINERVA outputs

The MINERVA network (2002-2008) elaborated guidelines and recommendations shared by the EU Member States for the digitisation of cultural heritage and online accessibility.

OUTPUTS : http://www.minervaeurope.org

Good practices handbookDigitisation guidelinesQuality tools for cultural web sitesCost reduction in digitisation handbookMultilingualism reportIPR guidelinesStudy on user needs of cultural websites and portals

Annual digitisation report...

Minerva achievements

MINERVA has contributed in stimulating decision makers and implementers:

• to use international standards• to adopt guidelines, shared at European level• to enhance interoperability and accessibility of digital

content• to create the conditions to improve the quality of

content and servicesIt gathered Ministries and governing bodies of all Member

States and created a network of hundreds of experts from all over the Member States

http://www.michael-culture.org

More than 10,000 digital collections The digital collections group millions of records.

One national portalfor each Member State

+1 European portal

A European inventory of digitised collections

BelgiumBulgariaCzech RepublicEstoniaFinlandFranceGermanyGreeceHungaryItaly (coordinator)

MICHAEL /MICHAEL+ (2004-8)

MICHAEL Culture Association (2007 ->)

Created in November 2007 to ensure the sustainability of Michael and to gather Michael partners

Maltathe NetherlandsPolandPortugalSlovak RepublicSpainSwedenUnited Kingdom

Cultural institutions represented in MICHAEL

• Ministries

• Government

• and local heritage agencies

• Foundations

• Research Networks

• Universities

• Libraries

• Archives

• Museums

National surveys of digital collections reach thousands of cultural institutions spread over the territory, at a national, regional and local level.

Sustained by Michael Culture Association

A reinforced political commitment since 2005

• April 2005 : Letter from six EU Head of Government to the Commission promoting the creation a European digital library

• 2006 : Commission recommendation on Digitisation and Online Accessibility of cultural material•2006 : Council Conclusions on the Digitisation and Online Accessibility of Cultural Material, and Digital Preservation (Finnish Presidency)

•2007 : European Parliament resolution on i2010: towards a European digital library

•2008 : Council conclusions on the European digital library EUROPEANA (French presidency)

•2009 : Discussion in the Council (27 November 2009 – Swedish presidency)

Based on the diagram presented by E. Niggemann, chair of EDL Foundation - MSEG - Luxembourg - 13/12/2007

The European Digital Library Galaxy

Europeana

National Aggregator

ACE

Film Archive X

Eurbica National

Archive 1

MICHAEL

TEL

NL 1 NL 2 NL 3

Museum X

Archive X

National Archive 2

Film Archive 1National Archive 3

Library X

Museum A Archive A Library A

National cross-domain organisation 2

National cross-domain organisation 1

Film Archive 2

Europeana The European Digital Library

Europeana The European Digital Library

Frédéric Chopin ?

Connecting cultural content in Europe

Cross-domain collaboration :

How to make it happen at national level ?

- actively pursue in a sustained manner the implementationof their national strategies and targets […]- promote synergies between them and between thevarious institutions involved in the digitisation andonline accessibility of cultural material […], in order to enrich the supply of digital cultural material,- continue their support, in the context of their nationalstrategies, for the incorporation of digital culturalmaterial in EUROPEANA, particularly by the promotion ofinteroperability standards, the setting-up or improvementof portals incorporating national content and, whereappropriate, by the definition of European themes for thechoice of such material, while respecting the priorities ofthe cultural institutions involved in the project,

Council conclusions of 20 November 2008 on the European digital library EUROPEANA

Cross-domain collaboration : how to make it happen?

The example of the French national strategy a national digitisation plan for all domains

run by the Ministry of Culture and Communication

Digitisation is one of the priorities defined in the action plan of the Ministry of Culture and Communication :

- As a major gateway to culture- As an instrument for the transmission of knowledge and the

democratisation of culture

November 2008 : European Council conclusions on the European digital library EUROPEANA state that each Member State has to implement a mass digitisation policy in order to contribute to Europeana, single European access point to cultural heritage

A national strategy in the European framework

To increase significatively the offer of digital cultural content available On-line

To support the development of coordinated networks and develop local partnerships

To develop On-line access for innovating uses and services

To increase national and European access

Four priority objectives

National priorities for digitisation of content :- 6 national thematic programmes - territories, persons, French

and languages of France, art and archeology, architecture, contemporary creation

-> legibility for the public, -> coherence and -> critical mass

To increase significatively the offer of digital cultural content available On-line

programmes are structured at national level :

- Bibliothèque nationale de France : Gallica (books)

- INA : Archives pour tous (audio-visual)

-National digitisation plan : Archives, libraries, museums, theatres, cinematheques, cultural associations…

To support the development of coordinated networks and develop local partnerships 1/2

-a national digitisation plan cross-domain (« archives, libraries, museums, monuments and archaeology » )

- monitored by the Ministry with a horizontal steering committee that gathers all sectorial directorates

- an annual call for projects for cultural institutions aims at developing a structured digital offer : thematic approach regardless of domain or format, creation of network of content and institutions, identification of national thematic portals

To support the development of coordinated networks and develop local partnerships 2/2

- genealogy- civil and military history : slavery, WW1 and WW2… - local history- 3D historical monuments - French and languages of France- Cinema

Thematic area : heritage

Portail « généalogie »

Portail « sources de l ’esclavage »

http://www.archives-esclavage.culture.gouv.fr/

Projet local : Archives orales de la Sarthe

http://www.fonds-sonores-archives.sarthe.com

3D Monuments

http://www.map.archi.fr/3D-monuments

Portail « Français / langues de France »

http://www.corpusdelaparole.culture.fr/

Patrimoine du cinéma

http://www.laternamagica.fr/ Cinémathèque française

- Contemporary music- Circus and street arts- World music - Orchestras- Dance- Design- Experimental cinema and video art

Thematic area : contemporary creation

Portail « musique contemporaine »

http://www.musiquecontemporaine.fr/

Portail « rue et cirque »

http://www.rueetcirque.fr/

Portail « musiques du monde »

http://www.spectaclesdumonde.fr/

Portail « vie des orchestres »

http://www.vie-des-orchestres.fr/

Mémoire vivante du ballet Preljocaj

http://www.idocpreljocaj.org/

Portail du design

- Mobile access to content- Geoservices and geolocalisation- 3D digitisation : virtual reality- Personnalisation- Web 2.0

-> a new call for projects for « innovative cultural digital services » launched this year by the Ministry

To develop On-line access for innovating uses and services

- National Aggregator Collections.fr on Culture.fr

- Contribute to EUROPEANA

To increase national and Europeana access

• Gives unified to more than 30 heritage resources and databases created by French ministry of culture, major cultural institutions and local authorities from all sectors (archives, libraries, museums, museums, archaeology)

• Item level : 3 million descriptions, 2 million digitised objects directly available - national digitisation plan

• Collection level : French Michael instance (1.370 collections from more than 500 institutions), archives databases

Portal Collections.fr on Culture.fr

Portail Collections

http://www.culture.fr

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Thank you for your attention

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•Across Europe, State and local authority programmes invested in the digitisation of cultural collections

• From all cultural sectors : archives, libraries, museums, monuments, archaeology

• Involving thousands of cultural institutions and private organisations

Introduction

• 2008 : a major step

• Users needs and expectations

• Interoperability

• Human and organisational interoperability

have been tackled

• Sustainability remains an issue

Conclusions