Nick, Jeremy, etc
Great thread..
I very much like the "value vs cost" as a way of measuring sustainability, and I also think many of the points that Nick raises are absolutely correct.
From a systems/technology perspective, I do have an issue with the statement "cheap = sustainable" per se though, because this often leads organisations up truly terrible paths where quick, cheap wins are favoured over longer term (I would argue, "sustainable..") futures. I guess I'm basically arguing about what "value" means here.
This is particularly pertinent to us at the moment - we are currently in the middle of a frighteningly complex CMS project which aims to connect a bunch of stuff across NMSI, and I have to say there's nothing like a top-down systems audit like this to highlight what is sustainable and what isn't...
What is important to stress here is that the cheap route isn't always the worst, either. What seems to be the definer is the amount of holistic thought that goes into developing content and systems. I think is is always useful to ask "what might we want to use this content for in 2, 5, 10 years time?". The answer could well be nothing - in which case the cheap/easy=sustainable route is probably the best. But more often than not, you'll find (probably with a CMS project!) that you're coming back at the systems and content in 5 years time and wishing you hadn't used some weird legacy text-format database which just happened to be cheap at the time.
For example: just because you're only using your staff database as a phonebook at the moment doesn't mean you won't want to use it as some kind of source for an interactive showing expertise across the organisation further down the line. Ditto, a piece of content written for exhibition X is (or should be) valuable enough to not want to throw it away when the exhibition closes. You may (next time some funding comes available) want to get the same content onto a kiosk, or CD, or cut it in a different way for a different audience. This isn't necessarily complex, or expensive, but requires a kind of thinking which is focussed on the content, and not necessarily just on the application of that content.
So.."granular and useful content which you can easily get in and out = sustainable content"
Haven't even touched on digital objects and preservation, but I think I'll stop now...
ta
Mike
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From: Museums Computer Group on behalf of Nick Poole
Sent: Fri 22/09/2006 18:30
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Sustainable new media
Nick,
I'm afraid I'll be giving next week's session a miss, but I look forward to
this email discussion with interest.
From my perspective, there is a unit cost of creating and keeping a piece of
digital information. That piece of digital information is likely to have a
value - whether in terms of realisable cash-value or long-terms indirect
'cultural' value.
If the realisable value of the piece of information exceeds the unit cost of
creating it, then it should be sustainable (emphasis on 'should').
We have developed some dodgy habits which effectively break this value
chain...
1. We tend not to take into account the true cost of creating and publish a
piece of digital information.
2. Previous work on creating digital objects has focused on technology. The
lessons of the past 5 years tend to indicate that the real problem lies in
sustaining meaningful editorial/workflow around the objects themselves.
Basically, servers cost less than staff.
3. We don't really know enough about which bits are likely to have
real-terms cash value, and there has been a tendency to overestimate the
commercial viability of the resources;
4. The availability of non-market-driven public investment for digitisation
creates an artificially inflated market which promotes mass content creation
over prioritisation;
5. The unit cost of creation, and particularly storage, is far higher for
individual ad-hoc/local projects than it is for large-scale aggregated ones
(because the further you go towards big content repositories, the more
significant the economies of scale become), but we persist in developing the
former.
Now, if there were a mechanism which allowed market forces to work on the
prioritisation and funding of digital cultural content, then the resulting
equilibrium would be properly sustainable...
Not sure about preservation...
Nick
Nick Poole
Director
MDA
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Purbeck Road, Cambridge, CB2 2PD
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-----Original Message-----
From: Museums Computer Group [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of
Ottevanger, Jeremy
Sent: 22 September 2006 11:10
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Sustainable new media
Dear all,
For those in a hurry, the short version:
Before next week's MA/DHRG conference "Fast Forward: Building a
sustainable new media future for UK Museums", I'd really appreciate your
definitions or understanding of a few terms:
* Sustainable/sustainability
* Digital object
* Preservation
The long version, for a bit more explanation:
The Museums Association and Leicester University's Digital Heritage
Research Group are organising next week's "Fast Forward" conference. In
my role as a research student with the DHRG, I am in the initial stages
of investigating precisely this area (the working title of the project
is "Sustaining public-facing digital assets in museums"). I am aware
that there are multiple meanings, assumptions and understandings with
regard to many key terms - indeed almost every word in the project's
title would be contested - and I would very much appreciate your
interpretations. It seems like a good idea to ask the question now,
before the conference - we can start with quite fresh "first takes", as
well as perhaps develop our ideas a little before the 29th. So your
thoughts, please, on the meanings of:
* Sustainable/sustainability
* Digital object/digital asset, and indeed any related term (I
suspect the word "virtual" may crop up, perhaps "learning object", what
else?)
* Preservation
At some point I'd also like to explore that old chestnut, the limits of
the museum and its responsibilities to digital material, but that might
be better left for another time.
I will of course ask your permission before citing any responses. Many
thanks in advance,
Jeremy
Jeremy Ottevanger
Web Developer, Museum Systems Team
Museum of London Group
Mortimer Wheeler House
46 Eagle Wharf Road
London. N1 7ED
Tel: 020 7410 2207
Fax: 020 7410 2201
Email: [log in to unmask]
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