Hi Jeremy,
As you say, the implications of this report are set to be huge, particularly as they have been so enthusiastically welcomed by Neelie Kroes.
By the end of this week, the UK has to provide the Commission with a roadmap for how we will achieve precisely the aim you picked up on in the recommendation. The Collections Trust has been asked to work on this roadmap, and the first question is clearly how we can take what is currently a very fragmented funding picture and tune it to ensure the outcome the Commission is looking for.
The devil is in the detail - there are recommendations here, for example, which touch on the pricing of digital content sold by cultural institutions, on the legal protection for using orphan works and on our obligation to apply persistent identifiers to all digital objects archived in our institutions. I will blog the main elements of these recommendations at http://openculture.collectionstrustblogs.org.uk and would like to invite discussion and debate about how best we should encourage DCMS to respond to them.
By the way, there is a very active discussion on the blog at the moment about the future role of museums (A Difficult Conversation) which some MCG members may find of interest - http://openculture.collectionstrustblogs.org.uk/2010/12/30/a-difficult-conversation/
All best,
Nick
Nick Poole
Chief Executive
Collections Trust
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Tel: 0207 022 1889
OpenCulture 2011
UK and international Collections Management Trade Fair and Conference
7th & 8th June 2011.
Register online at http://www.openculture2011.org.uk
http://www.collectionstrust.org.uk
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-----Original Message-----
From: Museums Computer Group [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Jeremy Ottevanger
Sent: 10 January 2011 15:41
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: EC 'Comite des Sages' calls for 'New Renaissance' in Digitisation & Online Access to Cultural
This is a big one, Nick. We can presume, I think, that in due course many of the recommendations will be adopted and put into effect. I can't wait to see what happens with "Member States must ensure that all material digitised with public funding is available on the site, and bring all their public domain masterpieces into Europeana by 2016".
I'm looking forward to reading the report properly (on a dead tree) on the way home tonight and seeing what other gems lie within
Jeremy
>>> [log in to unmask] 10/01/2011 15:30:09 >>>
Dear MCGer's,
I thought you might be interested to know that the European Commission has just published its press release announcing the recommendations of the Comite des Sages (Council of the Wise) on Digitisation, online accessibility of Digital cultural heritage and Digital Preservation.
To those of you not actively following the EC's work on Digitisation(!), the Comite des Sages (Council of the Wise) was established to review the barriers and opportunities for digital cultural content and to make recommendations on how the overall situation can be improved.
The full report can be downloaded here: http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/activities/digital_libraries/doc/reflection_group/final-report-cdS3.pdf
In summary, the main recommendations are:
· Recognition of Europeana as the central reference point for European Cultural Heritage
· A workable solution for the use of Orphan Works needs to be found
· Member States need to increase considerably their investment in Digitisation
· An active hybrid economy of public/private partnerships must be encouraged
· Europeana should act as an archival repository for EU Cultural Heritage
The Collections Trust is proud to have completed the research into the Costs of Digitising Europe's Cultural Heritage, which forms the economic underpinning of the recommendations made in the report. An abridged version of this research will be published on the Collections Link website (www.collectionslink.org.uk) later this month.
The text of the Press Release is provided below:
Digital Agenda: "Comité des Sages" calls for a "New Renaissance" by bringing Europe's cultural heritage online
The report of the Comité des Sages (high-level reflection group) on Digitisation of Europe's cultural heritage was delivered today to Neelie Kroes, European Commission Vice-President for the Digital Agenda, and Androulla Vassiliou, Commissioner responsible for Education and Culture. The report urges EU Member States to step up their efforts to put online the collections held in all their libraries, archives and museums. It stresses the benefits of making Europe's culture and knowledge more easily accessible. It also points to the potential economic benefits of digitisation, including through public-private partnerships, for the development of innovative services in sectors like tourism, research and education. The report endorses the Digital Agenda's objective of strengthening Europe's digital library Europeana and suggests solutions for making works covered by copyright available online. The Comité des Sages on Digitisation comprises Maurice Lévy, Elisabeth Niggemann and Jacques de Decker (see IP/10/456). The report's recommendations will feed into the Commission's broader strategy, under the Digital Agenda for Europe, to help cultural institutions make the transition towards the digital age.
Neelie Kroes said: "I sincerely thank the three "sages" for their constructive suggestions on how we can trigger a "Digital Renaissance" in Europe. Bringing our museums' and libraries' collections online not only shows Europe's rich history and culture but can also usher in new benefits for education, for innovation and for generating new economic activities. It will put high quality content on the net for many generations."
Androulla Vassiliou added: "The Group has balanced the interests of creators with the imperatives of a changing environment in the digital era. We need to find ways and means to do so in all the areas where the cultural and creative industries are confronted with the challenges of moving into the digital age. Culture and heritage in the digital era represent a set of opportunities for European economies and societies."
The report, called "The New Renaissance", key conclusions and recommendations are:
· The Europeana portal should become the central reference point for Europe's online cultural heritage. Member States must ensure that all material digitised with public funding is available on the site, and bring all their public domain masterpieces into Europeana by 2016. Cultural institutions, the European Commission and Member States should actively and widely promote Europeana.
· Works that are covered by copyright, but are no longer distributed commercially, need to be brought online. It is primarily the role of rights-holders to digitise these works and exploit them. But, if rights holders do not do so, cultural institutions must have a window of opportunity to digitise material and make it available to the public, for which right holders should be remunerated.
· EU rules for orphan works (whose rights holders cannot be identified) need to be adopted as soon as possible. The Report defines eight fundamental conditions for any solution.
· Member States need to considerably increase their funding for digitisation in order to generate jobs and growth in the future. The funds needed to build 100 km of roads would pay for the digitisation of 16% of all available books in EU libraries, or the digitisation of every piece of audio content in EU Member States' cultural institutions.
· Public-private partnerships for digitisation must be encouraged. They must be transparent, non-exclusive and equitable for all partners, and must result in cross-border access to the digitised material for all. Preferential use of the digitised material granted to the private partner should not exceed seven years.
· To guarantee the preservation of collections in their digital format, a second copy of this cultural material should be archived at Europeana. In addition, a system should be developed so that any cultural material that currently needs to be deposited in several countries would only be deposited once.
The recommendations of the 'Comité des sages' will feed into the Commission's broader strategy, under the Digital Agenda for Europe to help cultural institutions make the transition towards the digital age and to search for new and effective business models that accelerate digitisation while allowing fair remuneration for rights holders where necessary (see IP/10/581, MEMO/10/199 and MEMO/10/200). The recommendations will also be useful for the Commission's plan to develop a sustainable funding model for Europeana by 2012.
Today europeana.eu already offers access to more than 15 million digitised books, maps, photographs, film clips, paintings and musical extracts, but this is only a fraction of works held by Europe's cultural institutions (see IP/10/1524). Most digitised materials are older works in the public domain, to avoid potential litigation for works covered by copyright.
Background
The "Comité des sages" comprised Maurice Lévy (Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of advertising and communications company Publicis), Elisabeth Niggemann (Director-General of the German National Library and chair of the Europeana Foundation) and Jacques De Decker (author and Permanent Secretary of Belgium's Royal Academy of French language and literature).
Comité des Sages' recommendations: link here:
http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/activities/digital_libraries/index_en.htm
Nick Poole
Chief Executive
Collections Trust
[log in to unmask]
Tel: 0207 022 1889
OpenCulture 2011
UK and international Collections Management Trade Fair and Conference
7th & 8th June 2011.
Register online at http://www.openculture2011.org.uk <http://www.openculture2011.org.uk>
http://www.collectionstrust.org.uk
http://www.collectionslink.org.uk
http://openculture.collectionstrustblogs.org.uk
Follow us on Twitter: @collectiontrust <http://www.twitter.com/collectiontrust>
Follow me on Twitter: @nickpoole1
Contact me on Skype: nickpoole3
Connect via LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=5289899&locale=en_US&trk=tab_pro
Company Registration No: 1300565
Registered Charity No: 273984
Registered Office: Collections Trust c/o CAN Mezzanine, Downstream Building, No1 London Bridge, London SE1 9BG
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