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MINERVA - MINERVA - Towards a European Platform for Towards a European Platform for Digitisation of Cultural and Scientific ContentDigitisation of Cultural and Scientific Content

MINERVA - MINERVA - Towards a European Platform for Towards a European Platform for Digitisation of Cultural and Scientific ContentDigitisation of Cultural and Scientific Content

Belgrade CALIMERA ConferenceBelgrade CALIMERA Conference

Belgrade, November 15Belgrade, November 15thth, 2004, 2004

Giuliana De FrancescoGiuliana De Francesco

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MINERVA frameworkMINERVA frameworkeEurope initiative (december 1999)

Lund, 4th April 2001: meeting of experts and representatives from EU Member States

Lund Principles

Lund Action Plan

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MINERVA frameworkMINERVA frameworkLund Principles:Digitisation of Europe's cultural and scientific heritage is crucial:

• For providing improved access for citizens• For preserving Europe's collective cultural heritage (both past and

future)• For sustaining cultural diversity in a global environment • Is a key resource for education and for the tourism and media

industries

Lund Action Plan:• establishes a set of actions to be carried out by Member

States and EC

To progress, an ongoing forum for coordination of digitisation policies was needed

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Set up of the National Representatives Group (NRG), made up of representatives officially appointed by Member States

• to coordinate digitisation policies and programmes • to facilitate and monitor the adoption and

implementation of the Lund Principles and Action Plan NAS NRG appointed in 2003 The NRG meets every 6 months7th NRG meeting: 17th September 2004, The Hague. Next meeting in Luxembourg

National Representatives Group - NRGNational Representatives Group - NRG

Charter of Parma Strategic document continuing and supporting the Lund Principles,

approved at the 5th NRG meeting in Parma

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• is the “operative arm” of the NRG for implementing Lund Action Plan and organising its working groups

• funded by the EC IST 5th Framework Programme (2002–2005)

A network of Member States’ Ministries:• to discuss, correlate and harmonise activities carried out

in digitisation of European cultural content• to create an agreed European platform made up of

recommendations and guidelines• to give international visibility to national initiatives • to embed the results of European coordination in national

digitisation activities

MINERVAMINERVAMinisterial NEtwoRk for Valorising Activities in digitisation

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MINERVA and MINERVA PlusMINERVA and MINERVA Plus

MINERVA Plus (funded by the EC IST 6th FP) extends the network to:

• the 15 former EU Member States,

• the NAS (6 at start: Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Malta, Poland, Slovenia)

• Israel and Russia

•Spain•Sweden•United Kingdom

7 original partners: •Belgium •Finland•France•Italy

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How MINERVA worksHow MINERVA works

• Working groups

Publications (guidelines, handbooks, reports)

• Networking activities (enlargement of the network, website, newsletter, workshops, dissemination, on-line training, cooperation with other projects)

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MINERVA WorkgroupsMINERVA Workgroups Inventories, discovery of digitised content, multilingualism.

M+ specific topic: multilingual thesauri

Interoperability and service provision , IPR issuesM+ specific topic: business models for digitisation programmes

Identification of user needs, quality framework for common access pointsM+ specific topic: small cultural institutions requirements

Good practices and competence centres M+ specific topic: digitisation cost reduction

www.minervaeurope.org

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MINERVA PubliMINERVA Publiccationsations

Handbook for Quality in Cultural Websites: Improving Quality for Citizens

• Cultural Websites Quality Principles• Commentary and exploration of the ten quality

principles

Good Practice Handbook

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MINERVA PubliMINERVA PubliccationsationsTechnical Guidelines for Digital Cultural Content

Creation Programmes• NOT a single prescriptive set of requirements to which

all projects must conform: • seeks to identify those areas in which there is already

commonality of approach and to provide a core around which context-specific requirements might be built

• in order that the content produced is as widely useful, portable and durable as possible, resources should be interoperable

• the appropriate use of standards in digitisation can deliver the consistency that makes interoperability possible

• standards support also access, preservation, security

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MINERVA PubliMINERVA Publiccations:ations: NRG Report NRG Report Coordinating Digitisation in Europe. Progress

Report of the National Representatives Group • Policies, programmes and projects in the field of

digitisation of cultural and scientific heritage carried on in Member States

• Progress of the coordination initiative• Annual

2003: includes contributions from NAS, Israel and Russia

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Cooperation: Cooperation: Digitisation clusterDigitisation clusterMINERVA promoted a coordination among European cultural networks/projects. Purpose:• avoiding duplication of effort and waste of resources• merging efforts together to maximise the impact of the

individual projects• sharing knowledge and exchanging experience• promoting results (studies, reports, guidelines) • adopting common standards and common agendas

BRICKSCALIMERADELOSDIGICULT FORUM

HEREINMINERVAMUSICNETWORKPRESTOSPACESCRAN

EMII-DCFEPOCHERPANETEuromed Heritage IIEVA

Networks involved:Networks involved: ::

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MINERVA spin offsMINERVA spin offs MICHAEL - Multilingual Inventory of Cultural Heritage in

Europe (www.michael-culture.org) funded by eTEN partners: initially France, Italy, and UK develops MINERVA achievements in the fields

Inventories of digitised content and Interoperability Will develop a trans-european inventory of digital

cultural collections open source software, open standards-based

EURIDICE – EUropean Recommended materials for DIstance learning Courses for Educator

– project under negotiation (eTen)

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OpportunitiesOpportunitiesINTERREG initiative

• Strand B: cross-national cooperation• CADSES www.cadses.net• Among thematic priorities:

Priority 2: Efficient and sustainable

transport systems and access to the

information society Priority 3: Promotion and management

of landscape, natural and cultural heritage

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contact details:contact details:

Find out more!Find out more!

www.minervaeurope.orgwww.minervaeurope.org

defrancesco@beniculturali.it

rcaffo@beniculturali.it

Thank you for your kind attentionThank you for your kind attention