System Simulation www.ssl.co.uk
Mono to Multi – Reflections on the Evolution of Digital Cultural Heritage
Dr George Mallen
System Simulation Ltd
SSL - the simple facts
• Emerging from research work on learning and
decision making, founded in 1970 to do contract
research on applications of interactive computing
• Early projects on system modelling, decision
support and educational gaming
• Then visualisation and animation
• Then IR, museums, ePublishing, image libraries and
higher education
Current business
20 people based in Covent Garden, London
Market sectors:
• Cultural heritage
• Higher education
• Image libraries
• Publishing & information services
• Collaborative R&D
Selection of clients and partners
The British Museum, the V&A, the Royal Academy,
London’s Transport Museum, the Courtauld Institute,
JISC, the 24 Hour Museum, SCRAN, Getty Images,
Haymarket Medical, IFIS, MA, BFI, BBC, RTE, EC,
Wellcome Trust …
EU Framework projects – FPs 4, 5 and 6 on cultural
heritage projects
System Simulation www.ssl.co.uk
Some recent implementations
The British Museum's Merlin and Compass systems
The V&A's CIS, CSIP (Core Systems Integration Project) and DAM (Digital Asset Management)
Royal Academy
Courtauld Institute
London’s Transport Museum
SOPSE
Croydon Clocktower Museum
24 Hour Museum
System Simulation www.ssl.co.uk
Current concerns
Information systems are becoming the main repositories of externalised knowledge and cultural history. This raises loads of questions eg:
What are the processes which have got knowledge from inside our heads to outside?
How will our little market sector in museums react to the opportunity to become online knowledge repositories?
Do we have governance institutions which can use such systems for benefit?
System Simulation www.ssl.co.uk
Knowledge Management – a 60000 year odyssey
Showing
Telling
Proving
Simulating
System Simulation www.ssl.co.uk
Knowledge Management – a 60000 year odyssey
Showing (Internal – in our minds)
Telling
Proving
Simulating
System Simulation www.ssl.co.uk
Knowledge Management – a 60000 year odyssey
Showing (Internal – in our minds)
Telling
Proving
Simulating (External – in our machines)
System Simulation www.ssl.co.uk
Culture as Externalised Knowledge
• Survival after near extinction 70000 years ago largely based on ability to pass on skill and knowledge - “show and tell”
• Transition from hunter gatherer to settled communities demanded agreed or imposed rules and conventions. Set down as laws, ie externalised
• Religions as accepted beliefs with externalised texts and iconographies
• Scientific method as means of building external knowledge base
• Electronic information systems now main repositories for scientific knowledge and cultural history
System Simulation www.ssl.co.uk
Museums as guardians and teachers of cultural history
• Broadly we can see universities becoming the creators of new knowledge (high end knowledge markets), and industry/commerce becoming the creators of new technologies
• Will museums then become the guardians of history with a key educating/mediation role advising governance, policy formation and decision?
• The big question – is there a role for cultural history in tempering the application of knowledge and technology?
System Simulation www.ssl.co.uk
Information Systems and the Democratisation of Culture
• Information systems as repositories
• New communication technologies as means for enlarging social groups, communities of interest and constituencies
• Scientific knowledge warning of dangers – ecological, geological, economic, extraterrestrial
• Issues of governance and decision
System Simulation www.ssl.co.uk
Multimedia Knowledge Management - Challenges and Opportunities for Industry/Academia Partnership
The technology challenge - MMKM as step towards Automatic Knowledge Generation
The opportunity – to present cultural history as data for interpretation by AKG systems