Emerging Technologies for the Cultural and Scientific Heritage Sector
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DigiCULT Technology Watch Report 2 Watch Technology DigiCULT KK-03-03-002-EN-C Emerging Technologies for the Cultural and Scientific Heritage Sector Emerging Technologies for the Cultural and Scientific Heritage Sector for the Cultural Emerging Technologies DigiCULT Consortium www.digicult.info Technology Watch Report 2 Legal Notice Copyright The copyright for this document is the property of the European Commission.This document is supplied on the expressed condition that the contents must not be used for purposes other than that for which it has been supplied, or reproduced, wholly or in part without the prior written permission of the European Commission. Disclaimer The views expressed are purely those of the authors and may not in any circumstances be regarded as stating an official position of the European Commission. A great deal of additional information on the European Union is available on the Internet. It can be accessed through the Europa server (http://europa.eu.int). Cataloguing data can be found at the end of this publication. ISBN 92-894-5276-5 © European Commission, 2004 Reproduction is authorised provided the source is acknowledged Printed in Austria EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES FOR THE CULTURAL AND SCIENTIFIC HERITAGE SECTOR DigiCULT Technology Watch Report 2 February 2004 Seamus Ross Director, HATII, University of Glasgow & ERPANET Martin Donnelly DigiCULT Forum Technology Assessor, HATII, University of Glasgow Milena Dobreva Associate Professor, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences Table of Contents Acknowledgements, Introduction 7 The Application Service Model 15 The XML Family of Technologies 41 Cultural Agents and Avatars, Electronic Programming Guides and Personalisation 67 Mobile Access to Cultural Information Resources 91 Rights Management and Payment Technologies 119 Collaborative Mechanisms and Technologies 145 Annexes: Selected Glossary, Abbreviations and References 181 5 Acknowlegements ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS As readers can imagine, producing a document like this requires the support, guid- ance and advice of many colleagues.The authors would particularly like to thank: John Pereira, DigiCULT co-ordinator, Salzburg Research; Guntram Geser, Information Soci- ety Research, Salzburg Research; Daisy Abbott, Brian Aitken,Andrew McHugh and Peter McKinney, HATII, University of Glasgow;Ann Drummond, Director of Media Services, University of Glasgow; John Cairns, Intellectual Property Manager, Research and Enterprise, University of Glasgow. The case studies are central to the concept that underlies the DigiCULT Technology Watch Report, and we would like to thank those who participated in interviews and questionnaires: Danny Angus, Proboscis, Scotland;Yannis Avrithis, Syntax Information Technology Inc, Greece; Stephanie Baldwin,The Scottish Executive, Scotland; Luciana Bordoni, ENEA, Italy; Rosa Botterill, mda, England; Claudia Covert, Corcoran Library, USA; Matthew Chalmers, University of Glasgow, Scotland;Aaron Craig, Space, Italy;Andrea de Polo, Fratelli Alinari, Italy; Daniel Doegl, UMA Information Technology AG,Austria;Thomas Elias, Centre for Advanced Media Technology, Germany; Kurt Englmeier, LemonLabs GmbH, Germany; Geri Gay, Cornell University, USA;Areti Galani, University of Glasgow, Scotland;Andreas Generalis, Syntax Information Technology Inc, Greece; Aleksandar Golubovic, UMA Information Technology AG,Austria; Stephan Heuscher, Schweizerisches Bundesarchiv, Switzerland; Robert Huber, Universität Bremen, Germany;Andreas Kammler, Deutsches Schiffahrtsmuseum, Germany;Varvara Kiouki, Syntax Information Technology Inc, Greece;Walter Koch,Angewandte Informationstechnik Forschungsgesellschaft mbH,Austria; Naomi Korn, England; Giles Lane, Proboscis, England; Salvatore Lusso, Space, Italy; Jeff Marksz, DA Group, Scotland; Barbara McManus,The College of New Rochelle, USA;Theano Moussouri, University of Leicester, England; Kari Paulson, eBook Library,Australia; Effie Patsatzi, mda, England; Stephan Schneider, tecmath AG, Germany; Meehae Song, Centre for Advanced Media Technology, Singapore;Angela Spinazze,ATSPIN consulting, USA; Michel Texier,Valoris, France. Thanks to the following for help with images for the Report: Matt Adams, Blast Theory, England; Luciana Bordoni, ENEA, Italy; Claudia Covert, Corcoran Library, USA; Giorgio Da Bormida, Giunti labs, Italy; Kurt Englmeier, LemonLabs GmbH, Germany; Areti Galani, University of Glasgow, Scotland; Stephan Heuscher, Schweizerisches Bundesarchiv, Switzerland; Renato Iannella, IPR Systems, Italy;Andreas Kammler, Deutsches Schiffahrtsmuseum, Germany;Walter Koch,Angewandte Informationstechnik Forschungsgesellschaft mbH,Austria; Giles Lane, Proboscis, England; Salvatore Lusso, Space, Italy;Andrew McHugh, University of Glasgow, Scotland; Elaine McKean, Indigo Consulting, Scotland; Barbara McManus,The College of New Rochelle, USA; Michael Moss,TheGlasgowStory, Scotland;Theano Moussouri, University of Leicester, England; Kati Paulson, eBooks.com,Australia; Susann Pinnekamp, MediaSec Technologies GmbH, Germany; Jeremy Romero, Conversive, USA; Stephan Schneider, tecmath AG, Germany; Meehae Song, Centre for Advanced Media Technology, Singapore; Michel Texier,Valoris, 7 Acknowledgements France; Peter Thoeny,TWiki, USA; Petri Vuorimaa, Helsinki University of Technology, Finland. The production team at Salzburg Research is: Peter Baldinger (Design Concept), Andreas Gruber (Layout), and Werner Moser (Graphics). Finally, we wish to extend our thanks to the DigiCULT Steering Committee for helping shape the direction of this report, and for refereeing the content to ensure its quality: Philippe Avenier, Ministère de la culture et de la communication, France Paolo Buonora,Archivio di Stato di Roma, Italy Costis Dallas, Critical Publics SA, Greece Bert Degenhart-Drenth,ADLIB Information Systems BV,Netherlands Paul Fiander, BBC Information & Archives, United Kingdom Peter Holm Lindgaard,TV 2, Denmark Erich J Neuhold, Fraunhofer IPSI, Germany Bruce Royan, Concurrent Computing Ltd, United Kingdom 8 Introduction INTRODUCTION This is the second in a series of assessments of emerging technologies.The first DigiCULT Technology Watch Report (TWR1) was released in February 2003.With support from the European Commission’s Information Society Technologies (IST) Programme under the 5th Framework Programme The Digital Culture Forum (DigiCULT Forum, IST-2001-34898) monitors and assesses research and technological developments in and for the cultural heritage sector in Europe. This Technology Watch Report (TWR2) provides information resources to enable heritage institutions to continue to develop their uses of information technologies ‘to provide access to the riches of European cultural heritage’ as recommended in DigiCULT’s 2002 report, Te c hnological Landscapes for Tomorrow’s Cultural Economy. The Technology Watch Reports are part of a suite of DigiCULT’s deliverables, which also include Thematic Issues, the DigiCULT.Info Newsletter and a participatory website (http://www.digicult.info).They are all designed to provide the cultural heritage with access to accurate, accessible information about current, near- and longer-term techno- logical developments. In addition to examining the technologies DigiCULT reviews the experiences of its institutions as they attempt to take advantage of newer technologies, whether they be methodological, technical, or exploitative.The DigiCULT technology assessments are designed to identify developments that could be deployed without further work, those that would require further development or repurposing, and those that are still in early stages of gestation but show promise.The Technology Watch Reports offer accessible descriptions of new technologies, suggest how these might be employed within different cultural domains, indicate the implications and risks (e.g. social, organisa- tional, financial) of adopting particular ones, and include case © Seamus Ross / HATII studies demonstrating how a technology has already been used even if on occasion only on a pilot basis.TWR2 examines tech- nologies that improve interoperability between sectors, standards that promote long term viability of resources, approaches that support personalise experiences of the heritage, and those that support access to shared spaces, and mechanisms that enable curators and users of the heritage to participate in enriched real and virtual environments. In the Introduction to TWR1 (2003) we provided an overview of the processes DigiCULT uses to select, evaluate, investigate, and present technologies. Te c hnological Landscapes for Tomorrow’s Cultural Economy (2002), recognised the cultural value and the financial potential bound up in heritage collections.While the Lund Principles, adopted by the EU Member States in 2001, stressed that access for the citizen should be free of charge, at the same time, institutions recognise 9 Introduction that commercial exploitation of cultural services is essential and the income-generating potential of heritage assets needs to maximised. The sector should aim to become the natural source of high-quality cultural content, the first place publishers, advertisers, and others turn.This can only happen if potential users can identify possible material easily, negotiate the rights to use it efficiently, and have it delivered to them in a timely manner. Heritage Institutions need access to digital rights management technologies (DRM) and digital asset management (DAM) systems to enable them to track, exploit, and repurpose their digital assets. In TWR1 we examined