Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license Museum Documentation Standards in the International Community Nick Poole, CEO, Collections Trust
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license Introducing the Collections Trust Support museums, archives, libraries and galleries in unlocking the potential of their collections, by: – Providing know-how – Developing and promoting excellence – Challenging existing practices – Pioneering new ideas – Bringing experts together
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license Our work 5 Programmes – OpenCulture – Collections Link – Culture Grid – Excellence in Collections – International
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license Excellence in Collections A common framework to connect Collections standards to: – End-user value and impact – Organisational resilience – Cost-effectiveness – Sustainable collections development
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license Key challenges for museums…
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license 1. Maximising participation
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license 2. Treating KNOWLEDGE as an asset…
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license 3. Supporting collaboration & shared services…
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license 4. Supporting long-term planning
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license 5. Managing environmental impact…
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license 6. Promoting greater mobility & use of collections
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license 7. Supporting new forms of engagement
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license 8. Delivering compelling narrative…
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license 9. Developing sustainable approaches to risk
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license 10. Managing cost
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license Key challenges for Museums Maximising user engagement Ensuring knowledge is managed and used as an asset Supporting collaboration and shared services Supporting long-term strategic development and planning Managing environmental impact Promoting greater use and mobility of collections Supporting new modes of user engagement (mobile, social) Delivering re-purposable content and narrative Developing sustainable approaches to risk Balancing costs and improving efficiency To be effective, and to deliver value, Documentation has to support and enable these organisational outcomes for your museum.
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license How can international Documentation standards support these organisational needs?
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license What have we got so far…?
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license CIDOC Statement of Principles Effective Documentation should facilitate – Collections Policies – Collections Care and Accountability – Collections Access, Interpretation and Use – Collections Research The Museum should employ staff with appropriate experience of Documentation procedures, and use appropriate standards The Museum systems should provide access to the Collections
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license SPECTRUM 4.0 Industry standard for Documentation procedures & information Designed to support the rationalisation & improvement of Collections processes in your museum Developed via the Collections Link Standards Wiki – & supported by CG Vocab Bank – Developed in partnership with KE & other SPECTRUM Partners Emphasis on SPECTRUM as a procedural standard, supported by a framework of information/structural standards/protocols
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license Description & Interchange CDWA-Lite CCO CIDOC Core Data Standard for Sites and Monuments CIDOC Core Data Standard for Archaeological Objects MIDAS Europeana Data Model DC.Culture Advantages: lightweight, portable Disadvantages: purpose-specific, niche limits critical-mass Perpetual issue of lossy conversion – you can go from a rich schema to a simple one, but not the other way
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license Meta-standards for interoperability The challenge is to enable machine-to-machine processing of data so that it can flow seamlessly and incrementally between systems and contexts When my KE Emu museum loans an object to a non-KE user, the object may travel but the continuity of Documentation is broken Cross-mapping is labour-intensive and semantically and structurally inconsistent (preparing a data source for use over OAI PMH more art than science) CIDOC CRM provides a systematic approach to expressing different documentation systems in a semantically and structurally-consistent way – but does the effort justify the payoff, and is the payoff significantly better than delivering data as RDF.
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license Linked Data Semantic data and open API seem to offer a solution to the delivery of machine-readable data Context-aware information, and self-documenting schemata for museum data offers the potential for dynamic and emergent Collections Management and Documentation systems BUT the openness of the technology invites non-standard implementation There is a risk that, without significant advances in the automated generation of metadata, ‘semantification’ will aggravate the resource challenge of Documentation.
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license SPECTRUM Local SPECTRUM is an international open standard, used in more than 7,500 museums and galleries and 40 countries worldwide Licensed to national partners to translate and to localise (to reflect local variations in policy, practice and law) Current translations in the Netherlands, Flanders and Germany Active communities in Sweden, Portugal, Greece, France, Switzerland Arabic & Chinese translations planned An international community of practitioners
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license SPECTRUM Partners 14 Partners worldwide representing an installed user base of some 30,000 institutions Working together to develop a common vision of International Documentation standards and practice A vision that is essentially focussed on delivering operational efficiency and user value Access Compliance Functional Compliance Informational Compliance Procedural Compliance
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license Europeana INSIDE EU-funded project to integrate tools into your system to reduce the structural, financial, strategic, legal and operational barriers to participation in open content services. Need to change the balance from ‘it’s too hard’/’I’ll do it next year’/’I’ll do it when my Documentation is complete’ to ‘we’re doing it’ (and the sky hasn’t yet fallen on our heads…) – Drag and drop one-time-only data mapping – Granular access/use/rights management – Object/collection/institution level control (send it there, don’t send it there) – Tracking secondary & tertiary reuse – Re-ingesting enriched metadata into systems
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license SPECTRUM Roadmap Planning the 4-5 year Development Path for SPECTRUM Specific requirements include: – SPECTRUM RFID – SPECTRUM 4.0 Schema – Digitisation & Digital Photography – Digital Asset Management – Digital Rights Management – Digital Preservation – BPMN Workflows & automated systems – User-generated content – Narrative/re-use – Agile rights and usage metadata
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license What are we missing…?
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license Missing elements Clear user-focussed value proposition for investment in Documentation Persistent Unique Identification for Digital artefacts Stable methodologies for capturing and managing UGC Lightweight standards/protocols for RFID & microformats Common application profiles for data exchange (eg. OAI PMH) Specifications for API for museum data
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license Articulating the Value of Documentation We understand the value proposition, but many don’t Bringing together a consortium of international partners (CIDOC, Getty, CHIN, Collections Trust, National organisations) Showing that Documentation Delivers Supporting our case with clear evidence of economic Return on Investment and user impact/value
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license OpenCulture 2012 Annual Great Collections Management Exhibition and Conference June 26 th & 27 th 2012 At the Oval, London SPECTRUM Users/Roadmap meeting
Copyright Collections Trust Published under a CC license Contact Nick Poole Collections