CORDIS Archive

Action Plan on coordination of digitisation programmes and Policies

Implementation Framework for digitisation coordination actions in Europe

AREA 1: IMPROVING POLICIES AND PROGRAMMES THROUGH COOPERATION AND BENCHMARKING

Action 1a: National Web sites for policies and programmes

Progress July 2001: profile format agreed, technical options under investigation. MS profiles to be distributed end August. On target.

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Action 1b: Adoption of benchmarking framework for policies and programmes

Objective

to endorse and implement the benchmarking framework as a key tool for coordination within as well as between Member States and to develop measures to show progress and improvement.

Implementation and tasks

a focus group of experts will be set up to refine the model in order to present it to Member States for agreement and for adoption. The experts will also develop a strategy for endorsement and implementation of the model, such as “Declarations of intent". In order to underpin this activity, a network of correspondents in Member States will be set up as a forum for discussion, implementation and further development of qualitative benchmarking.

Actors

Member States will nominate experts for the benchmarking workgroup and establish national "Networks of correspondents and experts". The Commisison will support the workgroup for finalising the model.

Timescales

workgroup set up end June 2001; national correspondents network September 2001

Progress July 2001: Experts nominations still pending from most Member States. Meeting 17 July Brussels agreed strategy and emphasised need for support group and networks of correspondents.

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Action 1c: Development of indicators and collection of measures

Objective

to establish a framework for the benchmarking of digitisation of cultural and scientific resources in Europe and to monitor the impact on eEurope objectives for European digital content in global networks.

Implementation and tasks

Starting from the policy benchmarking framework, a set of qualitative and quantitative indicators will be identified and developed together with the methodologies and partnerships with other agencies needed for their collection. Scoping work will be carried out by the benchmarking experts group and supported by a study into reference models for digitisation, which will include the definition of a suitable set of core indicators for benchmarking digitisation in Europe.

Actors

Member States will contribute through their nominated experts to the group and the Commission will launch the study, as well as set up cooperation with other benchmarking initiatives and relevant IST projects.

Timescales

study to be launched in autumn 2001; core indicator(s) identified by February 2002, together with the collection of a first set of measures. Recommendations for a set indicators for digitisation to be provided by April 2002.

Progress July 2001: Call for tender for study due for publication July 2001. Candidate experts names still awaited from most MS

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Action 1d: Supporting coordination activities

Objective

to create an infrastructure supporting coordination between Member States

Implementation and tasks

A number of actions will be instigated to continue and to develop the cooperation established to date. These will include: creating a coordinating group of representatives from Member States, to meet initially under the aegis of the Presidency; setting up online fora or discussion groups for dialogue and exchange of experience between those in Member States responsible for or active in digitisation of cultural and scientific content; providing a supporting secretariat or facilitating agency.

Actors

Member States will set up the coordinating group and agree its mandate. Existing networks, supported under the IST Programme and, in particular, the CULTIVATE-EU network, will be used to host the discussion fora. The potential of supporting the secretariat as a support action under the IST Programme will be explored, eg by clustering existing activities

Timescales

coordinating group established by September 2001; discussion lists set up July/August 2001. Secretariat should be established by mid 2002.

Progress July 2001: Nominations for permanent contact and de facto coordinating group member in progress from MS. No progress on lists, on secretariat or supporting functions.

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AREA 2: DISCOVERY OF DIGITISED RESOURCES

Action 2a: National inventories

Objective

to make visible and accessible European cultural and scientific content by setting up inventories of on-going digitisation projects based on national observatories.

Implementation and tasks

Based on existing activities or using examples from other Member States, national inventories of projects or of selected content will be developed. The inventories need to comply with quality standards for the content to be included (based on good practice guidelines –see action 3b) and for the access services they provide. A technical workgroup led by Member States with greatest experience in this area will define the possible platforms paying particular attention to open-source and free software and produce a set of guidelines to support other Member States in establishing usable and sustainable inventories.

Actors

Member States to establish guidelines of good practice through the work group and to promote existing or develop new national inventories of projects.

Timescales

a workgroup created June 2001; definition of main recommendations, September 2001; inventories available from mid-2001 onwards.

Progress July 2001: Meeting in Paris, 6 July 2001 convened by Ministere de la Culture. Agreed: piloting of French system with Italy; definition of agreed inventory descriptors and submission to Dublin Core Community; assessment of feasibility of adoption of French approach and national customisation of public domain tools.

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Action 2b: Discovery of digitised content

Objective

to define a sustainable technical infrastructure for coordinated discovery of European digitised cultural and scientific content.

Implementation and tasks

inventories are usually a top-down exercise, but in order to make the digitised resources accessible work is also needed on defining the technical components and standards for identifying and harvesting eligible digitised content. This includes agreements on metadata, on harvesting tools, and on aggregation and retrieval services, with emphasis on public domain/open source tools and on support for multilinguality. An expert technical workgroup will examine metadata standards, taking into consideration also metadata requirements for national inventories, and make recommendations on technical strategies and on development/implementation test-beds.

Actors

Coordinated by France, Member States will set up a work group to develop metadata recommendations and to report on strategies to the coordinating group.

Timescales

work group set up in order to produce first recommendations on metadata by September 2001, together with recommendations for next steps, including possible test-bed projects.

Progress July 2001: Meeting in Paris, 6 July 2001 convened by Ministere de la Culture. DELOS Network of Excellence to integrate workgroup on metadata for discovering, harvesting and aggregating information on digitised resources.

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AREA 3: PROMOTION OF GOOD PRACTICE

Action 3a: Good practice exemplars & guidelines

Objective

support skills and efficiency by encouraging take-up of good practice Implementation and tasks: Member States should select and promote good practice examples from their projects in order to exchange experiences, skills and to collect consensus from Coordination of digitisation mechanisms Lund Actions Plan different communities. Take-up projects in Cultural Heritage under the IST Programme will be analysed for potential contribution to good practice. Existing good practice guidelines will be identified and promoted in the short term, with a view to producing a set of consensus guidelines on good practice at a later date. Relevant standards will also be identified and recommendations about their application developed, for example through workgroups and projects.

Actors

Member States to develop and promote their own examples of good practice; Commission with ongoing projects to provide overview of existing guidelines and to propose structure or typology for consolidating guidelines.

Timescales

Examples from Member States and overview of existing selected guidelines, September 2001; contribution from take-up projects and consolidated approach to good practice by April 2002.

Progress July 2001: Meeting in Brussels, 17 July produced recommendations on activities to compile information on standards, to share experiences and competences, and to identify pertinent guidelines.

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Action 3b: Competence centres

Objective

promoting "centres of competence"

Implementation and tasks

organisations or consortia of organisations with leading skills and competences in key technical domains should establish services to support and inform cultural organisations embarking on digitisation. These services may be established or promoted at national level or at European level, including using the possibilities under the current IST 2001 workprogramme.

Actors

Member States, research organisations and industry

Timescales

From 2002 onwards.

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AREA 4: CONTENT FRAMEWORK

4a: Cooperative action plan for access to quality European digitised content

Objective

Optimise the value and develop shared visions of European content, by developing criteria and a framework for an EU collaboration plan for digital cultural and scientific content, together with an appropriate implementation means (Charter, MoU etc).

Implementation and tasks

Once the coordinating group is established, and with the eventual support of its secretariat, a cooperative approach for a European eCulture infrastructure (eCulture Portal) for access to digitised cultural and scientific heritage should be developed, based on identifying added value and quality criteria for the digitised content to be included, on technical standards and agreements on their implementation, and on service quality. The strategic means of implementing this should also be identified, for example via a Charter, MoU etc

Actors

Member States

Timescales

Ongoing from October 2001 with working method set up through the Coordinating group of MS, with outline of framework and agreement strategy by mid 2002

Progress July 2001: first steps in development of criteria for a quality framework for resources on cultural sites (Brussels Quality Framework). Next actions proposed: experts meeting under Belgian Presidency to develop BQF and investigate strategies for its takeup (Charter, MoU etc). Coordination of digitisation mechanisms Lund Actions Plan

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4b: Sustainable access to content

Objective

ensure digitised cultural and scientific content is available over time.

Implementation and tasks

the application of standards and adoption of good practice provide some safeguards for the future availability of digitised content, but this is very limited. Research is needed into long-term preservation issues, into scoping and identifying the core problem areas, and in developing appropriate technical solutions. A research agenda for future actions needs to be developed to meet these goals. The DLM Forum and IST supported actions will input to this process.

Actors

Commission and industry

Timescales

2001 onwards.

Progress July 2001: DLM Forum 2002 scheduled for Barcelona, May 2002 with support of Spanish Presidency. IST support action on good practice and awareness for digital preservation (due to start January 2002). Industry position papers sent to Commissioner Liikanen

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Indicative timetable of actions

MS; MS + Commission support; Commission