Digital meets Culture

Happy Summer From MediaArea.net!

MediaConch Newsletter #5 – June 2016

New Release Notes

What’s new in MediaConch 16.05

Local GUI, Online, CLI, Server

MediaConch XML format v0.2
Improved Matroska tests
Improved HTML display
FFV1 parsing speed improvement

Local GUI

Option for applying a policy to all open files
Lists of values for several elements in the policy editor
Minor UI improvements/fixes

Online GUI

Option for applying a policy to all open files
User settings: default policy, default display, default verbosity
Minor UI improvements/fixes

Latest Downloads

Download MediaConch’s latest release from PREFORMA Open Source Portal or a daily build from MediaConch website.

MediaConch now supports plugins including VeraPDF and DPFManager!

Upcoming Events

Join us for our pre-IETF Berlin Symposium: No Time to Wait! A free workshop for audiovisual archivists, developers, and open standards working groups from July 18th – 20th hosted by the Deutsche Kinemathek, Zuse Institute Berlin, and MediaArea.net.

The MediaConch project and this symposium has received funding from PREFORMA, co-funded by the European Commission under it’s FP7-ICT Programme.

Feedback

MediaArea is eager to build a community of collaborators and testers to integrate the software in their workflows and participate in usability testing. Please contact us if you’d like to be involved!

Amsterdam, 2-4 November 2016

DiXiT workshop “Code and Collation: training textual scholars

The event is part of the DiXiT network and is hosted by the Huygens Institute for the History of the Netherlands. It brings together a group of international experts from the fields of textual scholarship and computer science.

The workshop engages with the theory and practice of semi-automated collation and provides an intense training in the open source collation program CollateX.

Participants will learn how to prepare source materials, how to perform semi-automated collation using CollateX, and how to inspect and modify the results; they will acquire or improve computational skills relevant to textual criticism and in particular to the production of scholarly editions.

The workshop venue is located at Kaap Noord, a business centre on the Northern bank of the IJ in Amsterdam, close to the Central Station. It is easily accessible by public transport (ferry, bus) or bike.

Registration is now open and free of charge.

Early registration is recommended since there are limited places available.

Detailed information can be found at the website: https://sites.google.com/site/dixitcodingcollation/

Venue information: http://kaapnoord.nl

For all questions, do not hesitate to get in touch at dixitcollation@gmail.com.

Madrid, 27June - 1July 2016

DH@Madrid Summer School 2016

Summer School “Digital technologies applied to the study of poetry”

Dates: 27 June to 1st July 2016

Venue: Sala Sáenz Torrecilla, Facultad de Económicas, UNED, Madrid – or your own computer (the course is available online)

The summer school offers an application of digital humanities to the study of poetry through practical learning of the latest technologies in this field.

More information: http://linhd.uned.es/en/p/dh-summer-2016/

OBJECTIVES

Provide researchers with knowledge and understanding of the different digital humanities technologies and their application, specifically for textual analysis: TEI-XML, LOD, PLN, R.
Reveal to participants the different technological and theoretical perspectives to address a single subject or philological concept as poetry, and provide them with simple tools they can use without extensive programming.
Generate materials and tools which can be applied to the analysis of poetry and that researchers can reuse by themselves for their projects.

PARTICIPANTS‘ PROFILE

Researchers in philology and digital humanities, as well as people from other areas interested in the study of poetry. It is not essential to have previous experience in this area, although it is recommended to have some understanding of digital humanities and associated working methodologies.

METHODOLOGY

The course will be mainly practical and delivered in a workshop form, although some more theoretical sessions are included.

The course is sponsored by HDH (Asociación Hispánica de Humanidades Digitales, www.humanidadesdigitales.org), AAHD (Asociación Argentina de Humanidades Digitales) www.aahd.org, and DIXIT (Digital Scholarly Editing Initial Training Network) www.dixit.uni-koeln.de. Members of all these groups will receive a 10% discount over the registration fees.

More information registration process and program: http://extension.uned.es/actividad/idactividad/11781

Nicosia (Cyprus), 2-4 December 2016

ICPT2016 International Conference of Photography and Theory

The conference, organised by the International Association of Photography and Theory, will be held between 2-4 December 2016, at NiMac, Nicosia, Cyprus.

Keynote Speakers: Martha Langford, John Stezaker, Lucia Nimcova

Research in historical, artistic and vernacular photography has been rapidly expanding in the past few years. Responding to this trend, the International Conference of Photography and Theory (ICPT) was created with the aim to provide an outlet for an interdisciplinary and critical theoretical exploration of photography and photographic practices. The 4th International Conference of Photography and Theory (ICPT2016) aims once again at bringing together researchers and practitioners from diverse fields of study, who share a common interest in photography. This year’s topic, ‘Photography and the Everyday’ investigates the current meanings, distribution, materiality, impact, and affect of vernacular photography (or else everyday photography) in relation to our economy of images. Furthermore, it aims to examine the ways vernacular photography influences, shapes and challenges memory, individual and collective identities, historical and other narratives, the social fabric, issues of authorship and authenticity, privacy and public life.

With the advent of the digital era, an unprecedented volume of photographs are being produced, shared and distributed, perhaps signalling a shift in our engagement with vernacular photography. Smartphones, tablets, social media and photo-sharing applications seem to have altered our economy of images, making everyday photography more immediate, accessible, shareable and visible than ever. The ease of taking vernacular photographs has resulted in fleeting, temporal, and what they are often described as ‘superficial’ images. However, the growing and overpowering number, the viral nature, and often personal – yet universally – understood content of such images cannot be easily dismissed. More so, online photographic collections have established a diverse and flexible channel for exchange of both images and discourse around everyday photography, whilst producers and consumers of photographic images have assumed curatorial roles over these collections.

CALL FOR PAPERS

The Call for Papers was open until 30 June 2016 for submissions from various disciplines, such as: photography, art history and theory, visual sociology,anthropology, museology, philosophy, ethnography, cultural studies, visual and media studies, communications, and fine and graphic arts. Submitted proposals for presentations should address, but are not limited to one or more of the following:

Vernacular, Snapshot and Everyday Photography

The nature of everyday photography: producing, collecting, displaying, categorizing and distributing the everyday image
The ephemeral nature of everyday photography
Found vernacular photography: issues of privacy and ownership
The Digital Archive: a new materiality
Personal photo album vs a shared public database
Redefining the family album
The digital rebirth of the surveillance society

Traces of Memory & Identity

Everyday image: memory, place and everyday life
The indexical nature of everyday digital photography
Digital memory: a fluid strand of memory
Sharing photographs online: constructing family and private life
Empowering through vernacular photography
Producing and consuming photographic images

The Effect of Photo-Sharing Applications & Social Networks

From Polaroid to Instagram
The Selfie phenomenon
Digital Photographic collections and communities: formulating, participating and social tagging
Collaborative photographic practices and experiences
Everyday photographic production and photo-sharing as a social process
Photo Diary/Weblog/Photostreams as narratives
Politics, revolutions and propaganda of photo-sharing

Art and Everyday Photography

The everyday/snapshot aesthetic in art photography
Artists’ use of everyday photography – found or (re)created
Issues of appropriation and assimilation
The personal and collective in everyday photography
Curating the vernacular
Simulating and performing the vernacular

For any further information please visit the website http://photographyandtheory.com/

Salford (UK), 10 – 12 October 2016

DCDC2016 conference / Collections, connections, collaborations: from potential to impact

DCDC2016 conference will look at the varied and innovative ways in which archives, museums, libraries, and academia can help realise the potential of collections and translate this into social, cultural, and economic impact.

The main conference themes will include, but are not limited to, the following:

Beyond apps: how technology can be used to enhance the impact of heritage collections and their place within society.
Dynamic partnerships: academic impact and collaboration with heritage organisations
Future and hidden histories: exploring new narratives for our collections
Out of the strong room and into the street: new uses for collections within social, cultural and economic contexts
Show me the money: new frontiers for funding and fundraising
Who do we think we’re for? Working with new audiences and taking heritage “outside of heritage”
Making collections work harder: social impact and cohesion through heritage
Joining the dots: connecting collections and communities

Registrations open from June 2016

Website: http://dcdcconference.com/

promoting audience development through photography as a public and shared art form

Urban Layers – New Paths in Photography

Urban Layers is an European Project about photography in the public space, whose aims are:
/ bringing contemporary art to a wider audience;
/ promoting photographic research and supporting emerging artists.

The project is funded by Creative Europe – Culture Sub-programme and aims to encourage a broad audience to take part in the cultural development of its territory through an active participation to the use of photography as a form of public and shared art.

Urban Layers consists of:
a Residency Program in Gibellina (Sicily) for 6 artists selected upon open call;
three Urban Photo–festivals in the cities of Málaga, Thessaloniki, Lecce;
a final conference in Cinisello Balsamo with the publication of the catalogue;
a scientific research on the art consumption by general audience.

The video below offers a visual journey through the Urban Layers Residency Program, with excerpts of interviews to the artists involved. The residencies took place in Gibellina (Sicily) from 31st March to 21st April, 2016:

Each Photo–festival will display:
— an itinerant exhibition composed by the Residency Program’s results;
— photographic projects selected upon open call;
— a site–specific installation by internationally renowned artist Adrian Paci.

The Project is promoted by:

Visit website: http://www.urbanlayers.eu/

Vienna (Austria), 16-18 November 2016

21st International Conference on Cultural Heritage and NEW Technologies (CHNT 21, 2016)

the „21st International Conference on Cultural Heritage and NEW Technologies“ is organized by the Urban Archaeology of Vienna and their partners and will take place in the City Hall of Vienna, Austria on November 16-18, 2016

The theme of CHNT 21 2016 will be Urban Archaeology and Data: Re-use and Repurposing of Archaeological and Historical Material and Data
Ever increasing understanding of our primary sources and technological progress have led to higher and higher standards of recording and analysis in archaeological and historical research.

Programme and Registration: http://www.chnt.at/

Topics of Sessions and Round Table

Preservation and Re-Use of Digital Archaeological Research Data with Open Archival Information Systems
Digging for the Digital Dividend: Information Systems and Excavation Data
The Employment of Mobile Applications for Survey, Documentation and Information
Combining ‘physical’ and ‘digital’ in archaeological practice: collaborative visualisation during excavation
New realities2: virtual, augmented reality and other techniques in Cultural Heritage for the general public
3D reconstruction as an interpretative melting pot of the (art-)historical data
Photogrammetry in Underwater and Aerial Archaeology
(Inter)relating to the Dead
PhD / Master Session

ROUND TABLES

Long-term preservation and access: Where is an archive for my data?
The integration between archaeology and history based on ICT
Target Groups, Users, Followers, Fans – The Nature and Potential of Social Data in Archaeology

POSTER – AWARD (Topics)

Urban Archaeology
New Technologies
Mobile Applications
Cultural Heritage
Virtual Realities
Burial Archaeology

Hannover (Germany), 5-9 September 2016

TPDL 2016 – 20th International Conference on Theory and Practice of Digital Libraries

The International Conference on Theory and Practice of Digital Libraries (TPDL) constitutes a leading scientific forum on digital libraries that brings together researchers, developers, content providers and users in the field of digital libraries. TPDL 2016 will take place in Hannover, Germany on September 5-9, 2016. The conference will be jointly organized by the L3S Research Center and the German National Library of Science and Technology.

TPDL 2016 General Theme: “Overcoming the Limits of Digital Archives”

Keynote speakers of 2016 edition are:

Jan Rybicki, Jagiellonian University, Kraków, Poland
Tony Veale, University College Dublin, Ireland
David Bainbridge, University of Waikato, and Director of the New Zealand Digital Library Research Project

Next to presentation of resercah papers, the conference includes tutorials, specialized tracks, a Poster Session, and workshops.

Registration is open and the list of accepted papaers is also available:
http://www.tpdl2016.org/

Riga (Latvia), 8-9 November 2016

Europeana Network Annual General Meeting 2016

The magnificent National Library of Latvia in Riga hosted this two-day event on 8-9 November 2016: this year the focus of the conversations was on topics like Europeana and the cultural commons, developments of our Network Association and Europeana’s impact across European digital cultural heritage.

[Show as slideshow]

The Europeana Network Association AGM is always a brilliant chance to get together with like-minded friends and colleagues, and catch up on developments in the sector.

The electoral campaign for Europeana Members Council was also launched some weeks ago and voting is started.

Learn more here: http://pro.europeana.eu/event/europeana-network-association-agm-2016

Berlin, 13-14 June 2016

AppHub PlugFest in Berlin

AppHub Software Quality Workshop, June 13, 2016, Berlin

Target to project coordinators who will learn to implement open source project management best practices. They will allow the market to find and to deploy their software more rapidly.

AppHub Software Appliances Workshop, June 14, 2016, Berlin

Target to project technical leaders who will learn to improve the quality and the interoperability of open source software. Through the AppHub Factory, they will generate software appliances for physical, virtual and cloud environments.

Where and When

Both workshops will take place in Fraunhofer FOKUS Berlin office:

Fraunhofer FOKUS
Kaiserin-Augusta-Allee 31
Berlin, Germany

The AppHub workshops registration is now OPEN. Please, check the detailed AppHub Plugfest agenda and register at http://l.ow2.org/apbw.

AppHub Workshops objectives

The main objective of the AppHub Workshops is to assist European open source project to bring their software into the AppHub European Open Source Marketplace. In addition, we like to understand the current state of open source software as developed by EU funded projects, and how we can assist them to improve their quality assurance and governance processes.

Participants contribution

Please do not prepare slides! We like participants to engage in an open dialogue about the challenges, problem, and success stories on open source software development.
Please prepare a short statement about: your project in general, and the software you are developing under an open source license; the group of users that you address with your software; the measures that you employ in order to ensure that you deliver quality software; the way you manage your community of contributors and users; the expectations that you have on our workshop.
Bring Your Own Software! If you have executables and an installation procedure ready we can immediately assist to bring your software into the AppHub Open Source Marketplace. We will organize hands-on session on the AppHub platform and OSCAR (Open-source Software Capability Assessment Radar) by OW2.

About AppHub

Open source software is the generic name for both a legal construct to share intellectual property and an approach to cooperative software development. While this approach has demonstrated its ability to produce world-class software, the potential benefts and efciencies of open source are not, however, always achieved, indeed, far from it. Publishing code is not enough to develop a community of developers and only a minority of open source projects actually make it to stardom. This is certainly why open source remains a challenge for many IT professionals who still prefer to see the downside of open source. The aim of the AppHub project is to support the market outreach strategies of EU-supported open source by launching AppHub, the European open source marketplace. AppHub is a service platform that will help the market to seamlessly identify, position and implement the software outcomes of these projects.