Digital meets Culture

Oxford, 17-18 September 2015

Hidden Spire 2015: Before The Tempest

“Before the Tempest” imagines what life was like on the island for Miranda and Prospero as a prequel to Shakespeare’s classic tale of love, magic and bad weather.

The play is the result of this year’s Hidden Spire, which brings together a team of professional artists to make a show from scratch alongside people who are homeless. They have been writing, devising, designing and building over 14 months to create what promises to be an extraordinary moment of live theatre with a striking set. A work of art in itself.

It’s about isolation and belonging, despair and forgiveness. It’s about wanting to fit in and being different. It’s about growing up. And it’s about birds.

There will be a Q & A after the performance on Thursday 17 Sept.

What is Hidden Spire?

A partnership between Arts at the Old Fire Station and Crisis Skylight Oxford, Hidden Spire brings professional artists and Crisis clients together to create a performance using music, dance, theatre, visual arts and more.

The two groups work together every step of the way: everything from set design, script-writing and front-of-house is done as a collaboration between the artists and Crisis clients. Hidden Spire isn’t just a production, it’s a process: it demonstrates the value and potential of having a public arts centre and resources for homeless people in the same building. Most importantly, it shows that excellent art and inclusive art can be the same thing.

Hidden Spire features as part of the Art In Crisis festival, a national programme of events and workshops aimed at foregrounding homelessness and the arts.

The arts are for everyone. Everyone has potential. Come and join Hidden Spire for “Before The Tempest” to see a truly unique and extraordinary moment of live theatre.

Hidden Spire was case study of EU project Civic Epistemologies, committed to examining how community groups of citizens engage with cultural heritage and participate in the generation and reuse of cultural heritage by using digital technologies. Homeless or vulnerably housed people tend not to identify as “citizens”, but the activities subject of Civic Epistemologies’ case study demonstrate the value of the work carried out by the Hidden Spire partners in transitioning the participants to citizenship, through gaining skills that enhance these people’s employability and contribution to society.

The Civic Epistemologies case study on “Hidden cultural heritage: inclusion, access, citizenship” was led by Coventry University.

Hidden Spire is supported by Highcroft PLC and Norbar.

For further info visit www.hiddenspire.co.uk

Pisa, 9 October 2015

E-Space creative marketing workshop. Innovation for Cultural Heritage

Digital Meets Culture, official media partner of the event, presents the E-Space creative marketing workshop “Digital Culture, Social Media and Innovation for the Cultural Heritage”

The cultural sector has always been facing the great challenge of building its audience, but the digital shift changed radically how cultural heritage is made, disseminated, distributed, accessed, consumed and monetised. One of the most important revolutions is that the visitors’ role changed dramatically, shifting from passive observers to active participants and contents producers.

This workshop, taking place in Pisa’s Scuola Normale Superiore on 9 October 2015, will explore different ways of communicating cultural contents with the use of new media and will show how a greater audience can be reached by combining the power of social media and storytelling.

Piazza dei Cavalieri, Pisa

The event, hosted by Fondazione Sistema Toscana in cooperation with Invasioni Digitali, is being held in the framework of the Internet Festival.

Participation is free of charge but subject to online registration. For registering click here.

Participants shall have at least one active social media profile. After the plenary presentations, they will be divided in groups. Each group will be assigned a tutor and a specific theme to develop. Groups will leave the building and collect materials (pictures, videos…) with their smartphones around the city. Groups will then have time to elaborate their contents before they present them to the audience.

B.Y.O.D.! – You’ll be using mainly your smartphones and computer (for post production). We’ll provide tables, chairs and plugs.

During the hands on and co-creation session there will be a free refreshment corner available for participants with coffee, drinks and sandwiches.

Download the workshop agenda

Deadline: 14 September 2015

DISH2015: only one week left to submit your proposal!

There’s only one week left to submit your idea for a workshop, ignite talk, chef’s table, poster or improvisation session for DISH2015.

DISH is the biennial conference about digital strategies for heritage. This year’s theme is Money and Power.

Call for Proposals
Are you an expert in user engagement with digital heritage? Do you care about the role of digital heritage in the public domain? Are you convinced that “open” means “more impact”? Do you have a cunning business plan with digital heritage? Then submit a proposal for a table session, a workshop, a poster session or an ignite talk!

You can read more about the Call for Proposals at http://www.dish2015.nl/call-for-proposals/. Proposals can be submitted until the 14th of September 2015.

More information

Read more about the theme Money and Power
Take a look at www.dish2015.nl.

New York, September 25 and 26, 2015

TECHFOCUS III: CARING FOR SOFTWARE-BASED ART

The Guggenheim Museum, the Foundation of the American Institute for the Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works (FAIC) and the Electronic Media Group of the American Institute for Conservation (AIC) are proud to announce the two-day symposium and workshop.

TECHFOCUS III: CARING FOR SOFTWARE-BASED ART
September 25 and 26, 2015

Day 1: Friday, September 25, 9:30 am–5:30 pm
Day 2: Saturday, September 26, 9:30 am–5:45 pm

Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
1071 Fifth Avenue at 89th Street
New York City

Join conservators, artists, computer scientists, curators, art historians, registrars and archivists to explore challenges and emerging practices in the collection and preservation of software-based art. Twelve lectures and four panels will focus on: the history of software–based art and its underlying technology; case studies from major art collections; methods of artwork analysis, description and documentation; strategies for preservation, display and long-term accessibility. Four guided practical exercises, conducted by participants on their own laptops, will introduce the audience to the concepts of coding and basic preservation tools, such as version control, disk imaging and emulation. See full programme and register on the symposium site.

Registration fee: $180 AIC members; $250 non-AIC members; students $80.
After August 20: $200 AIC members; $300 non-AIC members; students $100.

REGISTER

Granada, 1 October 2015: RICHES, Civic Epistemologies, E-Space, PREFORMA and Photoconsortium meet in a panel organised by Promoter SRL

From Digitisation to Preservation, Creative Re-use of Cultural Content and Citizen Participation

On 1st October 2015, in Granada, European projects RICHES, E-Space, Civic Epistemologies, PREFORMA and the international association Photoconsortium were invited in a panel organised by Promoter SRL under the title “From Digitisation to Preservation, Creative Re-use of Cultural Content and Citizen Participation”.

The panel was hosted by Digital Heritage 2015 (28 September-2 October 2015) as part of the conference programme.

Cogwheels – by www.elbpresse.de [CC BY-SA 4.0 through Wikimedia Commons]

If the amount of digitised cultural heritage in Europe is impressive (and holds a great potential of impact on society, since makes that heritage more accessible to citizens, students, researchers and generates benefits to the content owners), yet only a tiny percentage of the European cultural heritage is digitised and nowadays more and more attention is paid to those collections, hitherto unknown or not fully acknowledged, that are preserved in European States which relatively recently joined the Union. Furthermore, certain kinds of cultural heritage, such as early photography, are not preserved by memory institutions but are in the hands of private citizens, who should be invited to share their holdings with the whole community. It is therefore necessary that the digitisation activities go ahead in the coming years and acquire a more participatory approach.
Once data are in digital format, further challenge is to ensure their long-term preservation, through the accordance with standard file formats and the execution of conformance tests by memory institutions.
Subsequently, digitised cultural data needs to be re-used at best. This means unlocking their business potential in terms of fostering economic growth. Creative industry is certainly the key stakeholder to leverage on the digital cultural data for creating new tools and services to be placed in the real market, so generating new employment and economic rewards; to achieve this goal, a greater dialogue should be fostered between industry and the cultural sector, in the light of developing public-private partnerships for the benefit of both.
Next to this, it is also important to assess the sociological impact of digital cultural heritage and technologies: how do they participate in the community building and cohesion processes of the “new” European society, that is living now a moment of great change? How can digital cultural heritage help cultural institutions renew and re-invent their role in society? How can cultural heritage become closer to its audiences of innovators, skilled makers, curators, artists, economic actors? And finally how can the European citizens, individually or as part of a community, play a vital co-creative role and contribute to the research on cultural heritage and digital humanities?

Castillo del Mauror, también llamado Torres Bermejas, Granada

Experts from the partnerships of E-Space, RICHES, Civic Epistemologies, PREFORMA and Photoconsortium led the discussion panel trying to provide answers and solutions to the challenges issued by the digital heritage era. Relevant speakers, coming from key institutions in Europe which are involved in the scenario of digital cultural heritage,discussed to understand the path towards a more advanced society, that makes use of the full potential of digital technologies to foster cultural and societal progress.
The panel was an unmissable occasion for sharing knowledge and best practices: cultural managers, ICT experts, researchers, service providers and other European projects were invited to attend, for cross-dissemination and networking.

Featuring (in alphabetical order):

Neil Forbes, Coventry University
Neil Forbes is Professor of International History at Coventry University and Co-ordinator of the FP7 RICHES project – Renewal, Innovation and Change: Heritage and European Society. His research interests and publications lie in the following fields: conflict heritage, contested landscapes and the memorialisation of war, creative archiving and cultural heritage, the processes of financial stabilisation in Europe after the First World War, Anglo-American relations and the rise of the Third Reich, the interaction of foreign policy formulation and diplomacy with the business practices of multinational enterprise during the interwar years. He has played a leading role in a number of European and UK research projects, including a £1m digitisation project in association with BT and The National Archives.

Antonella Fresa, Promoter SRL
Director at Promoter SRL, small engineering company in Pisa (Italy). Since 2002, Technical Coordinator and Communication Manager of numerous European projects in the domain of digital cultural heritage, digital preservation and digital humanities, smart cities, creative re-use of digital cultural content, citizen science, crowdsourcing and e-Infrastructures. Previously, Project Officer at the European Commission, multimedia development manager at Tower Tech SRL in Pisa, video controller development manager at Olivetti Advanced Technology Centre in Cupertino (CA) and engineer at Olivetti Pisa and Ivrea.

Börje Justrell, Riksarkivet
Dr Börje Justrell is Director and Head of Operational Support at the National Archives of Sweden and coordinator of the PREFORMA project. Since 1989, he has been responsible for technical matters at the National Archives.
Justrell has been teaching archival science at the University of Stockholm for many years and also been a member of international committees within the archivists’ professional association, ICA. He has been representing Sweden in expert groups on digitisation and digital preservation within the European Commission and working in a number of European projects like Minerva, MinervaPlus, Linked Heritage, DC-NET and DCH-RP. He was coordinator of the European project PROTAGE for digital preservation in the seventh framework programme and between 2003-2009 he was responsible for an advanced international training programme for developing countries, conducted by the Swedish National Archives and sponsored by the SIDA, the Swedish International Development Cooperation.

Sy Holsinger, EGI

Sy Holsinger is currently a Senior Policy and Strategy Officer at EGI.eu, working on sustainability planning, business model development, market analysis and IT service management implementation. He studied Business Communications and Management in the U.S., focusing on project and financial management, business development, marketing and communication messaging. He has been involved in several EU-funded projects covering both management and support roles such as leading the commercial activities in the series of EGEE projects. His previous experiences include the U.S. Air Force and Teaching.

Frederik Truyen, KU Leuven
Frederik Truyen is programme director for the MA in Cultural Studies at the Faculty of Arts of Katholieke Universiteit Leuven. He publishes on E-Learning, ICT Education, Digitisation and Epistemology. He is in charge of CS Digital, the mediaLab of the Institute for Cultural Studies, and is involved in many projects on Open Educational Resources (such as Net-CU, OCW EU and LACE) and in the digitisation of Cultural Heritage, such as RICHES, Europeana Photography and E- Space. Prof. Truyen is President of the Photoconsortium association.

Sarah Whatley, Coventry University
Sarah Whatley is Professor of Dance and Director of the Centre for Dance Research (C-DaRE) at Coventry University. Her research interests include dance and new technologies, dance analysis, somatic dance practice and pedagogy and inclusive dance practices. Her current AHRC-funded project is “InVisible Difference: Dance, Disability and Law”. She is also coordinator of the EU-funded project E-Space, which is exploring the creative reuse of digital cultural content, and is researching the impact of digital technologies on dance and performance-based cultural heritage in the EU-funded RICHES project. Working with leading cognitive psychologists, she is also researching dancer imagery as part of a Leverhulme Trust funded project. She led the AHRC-funded Siobhan Davies digital archive project, RePlay, and collaborated with the University of Surrey to create the Digital Dance Archives portal. She has published widely on archival practices in dance and performance. She is Academic Advisor: Digital Environment for The Routledge Digital Performance Archive. She is also Editor of the Journal of Dance and Somatic Practices and sits on the Editorial Boards of several other Journals.

Target audience
This panel session is addressing professionals, projects and initiatives in the domain of Digital Cultural Heritage, digitisation, digital arts, digital performances, digital humanities and digital preservation. Aim is to highlight the latest progress in the research on digital cultural heritage, trying to understand what happens to cultural heritage after it is digitised and what to do with this mass of digital cultural data. Being the theme so important, inter-disciplinary and multi-faceted, fostering reciprocal awareness and cooperation is the key to cope with the common challenges: cultural managers and researchers are warmly invited to attend.

View the post published by the European Commission to announce this panel

View the article we published to announce the Digital Heritage 2015 conference

Entrepreneur, citizen science advocate and author Chandra Clarke on the future of citizen science

Citizen Science predictions of the Digital Era

a representation of the Internet of Things

In a recent post of hers Chandra Clarke, who has been dealing with citizen science for a very long time, since it wasn’t a real movement yet, observes the last years’ sharp increase of mainstream interest in citizen science.

«Where it was once just the province of a smaller group of hardcore geeks – she writes – it now seems like everyone is talking about citizen science. Anecdotally, I’ve been interviewed by a fairly wide range of media outlets, everything from CBC Radio to Woman’s World. On the hard data side, this screen shot of the Google Trends entry on citizen science bears this out:

More and more citizen science projects emerge, showing a more and more impressive variety of topics and types (so «now you can do everything from raising Monarch butterflies to being a paleontologist in your kitchen») and citizen science is merging with other movements, such as open source, participatory civics, activism, maker spaces, crowdfunding and «it’s increasingly hard to see where one movement begins and another ends».

Clarke’s mention Pybossa, open source software allowing users to create their own citizen science projects, and the Open Space Agency, aimed at developing a network of DIY (Do It Yourself) makers with engineering and building skills able to contribute to space exploration. And further Skywarn, a network of trained severe weather spotters, or Safecast, “global sensor network for collecting and sharing radiation measurements to empower people with data about their environments”.
She notes the increasing number of citizen science games (like EteRNA and Reverse the Odds) and refers to citizen science apps, which have «opened up a whole new frontier in citizen science».
Sound Around You, for example, is developed by researchers who intend to learn more about sonic influences on human psyche: people around the world are invited to use their smartphones to record clips from different sound environments, to upload them to a map and describe how those sounds make them feel. Loss of the Night is designed instead to measure light pollution.
In this regard, Chandra observes: «I think we’ve only just barely scratched the surface of what’s possible with current mobile technology. The average smart phone now comes with an accelerometer, a camera, a video camera, a magnetometer, an ambient light detector, GPS and, obviously, a speaker and a microphone, all as standard equipment. Considering how creative people are getting with simple GoPro cameras and their special mounts or cameras attached to drones just for fun, there’s clearly a lot of scope for some much more interesting citizen science apps than what we’re currently doing».

And what about Internet of Things? Sensors are cheaper and cheaper, the Internet more and more widespread. The average citizen «will soon be able to measure and track pretty much anything».
«Anyone will be able to deploy sensors and this will in turn generate huge amounts of highly granular data. Indeed, most of us will deploy sensors, even if not entirely deliberately, because they’re going to be embedded in the products we use».

In some ways – she concludes – we’re just beginning to build a massive nervous system for ourselves and our planet and it’s going to teach us all sorts of amazing things. We don’t yet know what we don’t know.

But it’s going to be very interesting. Stay tuned».

Read Chandra Clarke’s article

For further info:

Bari, 09-13 November 2015

EGI Community Forum 2015. Registration open!

Civic Epistemologies partner EGI (the Stichting European Grid Initiative) is pleased to announce the registration for the EGI Community Forum 2015 is now open.

The event will be held in Bari, Italy from 09 November 2015 08:00 to 13 November 2015 18:00 (Timezone: Europe/Rome).

Theme for this year’s EGI Forum is “Building Next Generation e-Infrastructures through Communities”. Nowadays, research practice is increasingly and in many cases exclusively data driven. Knowledge of how to use tools to manipulate research data and the availability of e-infrastructures to support them are foundational. Along with this, new types of communities are forming around interests in digital tools, computing facilities and data repositories.

By making infrastructure services, community engagement and training inseparable, existing communities can be empowered by new ways of doing research and new communities can be created around tools and data. The EGI Community Forum aims at gathering tool developers, infrastructure providers, data providers and research communities to work together towards open science.

EGI solicits contributions in the form of presentations, workshops, user community meetings, tutorials, posters and demonstrations for the following topics:

Community Engagement and Innovation
Virtual Research Environments
Data and Computing
Identity provisioning, Authentication, Authorisation and Accounting
Open Science Commons.

The Civic Epistemologies project will participate with a poster dedicated to its activities and outcomes. Antonella Fresa from Promoter SRL, Technical Coordinator of Civic Epistemologies, is member of the forum Programme Committee.

More information about the event is available here.

For more information view the scientific programme.

Waag, Theatrum Anatomicum, The Netherlands

5 October 2015: HACK THE AUDIENCE!

CC: Carina Erdmann/Waag Society 2015
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/

Co-creation is a powerful strategy to build new relationships. At “Hacking Heritage: the audience”, on 5 October 2015, museum professionals present and discuss the potential benefits of working co-creatively with their audience and share lessons learned and tips. Through inspiring panel sessions and presentations, Waag Society experts will explore the opportunities co-creation provides and the challenges that come along with it.

Co-creation starts from the idea that everyone is an expert on one issue or another, first and foremost on his/her own life. Actually, co-creation is nothing new, but it can bring something new to museum practices: it can enrich the stories a museum tells, it can enhance the understanding between the different worlds we inhabit or it can change the way a museum programmes its future events.

During “Hacking the Audience” participants will go into questions of language, creativity, equality, modern craftsmanship, innovation, cultural identity and strategy. Twelve heritage experts take the stage to discuss their experiences and come to new ideas together. Three inspiring examples will be highlighted in short presentations. There will be enough room for questions and remarks, both during the meeting as well as during drinks afterwards.

Speakers

Hannah Fox, project director van de Derby Silk Mill
Tiedong Yang, was involved in the Young Curators Project of the Chester Beatty Library

The full programme (with more speakers!) will be soon available on the event webpage.

The expert meeting “Hacking Heritage: the audience” takes place in the Theatrum Anatomicum of the Waag. Entrance is free.

For registration and further information click here.

Within the EU-project RICHES, Waag Society is preparing to launch a publication aimed at heritage professionals, providing them with inspiration, resources, strategies and tools for anyone wanting to explore co-creation. Within the expert meeting Waag Society’s members will give you a sneak peek of the tools they are developing.

Lezioni di fotografia analogica, fotografia digitale, ripresa e montaggio e camera oscura

Corsi e workshop Imago 2015/2016

SONO APERTE LE ISCRIZIONI

•Corso di fotografia Analogica
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24 ore
Scatto, sviluppo del negativo, stampa
Cosa succede quando scattiamo una fotografia: la luce, l’obiettivo, il diaframma, l’otturatore, la pellicola. Lo sviluppo del negativo e la stampa in camera oscura.
I temi e gli stili: composizione, still life, ritratto, reportage, notturno, paesaggio e natura.

In dotazione: rulli b/n, sala di posa con luci artificiali e flash, banco per still life e fondali, camera oscura con ingranditori, timer, carta fotografica 12×18, 18×24, 24×30, sviluppo e fix.

•Corso di fotografia Digitale
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20 ore
•La macchina fotografica digitale
Principali impostazioni e funzioni della reflex digitale. L’obiettivo, il diaframma, l’otturatore.
• temi e gli stili: composizione, still life, ritratto, reportage, notturno, paesaggio e natura.
La post-produzione del file digitale: l’elaborazione e l’archiviazione dell’immagine.

•Corso base di ripresa e montaggio
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Durata del corso: 20 ore (10 lezioni di 2 ore ciascuna)

LEZIONI I-V: TECNICHE DI RIPRESA

I LEZIONE: LA TELECAMERA
Struttura e componenti della videocamera, formati e supporti (minidv-dv- dvcam-hdv-hd-full hd), modalità di ripresa automatiche e manuali, messa a fuoco, esposizione, bilanciamento del bianco, filtri ND, ripresa audio.

II LEZIONE: IL LINGUAGGIO DEL VIDEO: LA TECNICA COME MEZZO PER LA NARRAZIONE

Nozioni di semiotica del video e di scrittura cinematografica (La sceneggiatura, la storia e il racconto, Il tempo e lo spazio nella narrazione, l’inquadratura, la relazione tra le inquadrature, sapere e vedere)

III LEZIONE: COME SI REALIZZA UN’INTERVISTA (RIPRESE IN STUDIO) Realizzazione di un’intervista (Ripresa video, audio e luci)

IV LEZIONE: RACCONTARE L’AMBIENTE CHE CI CIRCONDA (I USCITA)

Come descrivere l’ambiente che ci circonda attraverso il video. L’utilizzo del cavalletto e della camera a spalla. Documentario e reportage.

V LEZIONE: RACCONTARE L’AMBIENTE CHE CI CIRCONDA (II USCITA)

Le cinque variazioni. Raccontare un soggetto da punti di vista diversi.

LEZIONI VI-X: IL MONTAGGIO

VI LEZIONE: INTERFACCIA DI FINAL CUT
Strutturare un progetto di final cut, le impostazioni, acquisizione video, gli strumenti, nozioni di montaggio.

VII-X LEZIONE: MONTAGGIO DEL MATERIALE VIDEO GIRATO DURANTE IL CORSO

Ogni partecipante lavorerà sul proprio progetto video al fine di realizzare una serie di piccoli documentari.
Alla fine del corso verrà organizzata una serata in cui verranno proiettati i lavori svolti dai partecipanti.

Per frequentare il corso i partecipanti dovranno disporre della seguente attrezzatura:
Telecamera DV o HDV o Full HD Cavalletto Computer portatile

•Corso di camera oscura
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12 ore
Introduzione all’uso dei materiali negativi, supporti e carte, sviluppi, fissaggi e viraggi.
Stampa di provini a contatto, ingrandimenti 24×30 con tecnica di bruciatura e mascheratura.
In dotazione: rulli b/n, camera oscura con ingranditori, timer, carta fotografica 12×18, 18×24, 24×30, sviluppo e fix.

Per info:

Associazione Imago
VIA BOVIO, 10 PISA
mail: imagopisa@tiscali.it – tel:3286610814

The innovative resource for museum curators and staff is progressing towards its completion. It will be released as an open source software.

Search in Europeana via the Toolbox realised within the E-Space Museums Pilot

The Toolbox of Europeana Space Museums Pilot is a web-based application designed for museum curators, that will allow them to create always brand new educational videos and promotional worksheets melting the museums/memorials contents with the cultural heritage available in Europeana, the European digital library.

The first prototype was released and tested in the past months. Since the end of July 2015 the users of the museums subpilot Toolbox can search in Europeana for items and use them within the Toolbox. By using the Europena API the Toolbox offers now the possibility to search and link Europeana items directly to the Toolbox.

This milestone marks prototype II of Toolbox development and enriches the service and the uses enormously: not only local data, but data from Europenana can be used now in the same database, to create educational and promotional materials.

Important institutions in Germany already joined the Pilot and will participate to the testing of the prototype and the hackathon of the Museums Pilot is planned to take place in Spring 2016 in Venice (Italy).

Special thanks to the developer team at Museumsmedien.

[Show as slideshow]

More About the TOOLBOX:

The Toolbox gives small and mid-sized memorials/museums the possibility to collect and arrange items for creating digital media for educational work. In this way memorials/museums will get more influence on the creation process and cost can be reduced in the production process. By using the Toolbox, memorials/museums can produce worksheets and storyboards (as a base frame for a video production) with data of the museums local data bases or from Europeana.

Content provider for the Toolbox

Content provider for the Toolbox is one of biggest institution in Germany dealing with the German resistance against the Hitler Dictatorship: the German Resistance Memorial Centre in Berlin.

Technical background of the Toolbox

The Toolbox uses open source web-technology, based on a Linux/Apache Webserver with a Typo3 CMS 6.29 installation. In detail there will be used PHP, MySQL-Database, JQuery and other Java Script Frameworks. All software used within the Toolbox will be open source.

Are you interested in the Toolbox, the possibilities and services for your museum, memorial or institution: don’t hesitate to contact Beatrix Lehmann, lehmann @ museumsmedien.de