Digitising and preserving Europe's cultural heritage online for universal access

 

SUMMARY OF:

Conclusions on the digitisation and online accessibility of cultural material and digital preservation

WHAT IS THE AIM OF THE CONCLUSIONS?

• The Council notes the importance of digitisation and online accessibility of cultural material and digital preservation.
• This process enables everyone to access culture and knowledge in the digital era, whilst promoting the richness and diversity of European cultural heritage.

KEY POINTS

• Digitised cultural material is an important resource for European cultural and creative industries, boosting the economy and jobs. It also advances the digital single market, by offering new and innovative online products and services.
• However, the Council adds that the EU must coordinate its action, creating synergies between national efforts and ensuring that online accessibility of Europe’s cultural heritage reaches a critical mass.
• The Council also highlights how the context for digitisation efforts and for collaboration at European level has changed since 2006. The most notable development is Europeana — the common, multilingual access point to Europe’s cultural heritage online. Following the launch of this digital library, museum and archive in 2008, plans for its development were set out in the 2010 Council conclusions on Europeana: next steps.
• The Council welcomes the European Commission recommendation of 27 October 2011 on the digitisation and online accessibility of cultural material and digital preservation (2011/711/EU) as part of the digital agenda for EuropeThis recommendation includes an updated set of measures to step up digitisation efforts, including
  • the pooling of digitisation efforts and funding,
  • public–private partnerships to stimulate innovative uses of the material,
  • improved conditions for digitisation and online accessibility of in-copyright material, and
  • quantitative targets of digitised objects accessible through Europeana.

Recommendations

After recognising the progress in this field by EU countries and valuable work done by Europeana, the Council underlines the need to:

• bring out the richness of Europe’s cultural heritage online and to promote the creation of content and new online services;
• ensure the long-term viability of Europeana, including improvements to the quality and variety of digitised cultural material;
• promote the quality and technical standards for Europeana’s content, through EU countries and the Commission;
• do further work on technical standards for digitisation and metadata, including through Europeana;
• make more in-copyright material available through Europeana;
• promote voluntary agreements on large-scale digitisation and online availability of out-of-commerce works, with legal certainty in a national and cross-border context;
• take account of intellectual property rights in digitisation and online accessibility of Europe’s cultural heritage.

BACKGROUND

For more information, see:

• ‘Digitisation & Digital Preservation’ on the European Commission's website.

MAIN DOCUMENT

Council conclusions of 10 May 2012 on the digitisation and online accessibility of cultural material and digital preservation (OJ C 169, 15.6.2012, pp. 5-8)

RELATED ACTS

Council Conclusions on the Digitisation and Online Accessibility of Cultural Material, and Digital Preservation (OJ C 297, 7.12.2006, pp. 1–5)

Council conclusions of 10 May 2010 on Europeana: next steps (OJ C 137, 27.5.2010, pp. 19-21)

Commission Recommendation of 27 October 2011 on the digitisation and online accessibility of cultural material and digital preservation (2011/711/EU) (OJ L 283, 29.10.2011, pp. 39-45)

last update 03.08.2016