On-line Heritage Presentation in Flanders: A New Way of Searching and Presenting Heritage Content

Since April 2007, several research teams and heritage organisations in Flanders have been involved in a research trajectory called 'Heritage 2.0', in which problems regarding the on-line distribution of digital cultural heritage are analysed. One of the main challenges of the project is to develop a generic metadata exchange model for the whole Flemish heritage sector. While it spans the different heritage sectors, the target is not to create a centralised database, but rather to facilitate communication among existing databases and metadata standards. Out of this combination of information, heritage professionals can create new cultural heritage stories and can distribute much richer information to their audiences.

Nowadays heritage institutions increasingly have the possibility of using mobile technologies for presenting their heritage to the visitor. But are heritage institutions capable of taking this road? This paper aims at unveiling the needs and views of Flemish heritage experts concerning the two major components of the Heritage 2.0 research project: on the one hand, the creation of a communication layer on top of existing databases, and on the other hand, the presentation of heritage by means of mobile technologies (for example, a PDA). Since mobile heritage presentation is still in its infancy in Flanders, we decided to extend these focus group conversations by means of some in-depth interviews with international experts. We asked them to reflect upon 5 central issues regarding mobile heritage presentation. In this paper we highlight some of the most interesting conclusions.

ISBN:978-1-885626-36-3

Publication year:2008

Keywords:Heritage 2.0, online cultural heritage, metadata layer, heritage experts, mobile heritage presentation