Kulturskatter på nätet/en/Getting it perfect

Getting it perfect

Digitization training at the city archive in Lüneburg, Germany.

Most cultural heritage institutions "are thinking about" making their collections digital, but they want to make sure they are not making any mistakes. They want to learn about copyright law by getting advice from lawyers and organizations for rights owners, so that they can act without risk of blame or fines after the fact.

We do not oppose lawyers and copyright law – in fact, many of us are very intested in copyright law. But we also believe that you may have to try things once in a while. The organizations that have tested publishing the cultural heritage online, for instance The Swedish National Heritage Board and the Nordic Museum, know more than those who just did "reseach".

How do you get going?

Here are three tips of advice to get going:

• begin small, but do it now. You do not have to digitize everything at once. The important thing is that you try and get experience.
• choose material that you own the rights to or is old enough to be public domain, and preferably material that is already in digital form
• talk to people who use the material to find out what they want in the next batch. That decreases the risks of publishing material that will stay untouched.