Digital libraries: Europeana publishes its Strategic Plan 2011-2015

European Digital library Europeana has published its Strategic Plan 2011-2015.

The plan sets out a clear vision for the further development of Europeana. It focuses on four strategic tracks - aggregate, facilitate, distribute and engage - that will enable us to generate real value for our stakeholders.

The report reads:

“We are achieving our objective as an aggregator, and aim to give access to all of Europe’s digitised cultural heritage by 2025. However, to remain successful in the future we need now to move from a centralised role to a more distributed model. Europeana will take its place in a wider European information space, collaborating with other aggregators of content. From the users’ perspective, Europeana’s content will be readily accessible in the places they frequent online - social networks, educational sites and cultural spaces.

Our ambition is to provide new forms of access to culture, to inspire creativity and stimulate social and economic growth. To achieve this, Europeana and its stakeholders grapple with major challenges.

Primary among these are the intellectual property barriers to digitisation. Europeana will become outmoded if it is not renewed through access to 20th and 21st century material. To ensure such access, more concerted efforts are needed at a European level to deal with orphan works and rights harmonisation.

Secondly, it is vital that the digitisation of Europe’s cultural and intellectual record is accelerated.

Thirdly, long-term funding needs to be secured for both Europeana and the ecosystem of content providers and aggregators that supply its lifeblood”.