Archive notice: This article was originally published on October 9, 2008. Links and embedded videos are preserved as part of the historical record.
As digitisation advances throughout the media sector, we must prepare for a time when neither audio tape nor film reels are used. Even today, existing and archived content can be evaluated effectively and at a relevant scale only when it is available in digital form.
The non-profit Medien Bildungsgesellschaft Babelsberg has now launched the “CINEARCHIV digital” project to develop solutions for optimally digitising and comprehensively cataloguing audiovisual material, making it accessible to a broad group of users. On the one hand, valuable cultural assets must be preserved. On the other, films and audiovisual media are economic assets that must continue to be exploited and made usable.
Working with archives, rights holders, technical service providers, research institutions and distribution partners, “CINEARCHIV digital” for the first time bundles and coordinates the necessary steps in the complex digitisation process. Its focus is on documentary and contemporary-history content in all analogue formats.
The vision for “CINEARCHIV digital” is an internet marketplace for audiovisual content. The portal is intended to offer extensive content, easy access and high search hit rates. Alongside customers in the professional media sector, it will also serve growing interest in historical content among private users.
The project launches on October 16, 2008 with a major kick-off event in Potsdam-Babelsberg and will present its results at a public event in spring 2009.
Numerous renowned partners have already been recruited to participate actively in the project. They include the DEFA Foundation, the German Federal Film Archive, Chronos-Media and the Heinrich Böll Foundation as archives; Studio Hamburg, TeleFactory Babelsberg, Elektrofilm TMT and IVZ (ARD) as technical service providers; the Hasso Plattner Institute Potsdam, Fraunhofer Institute Bonn, Heinrich Hertz Institute Berlin and Potsdam University of Applied Sciences as research institutions and IT systems specialists; and Grundy UFA, In2 and Interlake Informationssysteme as distribution partners.
The Federal Ministry of Education and Research’s “Innovation Forums – Enterprise Region” programme is funding “CINEARCHIV digital” for six months and supports the creation of the network.
As initiator of the project, Medien Bildungsgesellschaft Babelsberg will coordinate development and cooperation within the network and innovation forum, while continuing active marketing to expand the network and customer base.
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