Mike’s made a mega point here – but I’d like to go further…

Regarding your proposition number one – what cultural/museum/gallery experience is it that audiences want?

Well, it’s all kinds of things, actually. But it’s generally not ‘we’ want them to have, based on what ‘we’ve’ got.

Let’s look at what *other media* serve to the public; because that’s a good guide. If a million people per week read the culture sections of the Telegraph and the Guardian, then I think that’s a useful indicator of what’s genuinely popular and bringing in readers and click through to ads.

So what is it? It’s a rich mix of reviews, news, personal blogs, walk-through image galleries, forums of exasperated opinionated people, some ‘expert’ views and tours, some panel discussions, some grown-up art critical essays, some short 1, 3 and 5 minute films of shows, some direct links to museum online exibitions, some films by personalities and experts guiding us through difficult stuff, or recommending things to see and do. There’s some great user participation going on – Saatchi’s Your Gallery and Deviant Art are exemplars.

That’s a quick survey of what the major [very popular] media serve up to the public. And for them, it pays.

So where are the online c0llections? Where is the direct pathway through to federated data? Where is un-mediated, un-editorialised content? Nowhere. In unmediated, uneditorialised form, it’s inedible.

So for me, that’s the Europeana conundrum – it’s on the way to being a good data product – to offer to others to be re-used and mashed into more complex media.

But as standalone cultural product, it offers content that mainstream media outlets don’t want [in my opinion, but based on my experience] unless it can be re-mixed.

What data product does the digital media publisher really want? Multi-platform outfits and their data input needs are kind of complex, but they basically want a regularly updated, consistently formed, quality stream of copyright free content that they can link to, mix other content with, and use as *white label* style source material.

Beyond that, there needs to be a rock solid SLA guaranteeing the content is legally and technically safe; and it needs to be offered in API forms that are ubiquitous, like the other data strands they use such as the Google API.

If they’re going to rely on our data to base other content on, then they need us to keep our stuff working 24 hours per day.

Can Europeana do that? Maybe. But let’s look also outwards at how other media use cultural data and content and be more realistic about what we’re making and publishing for this federated, cultural promised land.