New Economy and Digital Culture - the REGNET project

The concept of a 'European Digital Library' cannot be only based on a technical framework enabling access to digital goods - there is also a need to introduce new ways of cooperation between different stakeholders ('Cultural Organisations', Industries, Administrations, etc) as well as to 'reengineer' traditional business processes in the light of globalization and world wide markets. The main activities within a 'support environment for I(nternet) Markets' comprise: Content Engineering, Platform Engineering, and Enterprise Engineering. The REGNET-Project targets to all three areas and comprizes following activities:

• Development of a service infrastructure which enables business to business (B2B) transactions as well as business to consumer (B2C) transactions
• Development and use of existing - locally held - electronic catalogues (OPACS: Online Public Access Catalogues) referring to cultural & scientific objects contained in libraries, museums, archives, and galleries, as well as to goods and services
• Integration of a distributed search and retrieval system to achieve a 'virtual union' catalogue of all OPACS and product/service catalogues held locally
• Definition of Information Products and Services including necessary 'supply chains' and the connected business processes and functions to deliver digital and physical goods
• Development of a legal framework necessary for all business transaction on the B2B and B2C level (containing payment features, copyright systems, authentication control, etc)
• Integration and test of existing components, standards, and methods in the field of distributed search and retrieval and e-commerce
• Access to the REGNET-WEB services via wireless application protocol (WAP) using mobile phones
• Run a trial service (demonstration phase) which should be followed by a regular service