open-source

Tom Pert, Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales; Dafydd James, National Museum Wales, United Kingdom

http://peoplescollectionwales.com/

Abstract

Casgliad y Werin Cymru – The People's Collection Wales – is more than just a website: it is a collaborative and federated programme developed by national institutions to tell the story of a nation from the perspective of its people. In this paper, we will explain the development of this open-source system which integrates material from organisations with very different business models and data structures, and blends it through its API into a set of geo-aware digital cultural heritage resources that make sense to the end-user.

Keywords: Wales,collaborative, open-source, cultural heritage resource

Matthew Fisher and Stacey Mann, Night Kitchen Interactive; Kim Sajet, Historical Society of Pennsylvania; and Minda Borun, Museum Solutions, USA

Abstract

Recent advances in open-source technologies, advances in GIS mapping, and increased access to archival and community-curated content hold great potential for situating and visualizing the history of place in innovative ways. The 2010 launch of PhilaPlace, a collaborative and interactive community-oriented Web site, integrated two such open source solutions: Google Maps and Collective Access collections management system. Connecting stories to places across time throughout Philadelphia neighborhoods, PhilaPlace  supports a rich feature set that facilitates an interpretive mosaic of historical records as well as stories, photos, and video shared by ordinary people of all backgrounds to create an enduring record of collective heritage. Herein we explore how the open-source solutions and institutional partnerships for PhilaPlace might inform an AnyPlace approach to mapping and interpreting place-based historical narratives for communities and historical sites, with an eye towards issues of sustainability, institutional capacity, and the changing pace of technological innovation.

Keywords: place-based storytelling, GIS mapping, collective memory, crowdsourcing, open-source, iterative design