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ISSN 1039-3498 | no. 44 | April 2000


James Michalko speaks on heritage access issues

Jan Fullerton and James Michalko

Jan Fullerton, Director-General of the National Library, with James Michalko, President of the Research Libraries Group

‘To be real, your assets must be visible’: this was the message from James Michalko, President of the U.S.-based Research Libraries Group (RLG), during his recent visit to the National Library. He was speaking about RLG’s Cultural Materials Initiative at a public seminar held at the National Library.

The Cultural Materials Initiative is a priority for RLG in encouraging cooperation between its member cultural institutions, and was the focus of many of James Michalko’s discussions while visiting the Library. During his visit, James spoke to senior Library staff, representatives from other Australian cultural institutions and the Minister for the Arts and the Centenary of Federation, the Hon. Peter McGauran MP, about the work of RLG. He was also briefed on several National Library projects of common interest, such as the Digital Services Project, Image Search and Preserving Access to Digital Information (PADI).

The Cultural Materials Initiative aims to develop a system that provides aggregated electronic access to cultural materials. This might include published and unpublished texts, images of many types, artefacts and other objects—even teapots, as shown in one of James’s examples. The benefits of making materials of this nature easily accessible, particularly for educational purposes, were stressed. There are clear possibilities for linking a range of different types of materials on particular subjects for the first time, with likely benefits for research.

It was recognised that there were significant difficulties associated with the development of such a system. Problems include designing a system that could accept a variety of descriptive practices; dealing with technical issues, such as the representation of three-dimensional objects; adequate security; and designing a reliable, distributed yet integrated access structure. It was also recognised that the system would need to be sustainable with a clear service model.

More information about the Cultural Materials Initiative can be found on the RLG web site (http://www.rlg.org/culturalres/index.html).

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