People's Collection Wales: Online access to the heritage of Wales from museums, archives and libraries

Abstract

Purpose

The People's Collection Wales aims to collect, interpret, distribute and discuss Wales' cultural heritage in an online environment. Individual users or local history societies are able to create their own digital collections, contribute relevant content, as well as access digital resources from heritage institutions. This paper aims to provide an overview of the development of the People's Collection Wales, which is being funded through CyMAL: Museums, Archives and Libraries Wales.

Design/methodology/approach

Work on digitising various collections in Welsh cultural heritage institutions, such as Culturenet Cymru, the National Library of Wales, the National Museum Wales, and the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales has been in progress since the 1990s. An overview of this work is given, along with details of how the People's Collection Wales project has developed between 2009 and 2011.

Findings

Material available from the People's Collection Wales is available in a variety of media, including: film; images; video and audio clips; maps; photographs; and text. The web site also uses global positioning system technology to allow users to travel over the landscape of Wales, and view artefacts in three dimensions.

Originality/value

People's Collection Wales is an example of a service resulting from a convergence of libraries, archives and museums, and which showcases user involvement in the creation of digital content. A number of innovative applications, including mobile technologies, are being implemented within the project.

Citation

Tedd, L.A. (2011), "People's Collection Wales: Online access to the heritage of Wales from museums, archives and libraries", Program: electronic library and information systems, Vol. 45 No. 3, pp. 333-345. https://doi.org/10.1108/00330331111151638