This scheme is expected to create more than €600 million worth of bank loans over the next six years.

Boosting SMEs in the cultural and creative sectors: European Commission and EIF launch a new guarantee scheme

European Commission – Press release

Boosting SMEs in the cultural and creative sectors: European Commission and EIF launch a new guarantee scheme

Brussels, 30 June 2016

The European Commission and the European Investment Fund (EIF) today launched a €121 million guarantee initiative to support SMEs in the cultural and creative sectors via financial institutions. This scheme is expected to create more than €600 million worth of bank loans over the next six years.

Today’s initiative allows the EIF to provide guarantees and counter-guarantees, free of charge, to selected financial intermediaries in order to enable them to provide more debt finance to entrepreneurs in the cultural and creative arena. Guarantee institutions, commercial and promotional banks as well as other financial intermediaries benefiting from the €121 million guarantee will support more than ten thousand SMEs in a wide range of sectors such as audiovisual (including film, television, animation, video games and multimedia), festivals, music, literature, architecture, archives, libraries and museums, artistic crafts, cultural heritage, design, performing arts, publishing, radio and visual arts.

The financial instrument, set-up under Creative Europe– the main EU programme dedicated to the cultural and creative sectors, will be managed by the EIF on behalf of the European Commission. European SMEs should benefit from it as early as of the end of this year.
Commissioner for the Digital Economy and Society Günther H. Oettinger welcomed the initiative launched today: “Creative minds and companies need to experiment and take risks to thrive, for our society and for our economy. We are helping them to get the bank loans they would normally not get.”

EIF Deputy Chief Executive, Roger Havenith, said: “Helping business to scale up and access market-based financing solutions is high on the European Commission’s agenda. Providing credit risk protection and capacity building for finance providers are two essential ingredients in the recipe for support for SMEs in the cultural and creative sectors. The Cultural and Creative Sectors Guarantee Facility which we are signing today will help SMEs from the film to festival and music to museum arena across Europe to start up and develop.”
The creative and cultural sectors represent more than 7 million jobs in the EU and account for 4.2% of the EU’s GDP (source). Access to finance can be difficult for these sectors, primarily due to the intangible nature of their assets and collateral, the limited size of the market, demand uncertainty, and lack of financial intermediary expertise in addressing sector specificities.
The new Cultural and Creative Sectors Guarantee Facility includes capacity building activities for financial intermediaries, giving them specific expertise on key elements of these sectors (e.g. specific business models and credit risk assessment in the sectors). Capacity building would be provided by (a) capacity building provider(s) selected by the EIF (e.g. a consultancy company specialised in the way the cultural and creative sectors work) following an open call for tenders. Such training will be free of charge for financial intermediaries.

In the coming days, the EIF will publish a call for expression of interest to which eligible financial institutions (banks, guarantee institutions, leasing companies, etc.) will be able to apply. After a thorough selection process, the EIF will select financial intermediaries which can then make the new finance available to SMEs in the targeted sectors. Financial intermediaries will report thoroughly on the financial products they will propose to SMEs and their take-up.

Today’s initiative is part of the Commission’s efforts to support investment and make smarter use of new and existing financial resources, which is the aim of the Investment Plan for Europe. It also complements the work done under the Digital Single Market strategy to create the right environment for the cultural and creative sectors, and in particular smaller businesses, to thrive in the digital era.

About the EIF

The European Investment Fund’s (EIF) central mission is to support Europe’s micro, small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) by helping them to access finance. EIF designs and develops venture and growth capital, guarantees and microfinance instruments which specifically target this market segment. In this role, EIF fosters EU objectives in support of innovation, research and development, entrepreneurship, growth, and employment.

About the Cultural and Creative Sectors Guarantee Facility and Creative Europe

Set-up under the cross-sectoral strand of the Creative Europe programme, this new financial instrument is the first which such a wide scope in the culture and creative sectors. It pursues the same objective as the SME window of the European Fund for Strategic Investments (EFSI), which drives the Investment Plan for Europe: increasing lending to SMEs in order to scale up their activities.

Creative Europe is a 7-year programme (2014-2020) designed to support actors of the creative and cultural fields. It has a budget of €1.46 billion for the whole duration of the period. It is composed of the MEDIA programme helping the development and the distribution of European audiovisual works, the Culture programme, which supports culture sector initiatives promoting for example cross-border cooperation and literary translation, and the cross-sectoral strand. The objective of Creative Europe is to promote cultural diversity, encourage the circulation of European culture and creativity and strengthen the competitiveness of the cultural and creative sectors.

More information, Q&A

during the event, E-Space project was presented and disseminated

PS Value Talks’ Event: Cultural Policy and Local Growth

PostScriptum and the PanHellenic Union of General Directors of Local Administration “Kleisthenis” organized a unique PS Value Talk Event called “Cultural Policy and Local Growth” on Friday the 20th of May 2016 at Hyatt Regency Thessaloniki.

The event was held within the context of MoneyShow ’16 Thessaloniki, a multi-conference forum, fostered by the 2nd Forum of Local Government & Entrepreneurship and aimed at presenting an innovative strategy geared by the cultural domain and by following prototypes and design practices which achieve the development of a new “hyperlocal” growth model which is characterized by its sustainable and competitive nature and is based on the valuable resources that Greece offers.

In the recent years, the role of culture as a means of growth has been reinforced by the priorities of the national and European regional development policies which focus on the efficient use of the existing resources applied on new entrepreneurial models which associate culture with tourism and the environment, the design of innovative applications and the rise of synergies between public an private sector.

An integrated approach towards cultural capital and the promotion of creative industries locally in conjunction with the selection of appropriate funding tools constitute the main challenges and opportunities that local authorities will be facing for the coming period.

During the event, partner PostScriptum disseminated Europeana Space project with a presentation, particularly showcasing the value of content re-use and the value of hackathons to engage communities. Dissemination materials were also distributed. Attendees were Greek representatives of the culture and academic sectors, ICT Industry, and policy makers.

The Dance Pilot presented a panel during an international conference organized by SIBMAS

“Freeze! Challenge the Hierarchy: Researcher, Artist, User!” – E-Space Dance Pilot in Copenhagen

by Rosemary Kostic Cisneros (Coventry University).

This was an international conference mainly for Dance/Art related academics, professionals, archivists and practitioners, with over 150 participants, organized by SIBMAS, the international network of cultural heritage in the performing arts, on 31 May – 3 June 2016 at the Royal Library in Copenhagen.

The Dance Pilot presented a panel with 3 papers:

Exhibitions and Engagement- Educational Processes, By: Rosemary Kostic Cisneros
Animating the archives: re-mediating and re-embodying digital records of dance, By: Sarah Whatley
Reusing and Remixing Dance, By: Hetty Blades

Our objectives were to: (a) disseminate Pilot information, materials and tools. (b) Encourage people to learn more about E-Space and Europeana Foundation and visit project website and foundation’s website. c)Follow us on twitter and other social media outlets (d) Identify local test-users (e) gather feedback on the E-Space Pilot ideas.

[Show as slideshow]

The impact is hard to measure but it is known that all of the individuals understood the nature of the E-Space Pilot, the project and the Europeana Foundation. Attendees were interested and eager to learn more. The dialogue generated was constructive and useful for us as a pilot and for them as participants. We gathered information on the digital technologies they are familiar with or currently using, the IPR issues they face and the potential that our prototypes could have on their work. We also shared with them the usability testing results. This was the first time the pilot was engaging with professional archivists.

E-Space Booklet, website, and blog information was distributed, Hackathon and Pilot activities were also disseminated. We also shared images and project videos with attendees and shared the twitter information with others.

Audience was comprised dance artists, archivists, graduate students, academics and other dance/art professionals and practitioners of different nationalities: English, American, Spanish, Greek, Polish, Czech Republic, Romanian, Bulgarian, Brazilian, Russian, Portuguese, Chinese, Japanese.

Learn more on the event: http://www.sibmas.org/conferences/copenhagen2016/

a call for creative submissions and the selection of the accepted projects run since spring 2016.

Preparing the exhibition of Open Hybrid Publishing pilot

Within the framework of Europeana Space, the Open and Hybrid Publishing Pilot exhibiton is under preparation since few months and will be launched soon. First, a call for creative works was published in the project blog, on the media partner digitalmeetsculture.net and on Photomediations channels.

Then, a CREATIVE REM!X JAM workshop was designed and run at Coventry University in the UK, and Photography Studies College at Melbourne in Australia as a preparation for the exhibition run by the pilot. The CREATIVE REM!X JAM workshop kit has also been disseminated to the Europeana community and wider photographic community, with the workshops being then taken up by other institutions (Sheffield, Portsmouth, London, Nottingham, Huddersfield, Brussels and Gent).

Open and Hybrid Publishing Pilot call for creative submissions for the exhibition closed on 31 March. We ultimately had 537 people engage with the exhibition site during March and received 300 creative submissions via social media & our submission form/email.

The judges of the contest were:

Editors of Photomediations: An Open Book

Katrina Sluis – The Photographers’ Gallery

Karen Newman – Birmingham Open Media

Pippa Milne – Centre for Contemporary Photography

Judging for the competition was completed with 1 overall winner, 3 runners-up and 6 honourable mentions (names still under embargo!).

The exhibition as it stands presently will run into 3 formats:

1. Online exhibition built into the creative call site so it connects with the education function and can easily be linked out from the Photomediations Open Book.

2. An ebook enabling a mobile offline viewing and downloadable format for the viewer

3. A pop-up exhibition available as a complete ‘frozen’ package with instructions, images, texts etc or as a zipped folder with the RAW material for people to self curate and reinterpret the material, add too etc.

To see a selection of images submitted click on the random open content generator on the exhibition website: http://photomediations.disruptivemedia.org.uk/explore/

E-Space partner SPK is an important institution in Germany, that regularly organizes and participates to cultural heritage events and workshops

Latest dissemination activities by SPK

At the Ethnologisches Museum in Berlin, the Europeana DSI Workshop «Tools to make your collection widely visible» was co-organized by Michael Culture association, NEMO and SPK, within the Europeana Digital Service Infrastructure (DSI) project, on 15th Februaty 2016.
Sarah Wassermann from SPK spoke about E-Space in the presentation “Things to check when implementing an APP in a museum”, presenting guiding questions and things that should be considered when preparing an app for a museum – referring to the example of the development of the Blinkster App. the lessons learnt bu the Museums Pilot are extremely valuable for other institutions and in facts during the workshop raised the suggestion to spread and disseminate the raised questions and considerations in a public document.

The event agenda: http://www.dedale.info/_objets/medias/autres/agenda-ws-dsi-berlin-2016v4-1032.pdf

On 11th May an important German event Frühjahrstagung Fachgruppe Dokumentation (Spring Conference of Professional Group Documentation) was organzied by Deutscher Museumsbund (German Museums Association), and Monika Hagedorn-Saupe from SPK disseminate about E-Space project and the Museums Pilot within the attendees including professionals from the Cultural Heritage & technology field, e.g. Museums, Libraries and Universities, also distributing the E-Space pilots leaflet and networking with experts in the Cultural Heritage sector.

More info on the event:

http://www.museumsbund.de/de/fachgruppen_arbeitskreise/dokumentation_fg/terminordner/2016_fachtagung/beitraege_mai_2016_stand_31052016/

Leuven (Belgium), 7-10 February 2017

European Congress of Qualitative Inquiry / Call for Abstract closes 15/9

The 1st edition of the European Congress of Qualitative Inquiry is a unique event for sharing knowledge and seeking new collaboration and partnerships. It provides opportunities for addressing the common challenges that qualitative researchers face in their own geographical regions or research disciplines. Most importantly the Congress is a lively event, providing ample opportunities for interacting with friends and colleagues and learning about the latest developments and innovations in qualitative inquiry.

The venue of ECQI 2017 will be KU Leuven, situated near Brussels, the capital of Europe, and a centre of learning for almost six centuries now (founded in 1425).

QUALITY AND REFLEXIVITY IN QUALITATIVE INQUIRY

In order to ensure best practice and to stimulate innovation in qualitative inquiry we permanently judge, evaluate and critique the works of others and try to improve the quality of our own work, through peer review of papers and proposals and through acts of reflexivity and reflections related to our own personal and epistemological stances in qualitative inquiry. The internal compass we develop to assist in such processes is guided by a mixture of knowledge, experience and our personal stance on what we believe constitutes good qualitative research. We ‘live up’ to certain standards and ‘refuse’ others. The different positions we take can be considered both an advantage and a disadvantage. They contribute to the overall richness of our methodological field and allow us to deal with a variety of complex problems. At the same time, they complicate the search for a commonly accepted jargon to speak about quality and qualitative inquiry more generally. In the recognition of the value of flexible, emerging and progressive approaches to qualitative research we permanently negotiate quality frameworks based on our own reflexive research practice. We welcome contributions from all scientific domains and all qualitative research traditions, featuring innovative research methodologies, introducing worked examples that illustrate a reflexive research attitude or pushing the boundries of what we currently perceive as best practice in qualitative inquiry.

For the general conference track at this 1^st edition of ECQI we welcome contributions that answer the following questions:

QUALITY in qualitative inquiry

How has the debate on quality shifted over time and how has it hindered or facilitated progress in the field of qualitative inquiry?
Which quality frameworks are available to us? Do we need them at all, and why?
How do we choose to negotiate quality criteria and frameworks within the current evidence-based discourse? How do we balance methodological flaws against richness of description and the need to experiment with emerging and innovative methodologies and research lenses?
What sort of translations of quality do we support in the multiplicity of qualitative research paradigms and methodological approaches applied?

REFLEXIVITY in qualitative inquiry

What is a reflexive account to inquiry and how do we report on it?
What are the mechanisms by which we can make these processes more transparent for others to learn from?
What is the role of theory in our research? How and where does it manifest itself?

Also, in the general conference track, we further welcome contributions discussing a particular topical area of interest to a multidisciplinary crowd of qualitative researchers.

Please check the event website for further info. Call for abstract closes 15/9.

https://kuleuvencongres.be/ECQI2017

Naples (Italy), 27 November - 1 December 2016

VICTA 2016: 3rd International Workshop on Visions on Internet of Cultural Things and Applications / call for papers

This workshop is collocated with SITIS 2016 – The 12th International Conference on SIGNAL IMAGE TECHNOLOGY & INTERNET BASED SYSTEMS.

The adoption of Future Internet (FI) technology, and in particular of its most challenging components like the Internet of Things (IoT) and Internet of Services (IoS), can constitute the basic building blocks to progress towards unified ICT platforms for a variety of applications within the large framework of smart cities.

The combination of the Internet and emerging technologies such as near-field and BLE communications, real-time localization, and embedded sensors lets us transform everyday objects into smart objects that can understand and react to their environment.

In the last years, Cultural Heritage has turned out to be one of the most suitable domains in which such achievements can be profitably exploited, since it characterizes a domain where several aspects have to be considered at the same time. In line with SITIS tradition of promoting interdisciplinary research, the international workshop on Visions on Internet of Cultural Things and Applications, VICTA ’16, aims to be a profitable informal working day to discuss together hot topics about Internet of Things and its applications within the Smart City and the Cultural Heritage domain.

This third edition will be organized by DATABENC, the High Technology district for Cultural Heritage in Campania region, Italy. Authors are encouraged to submit both theoretical and applied papers on their research in the following topics.

Topics of interest for the workshop, include (but are not limited to) aspects of:

Internet of Things.
Innovative ICT solutions within Cultural environments (e.g. museums, exhibitions, etc.)
Smart Objects and Smart Environments
Smart City solutions
Knowledge classification and semantic representation in Cultural environments
Embedded platforms and sensors
Multimedia systems, applications and services for Cultural Heritage
Multimedia recommendations and User profiling techniques
Interactive 3D media and immersive environments
Data in social networks
Data mining analytics applied to Smart Cities
Data collection and management
Semantic-Web data
Big Data in Cultural Heritage applications
User studies, such as museum and sites applications, human interfaces, interaction and usability
e-Learning: Tools for Education, Documentation and Training in Cultural Heritage

Extended Submission deadline: September 24, 2016

Key selection criteria for the winners was the business potential of the idea, or product, or service proposed in the chosen projects.

…. and the winner is…. (E-Space incubated projects)

One of the key objectives of Europeana Space is to help creative industries to leverage on digital cultural content for creating new products and services – thus creating new businesses and job positions.

To do so, a series of 6 E-Space Hackathons selected 3 innovative projects each, which went through another round of selection during a series of Business Modelling Workshops. Key selection criteria was the business potential of the idea, or product, or service proposed in the chosen projects.

happy participants at the TV hackathon

Now these are the names of projects currently supported by E-Space project in a in intensive business and incubation period, at the end of which they will be ready to take the challenge in the real market:

WeMakeKnown: an application to experience our cultural heritage empowering both audience and experts (from the TV hackathon in Amsterdam)

Nous: a platform utilizing new BCI and EEG technologies to understand how users subconsciously react and perceive art works as a method for institutes to change their curation and exhibition (online and offline) work processes (from the Dance hackathon in Prague)

Vivl.io: to create a best-of-breed book in browser format – the digital reading environment in which a user can read, learn, play and explore (from the Open and Hybrid Publishing hackathon in Athens)

Spiced App: creating a unique tone of voice to attract young, urban female professionals (from the Museums hackathon in Venice)

PostArt: a new app developed by the Proverb team to make collecting and sending museum postcards easy (from the Museums hackathon in Venice too)

StoryPix: a web-based storytelling service for billboards users can interact with (from the Photography hackathon in Leuven)

Picasso’s Cat: a fun reimagining of art history through cat pics (from the Photography hackathon in Leuven too).

busy participants at the Open and Hybrid Publishing hackathon

These incubated projects will be celebrated during the upcoming E-Space third international conference in Berlin (21-22 November 2016) and will be on hand to meet and talk and to showcase their products.

http://berlinconference2016.europeana-space.eu

Ars Electronica received 1,861 entries from 54 countries

STARTS Prize 2016 to “Magnetic Motion” and “Artificial Skins and Bones”

Collection Magnetic Motion / Fotocredit: Morgan O’Donovan

Ars Electronica Linz was selected to conduct the competition to determine the first two recipients of an award launched this year by the European Commission that is as prestigious as it is highly endowed. The STARTS Prize, each accompanied by a €20,000 stipend, honors innovative projects at the interface of science, technology and the arts in two categories: one for artistic research, and thus projects with the potential to influence or change the way technology is deployed, developed or perceived, and one for innovative cooperative ventures teaming up industry/technology and art/culture in ways that open up new paths for innovation.

A total of 1,861 entries from 54 countries were submitted in response to an open call that ran from February 1 to March 16, 2016.

A committee then shortlisted 30 projects, which were presented to the STARTS jurors for their consideration. Following extensive deliberations, they decided on “Magnetic Motion” by Iris van Herpen (NL) and “Artificial Skins and Bones” a project seminar staged jointly by Berlin Weißensee Academy of Art, Ottobock and Fab Lab Berlin.

Both prizewinning projects will be on display at this year’s Ars Electronica Festival (September 8-12, 2016) in Linz, where the artists as well as the respective project partners will make appearances.

Plus, a major STARTS show will highlight the next BOZAR Electronic Arts Festival (September 22-24, 2016) in Brussels. Additional STARTS presentations are scheduled for autumn in Tokyo and London.

Artificial Skins and Bones / Visible Strength / Lisa Stohn and Jhu-Ting Yang / Fotocredit: Bernardo Aviles-Busch

Science + Technology + Arts = STARTS

“In the Digital Age, art and engineering no longer represent mutually contradictory ways of thinking,” maintains G.H. Oettinger, EU Commissioner for Digital Economy and Society. Science, technology and the arts (STARTS for short) constitute a nexus at which insightful observers have identified extraordinarily high potential for innovation. Accordingly, Commissioner Oettinger foresees digital transformations in industry, culture and society providing the main impetus for interdisciplinary and inter-genre collaboration when innovation is the desired result. Moreover, he emphasizes that the link-up of technology and artistic practice is a win-win situation for both European innovation policymaking as well as the world of art, which is precisely why STARTS focuses on both artistic relevance and a project’s significance/utility for industry and society. In this context, Commissioner Oettinger emphasizes that this should by no means be construed as restricting artistic latitude for experimentation. This is said to be utterly counterproductive since creativity on the part of artists is, after all, first and foremost an upshot of their independence.

Ars Electronica Linz Meets STARTS

Since 1979, Ars Electronica has been exploring the multifarious impacts that digitization and networking are making on our world. In going about this, art, technology and society are never scrutinized as discrete domains; instead, they’re considered as interrelated elements of a unified vision. Ars Electronica’s process of artistic reflection on explosive developments, its ongoing inquiry into alternative future scenarios and the framework circumstances, strategies and protagonists necessary for their emergence, as well as the ways and means inherent in all of these activities to encourage people to get actively involved in configuring our shared future are what make Ars Electronica the ideal partner of the STARTS program. The Ars Electronica Festival, a platform and showcase that has been making a name for itself worldwide since 1979, the Prix Ars Electronica competition that has honored excellence in media art annually since 1987, the Ars Electronica Center that premiered in 1996 as a Museum of the Future and educational facility, the Ars Electronica Futurelab founded the same year as an in-house R&D lab/atelier, and Ars Electronica Solutions, the division responsible for an impressive array of joint ventures with partners in industry and commerce, also contribute mightily to this effort.

See the full information: http://www.aec.at/press/en/2016/06/23/starts2016/

Brussels (Belgium), 6th July 2016

Rethinking Data Protection and Privacy in Europe: Shaping the European Digital Future

In January 2015, Europe’s data industry together with the European Commission committed to invest €2.5 billion in a public-private partnership (PPP) that aims at accelerating the development of Europe’s data-driven economy.

Data represents a key element for research, technological innovations and economic development. It covers various topics, ranging from transport and energy to healthcare and social issues, and can empower European citizens and businesses to fully seize the opportunities of the digital environment. Efficient flow of data is therefore pivotal to move forward and build a European digital single market. However, boosting the potential of the digital market can only be accomplished if people can trust the way their personal data is being used and if clear data protection standards are put in place.

This international symposium will examine the latest developments on data protection rules discussed at EU level. It will also explore new ways to encourage innovation by implementing one common data protection standard for businesses in Europe. Furthermore, the event will address the recurring concern on the balance between privacy and security as well as the issue regarding customers’ control over personal data.

It also provides an invaluable opportunity for key stakeholders within the public and private sector to explore the measures that are being taken to reduce territorial fragmentation of data protection laws and move towards a harmonised EU digital single market. The symposium will support the exchange of ideas and encourage delegates to engage in thought-provoking topical debate with local and regional practitioners and policy makers at EU level.

Delegates will also:

Explore new developments on Data Protection Regulation in Europe
Discuss unifying data protection rules for European businesses
Consider ways to achieve the right balance between privacy and security
Assess consumers’ rights and trust regarding the protection of personal data

Date: Wednesday 6th July 2016
Time: 10:00am – 4:30pm
Venue: Thon Hotel Brussels City Centre, Brussels

Key speakers:

Michele Voznick
Policy Officer, Directorate-General Justice and Consumers, Data Protection Unit
European Commission

Dr. Els De Busser
Lecturer – Law – Faculty of Public Management, Law & Safety, Senior Researcher – Cyber Security – Faculty IT & Design The Hague University of Applied Sciences

Professor David Wallom
Associate Professor and Associate Director University of Oxford eResearch Centre

Christoph Luykx
Director, Government Relations EMEA CA Technologies

Boris Wojtan
Director of Privacy GSMA

Jos Dumortier
ICT Lawyer – Honorary Professor ICT Law time.lex

Zoe Kardasiadou
Seconded National Expert, Freedoms and Justice Department
European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights

Alexander Whalen
Senior Policy Manager Digital Europe

Ero Balsa
Privacy Researcher COSIC – KU Leuven

Christopher Stacey
Co-Director Unlock

Download the Flyer with the Agenda (PDF, 423 Kb)

Registration module (.docx 30 Kb) or please click here

Inquiries: +44 (0)20 3137 8630