Digital meets Culture

Towards the largest repository of accessible and re-usable digital cultural heritage in the world

Europeana Business Plan 2015: Make the Beautiful Thing

Blowing Bubbles, 1700-1722, Pieter van der Werff, Rijksmuseum (public domain)

In May, Europeana has launched its Business Plan 2015. This is the first year of the Europeana Strategy 2015-2020, which outlines how the company will transition into a multi-sided platform: a truly networked organisation working together to create the largest repository of trusted, accessible and re-usable digital heritage in the world. The Europeana Business Plan 2015 reflects this change in perspective.

Europeana’s main aim will be to make sure its core infrastructure, processes and products are fit for enabling people – Europeana members, collaborators and all audiences, from the casual browser to the professional user – can do more and more with the data. In this sense, the most visible change of this year will be the improved user experience and engagement on the Europeana portal, where thematic channels will be introduced, making it easier to find great content.
To this end, the Network will run a country based campaign to bring in the best art pieces of each country; the new pieces collected will be used for the launch of the thematic channel on Art History in the autumn.
In 2015, Europeana we will take the first steps towards a new aggregation model for Europe, making data-sharing easier and more attractive, and will give partners more direct feedback on the results through a Statistics Dashboard. Finally, Europeana will work on improving its entrepreneurial capacity and on developing more creative tools that allow use of the content made available by the network partners.

This year, Europeana starts working on making the beautiful thing.

Balthasar Wigand Josephsplatz 1835, Wikimedia Commons (public domain)

Download the Europeana Business Plan 2015

By Karol J. Borowiecki and Trilce Navarrete

Fiscal and Economic Aspects of Europe’s Book Consumption

One of the available tools in cultural policy at the national level includes the reduction of VAT rates for cultural goods and services. Governments can decide, for instance, to lower the VAT rate for books to encourage reading and literacy. These indirect fiscal incentives receive however very little attention both at policy level as well as by the public. To remedy that, we document the standard and reduced VAT rates in European Union member states in the period from 1993 to 2013 and explored the underlying determinants. The results point at the existence of clear fundamental drivers of the standard VAT rates. However, when it comes to the reduced cultural taxes, we fail to find any correlates – it is as if the decision-making was done in a random-like process. This supports the concern that there is no clear directive on how to efficiently design the reduced rates.

We further introduce a theoretical framework explaining how reduced fiscal rates are expected to decrease prices and increase quantities of the consumed cultural goods and services. We show that a decrease in the VAT rate for books by one percentage point is associated with an economically significant drop in the price of about 2.6 percent. Finally, we show the positive effect of a fiscal reduction on household’s book expenditure, where the results imply that a one percentage point decrease in the VAT rate for books leads to an increase in expenditure by about 2.7 percent.

Figure 1. Prices, expenditure per household and VAT rate for books

An improved understanding of the reduced cultural taxes will allow to effectively employ this policy in order to support consumption of, among others, the fast growing digital heritage markets, such as the e-books market. It has been actually the increased use of digital technology for the production, distribution and consumption of cultural goods and services that has raised questions regarding the VAT Directive. Due to the positive externalities associated with cultural consumption, markets fail to provide the optimum quantity of culture at the right price. Tax instruments are thus proposed as effective tools that can be used to change the quantities and prices, in order to tackle market failures. From a policy perspective, this suggests that a reduction in VAT rates can stimulate household consumption and consequently should be designed in conjunction with a national cultural policy.

Paper can be downloaded here.

The study is part of the FP7 EU funded project RICHES: Renewal, Innovation and Change: Heritage and European Society.

The authors:

Karol Jan Borowiecki, Associate Professor at the Department of Business and Economics, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark. E-mail: kjb@sam.sdu.dk (corresponding author).

Trilce Navarrete, Postdoc at the Department of Business and Economics, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark. E-mail: trilce.navarrete@gmail.com.

The Associated Project will share experiences and guidelines and participate on RICHES Project activities

RICHES signs a Memorandum of Understanding with the “EuroVision – Museums Exhibiting Europe” (EMEE) project

RICHES (Renewal, Innovation and Change: Heritage and European Society) has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the project “EuroVision – Museums Exhibiting Europe” (EMEE).

This new cooperation will allow exploring synergies between both projects, especially on the case studies addressing the role of museums. The RICHES workshop “The context of change and the move from analogue to digital” (Ankara, 13-14 May 2015) has been the first opportunity to share experiences. Representatives of the EMEE project have attended the event, which has been the framework to discuss risks and opportunities on this context of change and its impact on Cultural Heritage.

RICHES workshop “The context of change and the move from analogue to digital”
Photo: Promoter Srl

The “EuroVision – Museums Exhibiting Europe” (EMEE) project explores an innovative interdisciplinary approach for national and regional museums to re-interpret their objects in a broader context of European and transnational history. The necessary theoretical and practical framework is developed, put into practice and evaluated by an international, trans-sectoral network bringing together the creative excellence of museums and cultural workers in a project based on the scientific expertise of history didactics in mediating culture.

EMEE_Young Scenographers Travelling Exhibition 3

EMEE Young Scenographers Contest, Travelling Exhibition
Photo: Janine Pichler

The project, which runs for four years (2012-2016) and is funded by the Culture Programme of the European Union, was initiated by the Chair of History Didactics of Augsburg University. It is implemented by eight interdisciplinary project partners from seven European countries. The aim of the project is to advance the modernization of museums by re-interpreting museum objects and topics from a trans-regional European perspective as well as by innovative mediating approaches. Thereby, especially national and regional museums shall be encouraged to try out new ideas and concepts through which a timely orientation of the institution “museum” in today’s intercultural, heterogeneous society can be furthered.

EMEE_Project Meeting in Vienna_June 2014

The EMEE project team during a meeting in Vienna, Austria in June 2014
© EMEE EuroVision – Museums Exhibiting Europe

Further information about the new member of the RICHES Network, “EuroVision – Museums Exhibiting Europe” (EMEE) project, at the following link:

www.museums-exhibiting-europe.eu

#EMEEurovision

Bari, 24-25 September 2015

Off the Beaten Track. Epigraphy at the Borders

“Off the Beaten Track. Epigraphy at the Borders” is the sixth in a series of international events planned by EAGLE (Europeana network of Ancient Greek and Latin Epigraphy).

This initiative is organised in Bari, from Thursday 24 September to Friday 25 September 2015, with the support of the Department of Classics and Late Antiquity Studies at the University of Bari “Aldo Moro”.

Aim of the meeting is to discuss issues and raise questions about encoding inscriptions different from those labelled as standard, starting from archaic times to the Middle Ages and beyond, even in languages other than Greek and Latin. Organisers intend to address peculiarities that are due to specific carriers (material supports) and/or executing techniques or also to graphic shapes, non-alphabetical signs and generally visual components relating to the epigraphic texts.

During the event, the EAGLE Portal will be officially launched and presented to the public for the first time, together with the EAGLE Storytelling Application. A training session on how to use the EAGLE Storytelling Application will be offered.

Further Info:

Event website: http://www.eagle-network.eu/about/events/sixth-eagle-international-event-2015/

Program Committee Chairs
Antonio Enrico Felle, University of Bari, Italy
Silvia Orlandi, Sapienza Università di Roma, Italy

Contact Information
For information on this workshop please contact one of the members of the steering committee.

Steering Committee
Antonio Felle (University of Bari) antonio.felle@uniba.it
Anita Rocco (University of Bari) anita.rocco@uniba.it
Raffaella Santucci (Sapienza, University of Rome) raffaella.santucci@uniroma1.it

Centre for Dance Research of Coventry University seeks highly motivated individuals

Vacancies at C-DaRE: apply within 30 June 2015!

C-DaRE has established itself as one of the UK’s leading Centres for dance research. It brings together artists and scholars, working collaboratively with partners from across the creative and cultural industries, both nationally and internationally, for interdisciplinary research. C-DaRE specialises in an inclusive approach to diverse forms of artistic research in dance, supported by new approaches to documentation, analysis and publication in various formats. Artistic research in dance at the Centre is situated within a range of interrelated areas including: research into the impact of digital technologies on the creation, transmission and distribution of dance; reflexive enquiry into forms of somatic practice; understanding of choreographic creativity; development of alternative sites for performance including screen and site-responsive dance.

C-DaRE is seeking highly motivated individuals, able to contribute to one or more of its research strands at the following levels:

Professors (2) – senior researchers with an international profile, a strong track record in achieving external research funding, excellent publication record and considerable experience in PhD supervision.
Senior Research Fellows (2) able to contribute high level research in a dance field, with a track record in income generation, excellent publication of research outputs and experience of supervising PhD students.
Research Assistants who are early career post-doctoral researchers, eager to provide support for research activities, including support for funding bids, editorial assistance, organisation of research events and other duties in support of the strategic work of the Centre.
Operations Manager –a key managerial role acting as chief operating officer for the Centre responsible for the day to day operations of the Centre; development and delivery of targets; management and reporting of administrative systems, finance, income and recruitment-related activity; building external relationships.

Closing dates for all posts: 30th June 2015
For full details and the application process please click on the headings below to be taken to the Coventry University Recruitment site.
Professor
Senior Research Fellow
Research Assistant
Operations Manager

The Hague, 16-18 September 2015

DiXiT Convention: submission deadline extended!

The deadline to submit proposals for the DiXiT Convention “TECHNOLOGY, SOFTWARE, STANDARDS FOR THE DIGITAL SCHOLARLY EDITION” has been extended to Thursday the 28th of May 2015.

The call for paper is open to everybody (except DiXiT fellows).

The Huygens Institute for the History of the Netherlands is organising the first of DiXiT’s three conventions, being held on September 16-18 2015 in The Hague, the Netherlands. The convention will be an informal meeting where the DiXiT research fellows will present their first results within interactive sessions. The event will be a lively get-together bristling with new ideas and people working in the field of scholarly editing and digital humanities are warmly invited to participate!

Programme

Monday 14: informal meeting of DiXiT fellows
Tuesday 15: two parallel workshops
– Net7 will present Pundit and Muruca
– Huygens ING will run a workshop ‘TEI and neighbouring standards’
Wednesday 16 until Friday 18 (morning): the Convention proper (“Technology, Software, Standards for the Digital Scholarly Edition”)
Friday 18 (afternoon) DiXiT supervisory board session

Keynotes will be given by Leo Jansen, editor of the acclaimed edition of Van Gogh’s letters, Laurent Romary, director of DARIAH, and Lorna Hughes, chair in digital humanities at the University of London’s School of Advanced Study (SAS).

Call for papers:

In order to broaden the scope and diversity of the meeting, the convention organisers are issuing this call.
While the focus of the convention is on technology, software and standards, topics for the sessions may include anything related to scholarly digital editing, such as:

tools for editing, collation, publication
text mark-up: application, development, advantages, disadvantages
sustainability and preservation of editions: economic and technical
editing as a social endeavour: crowd-sourcing, social editions and other forms of collaboration
the role of the editor in digital editing
other

Organisers encourage exploratory papers. Early-career scholars are welcome.
People interested in presenting a twenty-minute paper please mail their proposal to congres@huygens.knaw.nl.

The proposal should include:

name and email of the presenter
title of paper
abstract (ca. 400 words)

Dates:

call for papers: April 21, 2015
proposals due: May 28, 2015
decision about acceptance: June 14, 2015
meeting: September 14-18, 2015

Dixit Convention website: dixit.huygens.knaw.nl

The DiXiT project is an Initial Training Network funded by the European Commission under the Marie-Curie scheme. Its consortium is composed of many high-profile European universities and research institutions, which work together training a new generation of digital scholarly editors.

RICHES Workshop in Ankara (Turkey), Turkish National Library, 13-14 May 2015

International experts explore the context of change and the move from analogue to digital

Cultural Heritage (CH) itself, the ways in which it is made, held, collected, curated, exhibited, or simply exists, have completely changed in the 21^st century. This context of change has also transformed the roles and links between memory institutions, CH professionals, citizens, and economic and social actors at all the spheres of society.

In order to understand this context of change, the RICHES project organised a workshop at the Turkish National Library (Ankara, Turkey). Two intense days of discussion allowed the participants to discuss key questions about how these transformations are evolving, and identify the main opportunities and trends for the upcoming years.

After the welcome messages by Zulfi Toman, General Director (National Library, Turkey) and Hamdi Tursucu, General Director (KYGM, Turkey), the RICHES project was presented by the project coordinator Neil Forbes (Coventry University, UK). The first day of the workshop was devoted to explore the move from analogue to digital. The session was opened by Dr. Yasar Tonta (Hacettepe University, Turkey), who presented the Digital Future of the Past. The presentation addressed some of the stewardship challenges such as infrastructure and policy issues to preserve the past in digital form in perpetuity. The Rijksmuseum Volkenkunde-National Museum of Ethnography (Netherlands) explored the impact of the digital on ethnographic museums. Ahmad Lash, from the Department of Antiquities (Jordan), presented MEGA JORDAN, a geographic information system (GIS) to inventory and manage archaeology sites, which constitutes a best practice example on how to exploit digital technologies in the Cultural Heritage field. This session was complemented by the case studies developed within the RICHES project. On that sense, Bahadir Aydinonat (KYGM, Turkey) presented the evaluation of the Turkish National Library Digital Services in terms of user perspective, and Katerina Charatzopoulou (SPK, Germany) the case study on Museum Collections online and their potential for research. This first day was closed by Antonella Fresa (Promoter Srl, Italy), who presented the final conclusions of this session seeking to understand the context of change and the move from analogue to digital.

On the 14th May the workshop explored best practices and trends on Cultural Heritage transmission in a changing world. Amalia Sabiescu (Coventry University, UK) provided insights about this context of change, particularly on the development of new skills and the preservation of traditional skills. Mayor Veysel Tiryaki, from the Ankara Municipality of Altindag (Turkey), presented the experience of Hamamonu and the transformation of physical resources. A guided tour on the afternoon allowed the participants to discover the results of the intervention at Hamamonu, which constitutes a case study in the framework of the RICHES project. Exploring the CH transmission and its impact on education and learning, Prof. Dr. Mehmet Emin Kucuk (Hacettepe Technology Transfer Center, Turkey) presented the Global Libraries Project Turkey. Closing that session, MEMOLA Project presented its activities on Cultural Landscapes as places to get involved.

The final session of the workshop was completely interactive and open to discussion. Participants addressed specific aspects linked to the workshop topics in three parallel discussion groups:

TRANSMITTING CULTURAL HERITAGE: preserve & curate in a context of change
TALKING CULTURAL HERITAGE: communication and connectedness in the digital age, user engagement, mediated and un-mediated culture
THE MOVE FROM ANALOGUE TO DIGITAL: main risks and opportunities

Finally, the findings of the discussion sessions where reported to the global audience, and the RICHES project coordinator, Neil Forbes, concluded the event sharing the closing remarks. The event has been a successful platform to discuss key aspects linked to the RICHES project research, proving insights to continue exploring and understanding the context of change and the move from analogue to digital.

The abstract and speakers profile of the delivered presentations can be downloaded here: ANKARA WORKSHOP_SPEAKERS_Presentations

The workshop presentations are online:

Neil Forbes (Coventry University, UK): RICHES General Presentation

Dr. Yasar Tonta (Hacettepe University, Turkey): The Digital Future of the Past

Wayne Modest (Rijksmuseum Volkenkunde-National Museum of Ethnography, Netherlands): Fashioning Futures – Digitality and the Museum of World Cultures

Ahmad Lash, Arwa Massa’deh (Department of Antiquities, Jordan): Data Base and monitoring the Heritage of Jordan

Bahadir Aydinonat, Hakan Koray Ozluk (KYGM, Turkey): Evaluation of Turkish National Library Digital Services in terms of user perspective

Monika Hagedorn-Saupe, Katerina Charatzopoulou (SPK, Germany): Museum Collections online and their potential for research

Antonella Fresa (Promoter Srl, Italy): Understanding the context of change and the move from analogue to digital

Amalia Sabiescu (Coventry University, UK): Digital Craft Traditional and New Skills

Prof. Dr. Mehmet Emin Kucuk (Hacettepe Technology Transfer Center, Turkey): Global Libraries Project Turkey_Education-Learning

Lara Delgado Anés, Maurizio Toscano, José María Martín Civantos (MEMOLA Project): Cultural Landscapes Places to get involved

Creative re-use of digitised contents and citizen participation among the main challenge of the Digital Age

NALIS Forum 2015 successfully concluded

The fourth international forum, organised by the NALIS Foundation with the support of America for Bulgaria Foundation, took place on 12 May 2015 in Sofia, at the Radisson Blu Grand Hotel Sofia. This year the event, entitled “The Challenge to Collaborate in the Digital Age“, was dedicated to the large library consortia.

Jo Rademakers, Director of LIBIS, the Belgian library network (Photo: E.Voleva)

Special guests were: delegates of the Ministry of Education and Ministry of Culture; members of the Parliament and other official guests; representatives of the NALIS Foundation, its founders and associates; representatives from libraries and universities; museums; NGOs (non-governmental organisations) and other cultural organisations. Among them Antonella Fresa from Promoter SRL, participating as invited speaker with a talk on digitisation, creative re-use of cultural content and citizen participation. In order to validate the sociological impact of digital cultural heritage and technologies, Fresa presented some of the successful projects Promoter and NALIS were involved in (in particular EuropeanaPhotography, giving life to the Photoconsortium Association) and added some words about the ongoing EU projects E-Space, Civic Epistemologies and RICHES, whereof Promoter is taking care with the role of Technical Coordinator/Communication & Dissemination Manager. [download Fresa’s presentation]

The event was opened by Vanya Kastreva, Deputy Minister of Education, and Carl H. Pforzheimer III, Co-Chairman of the America for Bulgaria Foundation. The lecturers were representatives of leading libraries/library networks and cultural organisations from Europe and the US, who shared their experience in local and global collaboration (not only within the library community, but also within the IT community) in the framework of projects involving the digitisation of cultural heritage, creative re-use of digitised cultural contents and citizen participation.

Antonella Fresa, Promoter SRL (Photo: E.Voleva)

After the conference, the lecturers went for a pleasant sightseeing in the old Sofia.

Watch the speakers’ presentations on the NALIS YouTube channel.

View the photogallery of the NALIS Forum 2015:

[Show as slideshow]

Download the programme

Visit the NALIS Foundation’s website

October 11 - 16, 2015 - St. Julians, Malta. Deadline: June 1, 2015

HUSO 2015: First International Conference on Human and Social Analytics – Call for Papers

The recent development of social networks, numerous ad hoc interest-based formed virtual communities, and citizen-driven institutional initiatives raise a series of new challenges in considering human behaviour, both on personal and collective contexts.

HUSO 2015, The First International Conference on Human and Social Analytics, is an inaugural event bridging the concepts and the communities dealing with emotion-driven systems, sentiment analysis, personalized analytics, social human analytics, and social computing.

The event has opened a call for papers, looking for academic, research, and industrial contributions. Technical papers presenting research and practical results are welcome, as well as position papers addressing the pros and cons of specific proposals, such as those being discussed in the standard fora or in industry consortia, or survey papers addressing the key problems and solutions on any of the above topics short papers on work in progress, and panel proposals.

All tracks/topics are open to both research and industry contributions.

Tracks:

– Emotion basics
– Emotion-driven systems
– Sentiment analysis
– Social human analytics
– Personalized human analytics
– Social computing

The submission deadline for the presentation of full papers is June 1, 2015.

INSTRUCTION FOR THE AUTHORS

Authors of selected papers will be invited to submit extended versions to one of the IARIA Journals.

Publisher: XPS (Xpert Publishing Services)
Archived: ThinkMind^TM Digital Library (free access)
Prints available at Curran Associates, Inc.
Articles will be submitted to appropriate indexes.

Important deadlines:

Submission (full paper)	June 1, 2015
Notification	July 12, 2015
Registration	July 30, 2015
Camera ready	August 30, 2015

Contribution types

regular papers [in the proceedings, digital library]
short papers (work in progress) [in the proceedings, digital library]
ideas: two pages [in the proceedings, digital library]
extended abstracts: two pages [in the proceedings, digital library]
posters: two pages [in the proceedings, digital library]
posters: slide only [slide-deck posted on www.iaria.org]
presentations: slide only [slide-deck posted on www.iaria.org]
demos: two pages [posted on www.iaria.org]
doctoral forum submissions: [in the proceedings, digital library]

Proposals for:

mini symposia: [in the proceedings, digital library]
workshops: [in the proceedings, digital library]
tutorials: [slide-deck posted on www.iaria.org]
panels: [slide-deck posted on www.iaria.org]

FORMATS

Only .pdf or .doc files will be accepted for paper submission. All received submissions will be acknowledged via an automated system.

Final author manuscripts will be 8.5″ x 11″, not exceeding 6 pages; max 4 extra pages allowed at additional cost. The formatting instructions can be found on the Instructions page. Helpful information for paper formatting can be found on the here. Latex templates are also available.

Slides-based contributions can use the corporate/university format and style.

Your paper should also comply with the additional editorial rules.

Once you receive the notification of contribution acceptance, you will be provided by the publisher an online author kit with all the steps an author needs to follow to submit the final version. The author kits URL will be included in the letter of acceptance.

It is recommended to not use too many extra pages, even if you can afford the extra fees. No more than 2 contributions per event are recommended, as each contribution must be separately registered and paid for. At least one author of each accepted paper must register to ensure that the paper will be included in the conference proceedings and in the digital library, or posted on the www.iaria.org (for slide-based contributions).

CONTRIBUTION TYPE

Regular Papers (up to 6-10 page article -6 pages covered the by regular registration; max 4 extra pages allowed at additional cost- ) (oral presentation)
These contributions could be academic or industrial research, survey, white, implementation-oriented, architecture-oriented, white papers, etc. They will be included in the proceedings, posted in the free-access ThinkMind digital library and sent for indexing. Please submit the contributions following the instructions for the regular submissions using the “Submit a Paper” button and selecting the appropriate contribution type. 12-14 presentation slides are suggested.

Short papers (work in progress) (up to 4 pages long) (oral presentation)
Work-in-progress contributions are welcome. These contributions represent partial achievements of longer-term projects. They could be academic or industrial research, survey, white, implementation-oriented, architecture-oriented, white papers, etc. Please submit the contributions following the instructions for the regular submissions using the “Submit a Paper” button and selecting the contribution type as work in progress. Contributors must follow the conference deadlines, describing early research and novel skeleton ideas in the areas of the conference topics. The work will be published in the conference proceedings, posted in the free-access ThinkMind digital library and sent for indexing. For more details, see the Work in Progress explanation page. 12-14 presentation slides are suggested.

Ideas contributions (2 pages long) (oral presentation)
This category is dedicated to new ideas in their very early stage. Idea contributions are expression of yet to be developed approaches, with pros/cons, not yet consolidated. Ideas contributions are intended for a debate and audience feedback. Please submit the contributions following the instructions for the regular submissions using the “Submit a Paper” button and selecting the contribution type as Idea. Contributors must follow the conference deadlines, describing early research and novel skeleton ideas in the areas of the conference topics. The work will be published in the conference proceedings, posted in the free-access ThinkMind digital library and sent for indexing. For more details, see the Ideasexplanation page. 12-14 presentation slides are suggested.

Extended abstracts (2 pages long) (oral presentation)
Extended abstracts summarize a long potential publication with noticeable results. It is intended for sharing yet to be written, or further on intended for a journal publication. Please submit the contributions following the instructions for the regular submissions using the “Submit a Paper” button and selecting the contribution type as Extended abstract. Contributors must follow the conference deadlines, describing early research and novel skeleton ideas in the areas of the conference topics. The work will be published in the conference proceedings, posted in the free-access ThinkMind digital library and sent for indexing. 12-14 presentation slides are suggested.

Posters (paper-based, two pages long) (oral presentation)
Posters are intended for ongoing research projects, concrete realizations, or industrial applications/projects presentations. The poster may be presented during sessions reserved for posters, or mixed with presentation of articles of similar topic. A two-page paper summarizes a presentation intended to be a POSTER. This allows an author to summarize a series of results and expose them via a big number of figures, graphics and tables. Please submit the contributions following the instructions for the regular submissions using the “Submit a Paper” button and selecting the contribution type as Poster Two Pages. Contributors must follow the conference deadlines, describing early research and novel skeleton ideas in the areas of the conference topics. The work will be published in the conference proceedings, posted in the free-access ThinkMind digital library and sent for indexing. 8-10 presentation slides are suggested. Also a big Poster is suitable, used for live discussions with the attendees, in addition to the oral presentation.

Posters (slide-based, only) (oral presentation)
Posters are intended for ongoing research projects, concrete realizations, or industrial applications/projects presentations. The poster may be presented during sessions reserved for posters, or mixed with presentation of articles of similar topic. The slides must have comprehensive comments. This type of contribution only requires a 8-10 slide-deck. Please submit the contributions following the instructions for the regular submissions using the “Submit a Paper” button and selecting the contribution type as Poster (slide-only). The slide-deck will be posted, post-event, on www.iaria.org.
8-10 presentation slides are suggested. Also a big Poster is suitable, used for live discussions with the attendees, additionally to the oral presentation.

Presentations (slide-based, only) (oral presentation)
These contributions represent technical marketing/industrial/business/positioning presentations. This type of contribution only requires a 12-14 slide-deck. Please submit the contributions following the submission instructions by using the “Submit a Paper” button and selecting the contribution type as Presentation (slide-only). The slide-deck will be posted, post-event, on www.iaria.org.
12-14 presentation slides are suggested.

Demos (two pages) [posted on www.iaria.org]
Demos represent special contributions where a tool, an implementation of an application, or a freshly implemented system is presented in its alfa/beta version. It might also be intended for thsoe new application to gather the attendee opinion. A two-page summary for a demo is intended to be. It would be scheduled in special time spots, to ensure a maximum attendance from the participants. Please submit the contributions following the submission instructions by using the “Submit a Paper” button and selecting the contribution type as Demos. The Demos paper will be posted, post-event, onwww.iaria.org.

Doctoral forum submissions: (up to 6-10 page article -6 pages covered the by regular registration; max 4 extra pages allowed at additional cost- ) (oral presentation)
There contributions refer to PhD dissertations, new PhD approaches, and PhD out-of-the-book thinking, etc. They will be included in the proceedings, posted in the free-access ThinkMind digital library and sent for indexing. Please submit the contributions following the instructions for the regular submissions using the “Submit a Paper” button and selecting the appropriate contribution type Doctoral forum. 12-14 presentation slides are suggested.

Tutorial proposals
Tutorials provide overviews of current high interest topics. Proposals should be for 2-3 hour long. Proposals must contain the title, the summary of the content, and the biography of the presenter(s). The tutorials’ slide decks will be posted on the IARIA site.
Please send your proposals to tutorial proposal

Panel proposals
The organizers encourage scientists and industry leaders to organize dedicated panels dealing with controversial and challenging topics and paradigms. Panel moderators are asked to identify their guests and manage that their appropriate talk supports timely reach our deadlines. Moderators must specifically submit an official proposal, indicating their background, panelist names, their affiliation, the topic of the panel, as well as short biographies. The panel’s slide deck will be posted on the IARIA site.
Please send your proposals to panel proposal

Workshop proposals
See http://www.iaria.org/workshop.html

Mini Symposium proposal
See http://www.iaria.org/symposium.html

Updates about the Call for Papers and the International Conference will be regularly published at the conference website.

Brussels, 12 June 2015

Open Standards for ICT Procurement: Saving while reducing ICT lock-in

The Scenario

Under Digital Agenda, the European Commission commits itself through Action 23 to provide guidance on the link between ICT Standardisation and Public Procurement in order to help public authorities use standards to promote efficiency and reduce lock-in.

As a matter of fact, using ICT open standards results in:

Higher savings when procuring ICT
An increased level of competition among suppliers
Being compliant with EU Public Procurement directives

The Workshop

If you are involved somehow in ICT procurement and want to know how other organizations similar to yours are successfully dealing with ICT “lock-in”, you are warmly invited to attend the “Open Standards for ICT Procurement: Saving while reducing ICT lock-in” workshop, taking place in Brussels – at DG CONNECT – on June 12th, 2015.

The Workshop will be a great opportunity to meet MSP members, procurement managers, policymakers and ICT suppliers to discuss how to effectively reduce lock-in by using Open Standards.

The main goals of the event are:

Discuss ways in which Pre-Commercial Procurement can be used as a tool to steer the development of solutions towards concrete public sector needs;
Share some good and bad practice examples about the Procurement of ICT and Innovation within EU Public Administrations;
Gather new ideas to revamp the EC policy for the procurement of ICT products and services on the base of standards

Best practice examples have been carefully selected to match the needs and wants of all potential participants. In addition, we planned various networking opportunities to allow you to share your opinion with a number of top-tier experts.

Participation is free and subject to availability. You can register on-line at: http://www.pwc.com/it/OpenICTProcurement

A Detailed Agenda of the Workshop will be soon uploaded on Joinup.