- partners. Of the UK GLAM Sample data, 40 GLAMs (or 20.5%) are involved as investigators and/or partners on TaNC projects.
- TaNC funding imposes no obligation to publish outputs created with public funding for public reuse.
The increase in funding obligations over the years strongly correlates to the increase in open access to digital heritage collections. While such funding obligations are welcome, participants were concerned they might continue to provide limited reuse patches to a sector that prioritises a culture of copyright and commercialisation over open access to digital collections.
Participants commented it was harder to advocate for embedded change if open access occurs only in the margins. The experience was that it was easier for their work to be side-lined if it was externally funded. This was something seen as requiring fundamental attention.
Participants expressed frustrations that open GLAM in the UK seems reliant on funding obligations and open access carve outs. The feelings were that public funding is funded by the public, public collections are owned by the public, public institutions hold collections in trust for the public and operate according to public missions, and public domain digitisations should remain in the public domain for the public to use for whatever purpose the public so desires.
Funding obligations to publish the underlying research data (e.g., a zipped file with images, data, translations) as open access with a repository can raise barriers for researchers in higher education seeking to work with GLAM collections. Where agreements to publish the data in open access cannot be reached, researchers are unable to go through with the project. A positive alignment across funding policies would improve conditions for UK higher education and GLAM collaborations. One suggestion was to move the UKRI policy into practice with GLAMs.
5.3.4. The impact of GLAMs
As explained above, these layers build upon one another to shape what becomes the UK's digital national collection.
Each GLAM holds exclusive access to their own physical collections. With that comes significant power in terms of unique content for digitisation with added curatorial and educational insight. This will never cease being of value to commercial partnerships. However, the data suggests a culture of copyright and commercialisation is deeply embedded within GLAM practices and has already impacted the digital national collection.
First, as discussed above, GLAMs and commercial partnerships have already selected what gets digitised and how users encounter it.
Second, projects focus on digital access through new interfaces that connect collections or research and shape how users access and engage with collections in new ways.
Third, projects incorporate and produce new research on Al, deep learning, cross-collections engagement and research and other methods, which will undoubtedly produce fascinating results.
Fourth, no plans are made to release these public domain collections or publicly funded outputs for unfettered reuse.
