Open access white paper published

The GLAM-E Lab is delighted to share a new White Paper co-authored with the Royal Albert Memorial Museum & Art Gallery (RAMM) called ‘Making the Business Case for Open Access: How the Royal Albert Memorial Museum & Art Gallery adopted an Open Access Strategy for digital collections and new open business models’.

Over the past 18 months RAMM has been working with the University of Exeter to go open access. The White Paper sets out the research-led approach taken by RAMM and GLAM-E Lab to make the business case for open access, starting with a small set of 63 CC0 images published to Wikimedia Commons.

The Process of Going Open Access

When planning how to go open access RAMM held a roundtable with institutions that have gone open access. This allowed us to understand how they went open access, with each institution taking a slightly different route. We learned how they each had spoken to management, how they had selected what should be open access, where they published their open access images, etc. 

Based on this roundtable RAMM then released a trial set of open access images onto Wikimedia Commons. We released 63 images of places local to Exeter, including many buildings that no longer exist either because they were demolished or they were hit during the Blitz. The use of these images was analysed with Wiki tools and reverse image searching. We found that the images had been placed on 65 different Wikipedia pages in 7 different languages resulting in over 6.5 million views over the space of a year. These images were also used on history websites, study guides, artist websites and have inspired Wikipedia Edit-a-thons on Exeter history. 

Using the data from the trial, RAMM submitted a report to Exeter City Council to seek permission to adopt an open access strategy. This report went through various iterations before the team was happy. Once submitted the report was signed off by various departments which meant RAMM could formally adopt the open access strategy. 

RAMM’s Open Access Strategy

RAMM’s open access vision is to make our public domain collections available to everyone for research, inspiration and enjoyment, while also sharing the research outcomes of the GLAM-E Lab partnership for reuse by other organisations. Our strategy aims to ensure the wider public awareness and long-term preservation of RAMM’s collections.

At its heart, RAMM’s strategy recognises that public domain collections should remain in the public domain after digitisation. It balances this recognition against the costs of providing digital programming and open access services to the public.  We believe that adopting an open access strategy enables RAMM to fulfil its central purpose. Open access lets everyone access and use our digitised public domain artworks and contribute to the rich cultural heritage of Exeter, regardless of their location. We want people to be inspired, informed and entertained by the museum’s collection and to use it to foster individual creativity. We recognise the importance of providing knowledge and information to the public to advance our mission and to unlock new cultural discoveries. 

RAMM releases digital surrogates in “medium resolution” (300 dpi when printed at A5) using the CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication where:

• RAMM has borne the digitisation costs of 2D artworks, rather than a third party or commercial image library
• Grant-funded projects cover the digitisation costs of any collection items, in line with commitments to open access and funders’ open licensing requirements (including requirements to release the images at full size) 
• Researchers or members of the public have paid for new digitisations

RAMM wants its digitised public domain artworks to be freely downloaded, reused, circulated, modified, and shared without restrictions and by anyone who finds them. For this, Creative Commons recommends using the CC0 1.0 Public Domain Dedication. Some countries will recognise copyright, database, or related rights in artwork reproductions and data they hold. CC0 1.0 allows RAMM to waive any rights arising in these countries so users can engage with the collections without risking infringement.

What now?

RAMM is currently uploading batches onto Wikimedia Commons as we clear copyright and has so far released over 700 artworks CC0 for people to use however they wish. These include artworks of Devon, artworks by women and paintings of wildlife. RAMM will continue to release images throughout 2024. RAMM is also planning work on the RAMM Collections website which will enable download of open access images and include a short survey so that RAMM can see how the images are being used. 

After a year of releasing open access images RAMM also plans to review the strategy and see whether it can be extended to additional works. 

Funded by the AHRC, the GLAM-E Lab is a joint initiative between the Centre for Science, Culture and the Law at the University of Exeter and the Engelberg Center on Innovation Law & Policy at New York University Law School. The Lab works directly with smaller cultural institutions and community organisations to build open access capacity and expertise and to develop open access solutions that are scalable to the wider cultural sector.