The vice-president of Wikimedia Australia, Liam Wyatt, told the forum the often-criticised comparative rarity of Australia/New Zealand content in Wikipedia can be attributed in part to over-zealous protection of copyright in this part of the world.
Wikipedia/Wikimedia’s open standards dictate that it can’t use anything that cannot be licensed for general reuse. Much New Zealand’s content is more tightly restricted than that, he says.
Wyatt outlined some of the positive collaborations Wikimedia has set up with conventional museums, libraries and archives, which shows an encouraging change of attitude internationally to open licensing of content.
Museums, libraries and art galleries are already primes sites for public social interaction with information. With computing and the internet taking on an ever more personal and social face, the fields are converging in interesting ways.
Angelina Russo, from Swinburne University, Melbourne, researches technology’s role in the design of the public interface of GLAM (galleries, libraries, archives and museums) institutions. She had high praise for the colossal squid exhibit at Te Papa, where the conference was held.
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