IP and Business Models for Cultural Heritage Institutions

1. IP and Business Models for Cultural Heritage Institutions Rina Elster Pantalony WIPO Conference on Intellectual Property and Cultural Heritage in the Digital World Madrid, Spain October 29-30, 2009

2. The Experience Economy* • Service oriented • Consumed as a package deal • Based on consumers’ participation • Oriented on consumers’ need to associate • Based on branding and messaging • Operates across physical and virtual worlds • *Tom Kelly; The Art of Innovation; Doubleday Random House; New York; 2001

3. The Role of the Museum in the Experience Economy • Not a new phenomenon for museums • Museums are inherently social spaces • Role of modern museum includes: • Preservation • Providing access to collections • Educating the public • Entertaining and interacting in story telling • Providing the public with an experience

4. The Value of Museum Content in the Experience Economy • Commercializing authoritative content • Commercial content aggregators seek museum content for commercially driven interests • Engaging with business partners • New partnerships distinct from sponsor-based relationships that place value on authoritative content and the museum brand

5. The Value of Museum Content in the Experience Economy • Interpreters of primary content • Those who have authority and place content into context are in high demand in the online environment • Engaging interactive participation • Social spaces in the online environment that place value on visual story telling, socializing, learning, researching and communicating

6. The Role of Intellectual Property for Museums in the Experience Economy? • Is an inherent building block in creating visitor experiences • Creates association and awareness of the institution as a brand • Allows the museum to leverage its brand economically

7. Balancing Traditional Interests with Economic Interests • How do you harness this potential in keeping with a museum’s overall purpose? • Ignoring a need for balance at your peril

8. Defining Return on Investment • What constitutes success in the cultural heritage community may not constitute success in the business community • Financial sustainability forces museums to acknowledge potential

9. Return on Investment in Culture • Simon Tanner UK Study 2004*: • Not just money but service to mandate: • Serve public and educators • Promote museums and collections • Serve publishers and commercial users • Serve internal museum requirements • Recover costs of service • Manage museum collections better • Protect museums from copyright infringement • *Simon Tanner; King’s Digital Consultancy Services; “Reproduction Charging Models & Rights Policy for Digital Images in American Art Museums”; Andrew W. Mellon Foundation; New York; 2004

10. Traditional Business Models • Traditional and Successful Models: • Production of tangible goods branded by the museum: • Lines of production of goods based on or inspired by collections • Requires object-based collections

11. Traditional Business Models • Traditional and Less Successful Models • Licensing images of artworks in the museum collection • Twinned with specialized publishing industry • Based on scholarly use • Assumes a market for primary, as opposed to contextualized content

12. The Co-Branding Relationship • Presumed partners of equal stature • Partnership based on mutual need to leverage each other’s brand to create awareness • The means by which to create an optimum experience for the consumer • Based on institutionally created intellectual property such as its marks or name

13. Authenticated Content • Combines institutionally created intellectual property with its collections-based intellectual property • Leverages the brand as having the authority to contextualize content and tell the stories associated with it • Business relationships are built between information aggregators and cultural heritage institutions

14. Social Networking and the Business Model • Relatively new phenomenon of social networking • Web 2.0 – interaction and cultural heritage institutions: • Flickr.com • MySpace.com • Facebook.com • Youtube.com • Twitter.com

15. The YouTube Experiment* • Ontario Science Centre experiment to leverage audience awareness and build young following • Combines institutional intellectual property with collections-based intellectual property in the Web 2.0 interactive environment • *Kevin Von Appen; Kathy Nicholaichuk; Karen Hager; Ontario Science Centre; “WeTube: Getting Physical With a Virtual Community at the Ontario Science Centre; Museums and the Web 2009; http://www.archimuse.com/mw2009/papers/vonappen/vonappen.html

16. The YouTube Experiment • YouTube #2 search engine after Google, • Combining search capability with Ontario Science Centre brand and content • Audience interaction to create (using appropriation methods) new works (IP) ?

17. Ontario Science Centre and YouTube • Ontario Science Centre experienced 5 million views, 19 different sites, with 340 OSC produced videos thereby syndicating OSC content • In 2008, Ontario Science Centre expanded experiment to host YouTube “Meetup” • combining physical and virtual worlds to increase visitor numbers

18. Ontario Science Centre and YouTube • Attracted young demographic • Attracted new local audience • 1000 videos produced around the event by visitors/YouTubers • Only a small % covered substantive content

19. Assessing the Impact • Meetup reached 2.3 million people • Cost more to produce than traditional promotion • But • young demographic does not respond to traditional interaction • Young demographic most lucrative media market and represent future supporters of Ontario Science Centre

20. Conclusion • Traditional collections-based licensing opportunities only a part of intellectual property opportunities for museums • New media has created new ways for museums to meet mission and purpose thereby generating return on investment