On Wednesday 25 October 2023, the Gecoördineerd Initiatief voor Vlaamse Erfgoeddigitalisering (‘Coordinated Initiative for Flemish Heritage Digitisation’ - GIVE, for short) took home the Digital Flanders Award for the most sustainable project – chosen in a vote during the Digital Flanders Day event. This is a significant recognition following two intensive years of close collaborations, technical AI innovations and countless hours of meticulous registering, digitising and sustainable archiving.
Meemoo, Flemish Institute for Archives, in collaboration with over 175 partners from the cultural and government sectors, is accelerating the digital transition in Flanders with the GIVE project. Together, they are digitally mapping vulnerable and hard-to-access newspapers, glass plates and Flemish masterpieces, and enriching the descriptive data of thousands of hours of images and audio with artificial intelligence. Additionally, the GIVE project is bringing heritage a step closer to home with the expansion and revitalisation of knowyourcarrier.com, which allows you to easily identify audiovisual carriers from your personal archive – to also include photographic materials.
From 30 November, you can discover the first digitised heritage gems and fascinating anecdotes from up close. A selection of Flanders’ rich heritage will be made more accessible, searchable and reusable by the end of this year.
The jury was highly impressed with the GIVE project:
“Over the past few years, we have digitised and added metadata to audio, video, prints and photos – even including carriers that are vulnerable and difficult to access, such as newspapers and glass plates – through this initiative. The project is of great societal value for the general public and researchers alike.”
Nico Verplancke, director at meemoo, emphasised the importance of collaboration in this journey:
“Collaboration is a keyword in the GIVE project. More than 175 partners – both (very) small and large – have invested time and energy with meemoo to make the project a success. From preparing materials to actively discussing and participating in working groups, this is a story involving many people.”
Our director also thanked VLAIO (Flemish Agency for Innovation and Entrepreneurship), the Flemish Department of Culture, Youth and Media, and Minister Jambon for giving meemoo the opportunity to run this ambitious project.
Only the most impressive digital transformation projects have a chance to win a Digital Flanders Award. This year, there were 26 submissions divided into three categories. Digital Flanders recognises projects that are innovative, promote sustainability or stimulate digital inclusion. The GIVE project was therefore not the only winner! The award for the best digital transformation project went to the Flemish Department of Culture, Youth and Media’s UiTwisselingsplatform – a platform for collaboration and data sharing in the cultural sector. And non-profit organisation Dwengo won the award for the most inclusive project with its AI at school initiative.
The GIVE projects have been made possible thanks to support from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and are part of the Flemish Government’s Resilience Recovery Plan.
