UK: BFI and British Library Join Forces to Increase Access to Their Unique Collections

From a British Library Announcement:

The BFI [British Film Institute] and the British Library have today signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU), with the objective of increasing public, professional and research access to audiovisual and broadcast content and integrating it with other knowledge collections.

Signed by BFI Director, Amanda Nevill and British Library CEO, Dame Lynne Brindley, the MOU outlines key areas for joint strategic thinking, including public access, rights management and digitisation.

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[Our emphasis] Both organisations aim to explore areas such as: collecting policies; contributing to IPR and copyright discussions; metadata and resource discovery; how new digital technologies and enhanced physical spaces can improve access to film and television content; digital and paper conservation; exhibitions and public programmes; and how both institutions can offer services for the creative industries. More specific details will be developed at a strategic summit in early spring.

Both organisations are already collaborating as members of the UK Sound & Vision Collections group convened by the BFI and looking at national audio-visual collection policy. A letter from the group announcing its formation was recently sent to Ed Vaizey, Minister for Culture, Communications and Creative Industries. Other group members comprise the BBC, the National Archives, the Imperial War Museum, the National Media Museum, the National Library of Scotland, the National Library of Wales and National Museums Northern Ireland.

The MOU signed by both parties is non exclusive. Both the BFI and the British Library intend that this partnership will evolve as a model of best practice and in time would seek the opportunity to work with other public archives throughout the UK to expand the project. It complements the MOUs signed between the BBC and BFI in 2009 and between the BBC and the British Library in 2009.

Read the Complete Announcement

Filed under: Archives and Special Collections, Journal Articles, Libraries, Management and Leadership, National Libraries, Preservation, Resources