“Coding da Vinci” – Deutsche Digitale Bibliothek organises Germany’s first culture hackathon
From 26th April to 6th July the Deutsche Digitale Bibliothek will be teaming up with the Service Center for Digitizatin Berlin, the Open Knowledge Foundation Deutschland and Wikimedia Deutschland to host the first “Coding da Vinci” hackathon in Berlin.
The hackathon is bringing developers, gamers and designers together with cultural institutions in a project to channel their own creativity and use open data to come up with exciting games, applications and visualisations. Open data is information that anyone can freely use and disseminate – with the maximum proviso that sources be named and data be propagated on a share-alike basis (http://okfn.de/opendata/).
In an unprecedented move digitised representations of cultural artefacts stemming from a range of institutions are now being made freely available for unrestricted use. In a dialogue between memory organisations and participants from throughout Germany developers are creating prototypical applications based on open cultural data in line with the motto “Let them play with your toys!” (Jo Pugh, National Archives UK).
Cultural institutions provide the teams with data in the form of metadata, images, audio and video files and 3D models. A frequently updated overview of supplier institutions is available on the Website, and more data and institutions are being added. Since the beginning of April all data has been downloadable.
The results of the “Coding da Vinci” project are being published under open licence for unimpeded use.
“Coding da Vinci” aims to reveal the underlying potential of the digital material being held by memory institutions. As well as fostering the development of creative and useful applications, the project also seeks to encourage links between the community of programmers, gamers and designers and memory organisations such as museums, archives and libraries.
“Coding da Vinci”: 26th/27th April to 6th July 2014
26th/27th April 2014: Presentation of information, development of ideas, hacking: Wikimedia Deutschland (Tempelhofer Ufer 23-24, 10963 Berlin)
The event will begin with cultural institutions presenting data BarCamp-style, whereby anyone is at liberty to offer a workshop, give a talk or organise a podium discussion. The Deutsche Digitale Bibliothek will be introducing and explaining its API.
The event will set out a number of challenges which participants will bear in mind when pursuing their projects; these challenges are already listed on the Coding da Vinci website. Participants will group into teams and start working with the open data. Workshops will also be held on subjects such as data visualisation, data formats and best-practice projects. The organisers invite all interested parties to register on the website and take part in the culture hackathon! A limited number of grants will be available to cover travel and accommodation.
Institutions providing material (updated 19.03.2014):
API of the Deutsche Digitale Bibliothek
Berlinische Galerie
Deutsches Archäologisches Institut
Ethnologisches Museum Berlin
Max-Planck-Institut für Wissenschaftsgeschichte Berlin
Museum für Naturkunde Berlin
Senatsverwaltung für Wirtschaft, Technologie und Forschung
Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin – Preußischer Kulturbesitz
Stadtmuseum Berlin
Zentral- und Landesbibliothek Berlin
Ten-week sprint: teams push on with projects; online phase
The teams have ten weeks in which to pursue their projects, link their material with other sets of data and present the information in an appealing and comprehensible manner. Teams will be assisted where necessary by the event hosts and cultural institutions and will organise themselves online.
6th July 2014: Presentation and public awards ceremony (venue to be announced)
An awards ceremony, open to the public, will take place on 6th July. We look forward to welcoming an audience made up of participants and other interested persons from the world of culture and technology. The teams will present their work and a jury will select the best projects.
Website and further info: http://codingdavinci.de/
Registration: http://codingdavinci.de/anmeldung/
Twitter: @codingdavinci
Hash tag: #codingdavinci