The British Library and the BFI, the lead body for film in the UK, have 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.
Managed by a joint steering committee, this new partnership will look at ways the UK’s leading custodians of the nation’s audiovisual and broadcast heritage can meet the challenges of collecting, preserving and providing contemporary and long term access to their unique collections in the digital age, for the benefit of research and the wider public.
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.
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.
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