Our collaborations with content partners
Content partners are organisations that entrust us with their content. They take part in digitisation projects and store digital content with meemoo, with associated agreements for accessing the content online. These partnerships are based on practical needs and the resources we’ve been allocated, and have steadily increased in number since we were founded.
Meemoo now has over 170 content partners and we’re not currently planning any further structural expansions. Minimal growth with a few new content partners per year is however possible within our existing areas of work – for example when new organisations become accredited or only decide to come on board at a later date. Any structural expansion is considered in relation to the resources available at meemoo and takes place in consultation with our Board of Directors.
Who can be a content partner?
The following types of organisations can qualify as a content partner:
broadcasters (regional and national channels);
structurally funded and/or accredited content managing cultural heritage institutions in the framework of the Cultural Heritage Act;
structurally funded cultural heritage bodies in the framework of the Cultural Heritage Act;
structurally funded performing arts organisations in the framework of the Arts Act;
major city archives;
Flemish public institution archives: Flemish parliament and administrations.
Content partners are mostly content managing institutions or organisations with sustainable operations in archiving. Individuals cannot currently become content partners. Non-commercial organisations that are not one of the types listed above can however make use of our paid services, and we provide a custom proposal for this. We already work with service buyers such as Meise Botanic Garden for the digital storage of its digitised herbarium, for example, and Ghent University for the sustainable archiving of its research data.
What do we do for our content partners?
Our content partner services fall into different categories:
digitising audiovisual content (for all content partners except cultural heritage bodies);
archiving digitised – or already digital – collections in a sustainable way;
providing access to and valorising content. Content is shared primarily with specific target groups, and always in mutual agreement with our content partners.
Our services for content partners are alligned with Digital Archive Flanders, with whom we coordinate on a regular basis.
> Read more about digitisation and digital archiving and management
How does a collaboration work?
If an organisation wants to become a meemoo content partner, we set out all the agreements, rights and obligations of the parties concerned in a declaration of intent and collaborative agreement. This includes all agreements for the preparatory phase, storage costs, re-use and sharing of content, etc. So everyone knows exactly what meemoo’s services entail, how we implement them, and what guarantees we do and don’t provide. We’re currently working on updating our collaborative agreements framework.
Once we’ve finalised the collaborative agreement with our partner, we start providing our services and training to help them get started, e.g. registering analogue carriers in an online tool and managing digital content. All content partners are allocated an account manager as their contact person. Our account managers are the link between meemoo and our content partners, and can answer questions in their own areas of expertise of refer them to other teams if necessary. Our partners can also always visit the meemoo partner portal for news and documentation intended specifically for them.