Since 2007, the PATCH workshop series (https://patchworkshopseries.wordpress.com/) have been gathering successfully researchers and professionals from various countries and institutions to discuss the topics of digital access to cultural heritage and specifically the personalization aspects in this process. Due to this rich history, the reach of the PATCH workshop in various research communities is extensive.
INTRODUCTION Cultural heritage (CH) is a privileged area for personalisation research because CH sites are rich in objects and information, far more than the visitor can absorb during the limited time of a single visit. Moreover, the convergence between CH and the Internet has made huge amounts of information about CH readily available in electronic format. Two important challenges to be addressed are thus: § How to provide an engaging experience for the digital, mobile and traditional CH visitor before, during and after a visit, by exploiting information from previous interactions on CH sites and elsewhere on the ubiquitous Web? § Can this kind of support can be a basis for maintaining a lifelong chain of personalised CH experiences, linked to broader lifelong learning? Not only traditional CH sites, but also cities are excellent test-beds for personalisation research: modern urban planning shows an avalanche of diverse initiatives focused on creative urban development. Consequently, it has become fashionable to regard the many forms of cultural expression, like art, festivals, exhibitions, media, design, digital expression and research as signposts for urban individuality and identity and departures for a new urban cultural industry.
Personalisation also has a role to play in supporting collaboration that enables groups of people to take part in the preservation, enrichment and access to cultural heritage. This is because it can be an enabler for people to be both information consumers and producers, and actively involve them in the management of cultural heritage information. Methodologies and technological utilities for online communities can help them to become actively engaged in the publishing process, contribute their knowledge, and partake in a dynamic creation and conceptualisation of the cultural resources will be thus central to the workshop themes.
During the workshop we aim to identify the typical user groups, tasks and roles in order to achieve an adequate personalisation for cultural heritage applications. Important aspects to discuss evolve around: § In-door localisation, navigation and browsing patterns; § Interaction concepts with personal (mobile or desktop) and group (on-site public or desktop) displays; § Collaboration, communication and sharing aspects in the process of cultural heritage production and consumption. The sense of presence computer-mediated environments’; § Information needs, information access (including visualisation for various sources of information, not only textual, but also 2D and 3D objects) and search pattern; – Exploiting data from various sources, i.e., catalogues, Linked Open Data, and usage logs; § §
Digital storytelling, narratives, smart summaries and recommendation explanations; Novel ICT and their impact on CH organisations and their longer-term strategies. Finally, we aim at identifying a set of requirements for personalized interaction and interfaces in the cultural heritage domain, and provide practical guidelines for deploying such personalization techniques in this domain.