Digital content is generally defined as digitized spoken language, text, graphics and videos which have by means of information technology added value for use as products or services. Taiwan digital archives program is a government-sponsored science and technology program, and one of its main goals is "to digitize our national collections and cultural heritage, and create a national digital archives".

      Dr. Der-Tsai Lee, Deputy Program Director of the Taiwan e-Learning & Digital Archives Program put it in clear and simple terms. Dr. Lee explained it further that Taiwan is the first nation in the world to initiate such a grand project by using its wherewithal to create a national digital archives from collections that belong to various government agencies, and major content holders . With the support of the government and the cooperation of the private sector, a knowledge economy chain in digital content industry is being formed. Digital content is the first mile of digital content industry, while the digital archives program is an important initiative that helps create a high-quality, extremely precious and moreover representative of Chinese digital assets for Taiwan.

Gathering Chinese digital content and creating a standard process for digital archiving

      During the six years of implementing the National Digital Archives Program (NDAP), we have accumulated a total of 3.5 million digital items in the Union Catalog which were contributed by many key museums and libraries in Taiwan, and the content span many different subjects and themes, and built a Digital 101 Exhibition System, a virtual museum which contains special items in selected collections for the public to browse over the Internet. Through the accumulated experience digitizing these cultural collections, we have developed standard operating procedures (SOPs) of digitization for each major content category. These SOPs have been published as a series of books and videos, and posted on the Internet for people to use as reference guides for digitization of collections. "The first important achievement of NDAP was a solid foundation built for creating and preserving precious Chinese digital content" said Dr. Lee.

      Furthermore the Program has also laid a foundation for digitization technology, while providing a technological bridge between basic research and applied research. The National Digital Archives Program transcends humanities, social sciences and IT disciplines. For this reason, it requires during its execution research personnel and assistants in humanities and social sciences as well as scholars and engineers in the IT field to work together. Because they have different expertise and background, they have different views and priorities. Dr. Lee noted, communicating across these different disciplines has been a challenge throughout. Since its inception, Dr. Lee proudly noted, the Program has made a significant advancement to date. That content experts and IT specialists work seamlessly together makes Taiwan's digital archives unique with the characteristic of a cross-fertilization of technologies, sciences and humanities.

      In addition, Dr. Lee pointed out that because IT continues to develop so swiftly, keeping abreast of international standards and rules has been a challenge that IT scholars and engineers must face. Intellectual property rights and related laws, as well as licensing and valuation of digitized works are issues that must be addressed in the future.

      Dr. Lee reiterated, NDAP is the only digitization project in the world that takes a national effort to digitize national cultural heritage. In recent years NDAP has work closely with international organizations, participated in workshops and conducted exchanges and dialogues with counterparts in the world who are involved in digital museum and digital library projects. This effort has helped build a very good image of Taiwan, treasuring its cultural assets as well as willing to invest national resources to the development of digital archives. To further expand its international influence, we set up the International Collaboration and Promotion Project in Phase II of the program, starting in 2007.

Enabling the commercialization of digital archives and realizing the vision of sustainability

      With the accumulation of the precious digitized assets after the first phase, the following issues emerged and must be addressed: 1) how to bring the assets to life and make them useful in a way the general public could understand; and 2) how to use the assets to improve people's cultural awareness, quality of life and self confidence. Dr. Lee observed that, to achieve commercialization of digital archives and realize the vision of sustainability, it is crucial that we make use of cutting-edge technology to infuse our rich content into education, industry and other sectors.

      Dr. Lee also noted that a bottom up approach was adopted in the first phase of this Program to create the Taiwan digital archives, such that various organizations digitized their collections independently. As a result, the digitized works were not properly organized and lack a theme. To remedy this, in Phase II the Program a top down approach is taken, thereby providing a clear direction and goals for the content organizations as well as developing a common theme for the digitization effort that is representative of Taiwan characteristics.

      Dr. Lee explained, through "intellectual property rights (IPRs) clearance" and the NDAP "Bridge Project", the promotion of these two efforts will lay the foundation and create a model for sustainability of the digital archives.

      He indicated that the objective of the "IPRs clearance" Project is to create a complete management mechanism for the Program's intellectual property rights. When this mechanism is created, it can be used as a basis to facilitate the transfer of innovative and value-added content to private sector, optimizing the economic impact of the digital content. The objective of the NDAP Bridge Project is to help develop a digital content industry. The "Bridge" is to build an IT platform for the promotion of digital contents created by NDAP and establish a mechanism to help create a marketplace for the digital content. The strategy includes using promotion, production, marketing and other schemes to identify and select content of potential or real commercial value, and to help businesses invest in production and marketing of value-added products. This will not only support the nation’s economy, but also boost international standing of Taiwan.

Becoming a key global center for digital archives and allowing the world to witness Taiwan's competitiveness

      Overall, under the Phase II plan of NDAP, key projects will include the following:

1) The creation of digital content representing Taiwan's cultural and biodiversity such as the Knowledge Base of Taiwan's Natural History, the Knowledge Base of Taiwan's Cultural History, etc..

2) The extension of the output of the digital archives to application in the aspects of culture, academics and socio-economy. This will include the promotion of IPR clearance and licensing, e.g. creative commons licensing model, and the participation of Taiwan's creative industry businesses in the New York Licensing International Expo and so on.

3) International involvement of the Program to create an international network for cooperation. The Taiwan Chapter of the Museum Computer Network (MCN) has already been established. In the future, the Program will establish the Asia-Pacific Secretariat Office of the Culture Mondo Network, an international cultural portal organization. Through such exchanges, it will be possible to demonstrate Taiwan's expertise in digital content and technology. As a result, NDAP will play a leadership role of digital archives in the international arena.

      Dr. Lee emphasized that the NDAP has created a team with innovative R&D skills in digital technology, which will help Taiwan become a key global center for Chinese cultural digital archives. Taiwan is very well positioned to help other nations with digital archives-related programs. NDAP will therefore promote international cooperation in a more vigorous manner, allowing the world to witness Taiwan's competitiveness.