Finland’s cultural portal opens its doors
Published: 16.5.2008
The MICHAEL cultural portal combines the digital materials of Finland’s museums, libraries and archives. Previously, Finland’s memory organizations were not linked by a national online service. The cultural portal is one of 19 MICHAEL portals opened in Europe that will provide information for the MICHAEL (Multilingual Inventory of Cultural Heritage in Europe) portal.
Thanks to increased digitization, all citizens can access Finland’s cultural tradition over the Internet. Finland’s memory organizations have comprehensively digitized our country’s historical source materials: parish records, census lists, maps, compilations, newspapers, photographs, object collections and works of art. The browsing and use of the digitized materials is for the most part free of charge for all users. The MICHAEL cultural portal assembles these collections under the same service and facilitates users’ access to Finland’s most significant materials.
Finland’s MICHAEL cultural portal is being implemented cooperatively by the country’s eKAM memory organizations (electronic libraries, archives and museums), and it is part of the MichaelPlus project funded by the European Commission’s eTEN program. In Finland, the project’s official partners are the National Board of Antiquities, the National Archives of Finland and the National Library of Finland, whose National Digitization Centre is coordinating the project.
Finland’s MICHAEL cultural portal opens its doors at the address:
http://www.michael-culture.fi
The pan-European portal can be found at the address:
http://www.michael-culture.org/en/home
Further information
Majlis Bremer-Laamanen, Director, The National Digitization Centre,
The Centre for Microfilming and Conservation in Mikkeli
majlis.bremer-laamanen (at) helsinki.fi
Terhi Mikkola, Project coordinator, The National Digitization Centre,
The Centre for Microfilming and Conservation in Mikkeli
terhi.mikkola (at) helsinki.fi
