The Digital Media Library NGO Initiative – Romania’s Digital Heritage

Foto: Journalists Marius Stoian and Cristian Unteanu at the first ARPMM meeting in Bucharest|(c) CRSC Europe 2011

The project of the Digital Library of the Romanian Written Media is based on a need of the civil society and it is, like the journalist Marius Stoian calls it, a forceful political idea: the recovery of the historical textual and imagistic patrimony of a guild, of the journalistic guild of a European state.

Capitalizing on the cultural and informative deposit of the Romanian printed media is a piece of national identity, consequently a component of European cultural identity.

In the new digital era, the connection with the past can bring a clear light upon the present. The Digital Media Library should be a cornerstone for the future generations of journalists but in the same time a pillar for the new values of the Romanian media.

The value of a digital library built at this historical and material scale is hard to shape or appreciate. There are journalists that consider it the equivalent of a revolution for a national conscience that has been tormented by the releasing the files from the former Secret Services and by forgetting the journalistic history of the new nation.

A Romanian and European effort of the civil society

Transcribing the Romanian media collection (newspapers, magazines, supplement, periodicals of any rank) from a written support on the digital one it a part of the alignment to the common interest for creating the European Digital Library.

Europeana.eu, Europe’s virtual multimedia library, inaugurated in 2008, gathers 4.6 million books, maps, photos, movie clips and digitalized newspapers. Hosted by Koninklijke Bibliotek, the Dutch national library, Europeana is administrated by the European Digital Library Foundation, which gathers the most important libraries, archives, museums and cultural institutions.

The Media Digital Library of the Romania Written Media, the intellectual property of the Romanian Association of the Mass Media Professionals, brings into the attention of the civil society a new perspective from which we can understand the history in the digital era.

It’s a responsibility that lays on the shoulders of the present generation and also an invaluable resource for the common intellectual patrimony.

CRSC Europe is one of the first supporters for The Digital Media Library NGO Initiative.