Cultural repositories and discoverability of content

• Associations
• Commons
• Departments
• Local public enterprises
• EPCI with own taxation
• Public institutions/ State services
• Regions

Eligible for this funding window are:

• the services of the Ministry of Culture (central and decentralized administration, services with national competence)
• operators under the supervision of the Ministry of Culture and similar bodies
• institutions certified or agreed by the Ministry of Culture and other partners aligned with the Ministry’s digital strategy

Projects must meet one or more of the following objectives:

• enable the production and sharing of new reusable repositories
• remove constraints mainly related to data quality that prevent the sharing and reuse of repositories
• to test new uses which concern the reference systems and which could interest the cultural sector
• encourage the alignment of repositories with other cultural repositories (or by relying on pivots such as Wikidata and/or DBpedia) in order to enrich and create a link between the data

The duration of the project does not exceed 12 months.

Before officially submitting a project, the applicant and the Ministry of Culture leave themselves the possibility of organizing exchanges in the form of discussion workshops forassess the timeliness and quality of the project and possibly propose a readjustment or abandonment of the project in relation to the objectives and budgets of the Ministry of Culture.

Projects may include one or more types of action:

1. Production of new repositories or redesign of existing ones : identifying stable and highly shareable data within the organization can lead to the production of a common repository – this may involve identifying, co-producing, standardizing and structuring, and to set up governance for the construction of a new common framework.
2. Reference cleaning : Data cleaning operations are often based on computer algorithms. This type of operation makes it possible to prepare data sets in the most technical and industrial way possible. In most cases, this may involve deleting duplicates, deleting/replacing erroneous data, deconcatening/separating fields or elements of a file, identifying/filling in empty mandatory elements, etc.
3. Rise in “scientific” quality: cleaning operations are sometimes not enough to have complete and quality standards. Some operations require a more intellectual and scientific intervention that must be carried out by a specialist in the field: he will intervene to complete, disambiguate, clean the fields and this, based on their own knowledge of the field and/or scientific research.
4. Enrichment of existing datasets based on repositories : The aim is to integrate reference data into datasets based on repositories.  
5. Semiantisation: to be exploited and made available in the web of the linked data, some repository producers can be accompanied by a service provider to transform the structures of this data in RDF format.
6. Alignment : These are operations related to the production of cultural repository alignments with other repositories and more particularly according to the principles of the linked data web. It is important to note that in this case, it will be appropriate not only to share the aligned repositories but also the matching sets from these operations.
7. Merge: Merging multiple datasets, regardless of format, creates a single repository from multiple repositories. This sometimes requires technical and/or scientific cleaning of the final dataset. For example, to obtain a single list of authorities from several lists: it will be necessary to define a data model, to perform the merger operation, then to clean and validate the results of the operation. Merging or reconciling knowledge graphs, for example, makes it possible to preserve the history of developments, which is more in line with good practice. When it comes to lists or records of authority, the management of homonyms and duplicates are quite heavy operations that sometimes require the intervention of a third party.

The grant cannot exceed €23,000.

The grant is paid in two instalments:

• 80% of the first Party at the signing of the Convention
• a second part of 20% at the end of the project and in compliance with the commitments made by the beneficiary (sharing of results and feedback)

The file is evaluated by a group of experts of the Ministry of Culture according to the following criteria:

• reusability of project results by actors other than project sponsors
• interest in the ecosystem of the Ministry of Culture
• interest in data interoperability and use of web-based technologies related data
• interdisciplinarity of the project or shared reflection between several organizations
• taking into account the constraints of transfer, hosting, maintenance and sustainability of the datasets concerned
• anticipation of the deployment phase within cultural institutions

Processing of files

The project description sheet is reviewed by a group of experts internal and/or external to the Ministry of Culture. This step ensures the eligibility of the project and allows for its evaluation.
In this context, the Ministry of Culture may have to contact the applicant in order to better assess the application.

If the project is selected, the applicant is invited to provide the administrative documents necessary for the establishment of an agreement materializing the grant.

If the file is retained, the beneficiary undertakes to:

• share with the community the results of the project, the window aimed at promoting the widest possible sharing of reference systems. The holder will thus authorize the dissemination on the platform of the Ministry of Culture of each data set that has benefited from the device, whether it is a reference system or a matching set if it is an alignment operation
• make available to the Ministry of Culture each set of data that has benefited from the scheme in csv and/or RDF/SKOS format, whether it is a repository or a matching set if it is an alignment operation
• provide feedback on the project which should be presented in a summary document. This feedback can be shared and presented at events organized by the Ministry of Culture
• systematically mention the support provided by the Ministry of Culture in all communication and promotion actions related to the project (single mention “This project was supported by the Ministry of Culture” accompanied by the logo of the ministry)
• authorize the departmentto use your name, brand and logo for any institutional communication action related to this window

• File Open: February 2023
• Deadline for submission: 13 October 2023, 23:59 (Paris time). No file may be filed or considered after this date.
• The filing and processing of files is carried out on an ongoing basis throughout this period.
• A notification that the application has been processed shall be sent following the submission of the grant application together with the project description sheet.
• Announcement of results: final reply sent no later than one month after the filing of the application

Applicants are invited to contact the Ministry in advance of their submission to verify the project’s eligibility.

1. Download the file below and complete it.
2. Return your file by email by clicking on the "Submit my file" button.