Digital cultural collections in an age of reuse and remixes

This paper reports the results of a survey of U.S. cultural institution (CI) professionals about whether CI should seek to control access to and use of digital cultural collections. It describes motivations that encourage institutions to control access to or use of collections and factors that discourage institutions from controlling access and use. The paper describes the results in terms of three general themes: “Object descriptions, representations and control,” “Legal risks and complexities” and “Getting credit: fiscal and social costs and revenue.”