Linked Open Usable Data for Cultural Heritage

Acknowledgements

While a thesis is often perceived as an individual effort, I could not have succeeded without the ideas, encouragement, and support of those around me, and the opportunity to ask questions, no matter how naive they may have been. I would like to extend my sincere thanks to all the individuals and collectives mentioned here, and apologise if I have inadvertently missed anyone.

To begin with, I would like to thank Peter Fornaro, my first supervisor, who contacted me shortly after my Master’s thesis defence in August 2020 to possibly offer me a PhD position at the University of Basel’s Digital Humanities Lab (DHLab) within the Participatory Knowledge Practices in Analogue and Digital Image Archives (PIA) research project. I am also deeply grateful to Walter Leimgruber, my second supervisor, who, together with Peter, interviewed me in Basel at the end of 2020 and officially welcomed me into the research project. Secondly, I would like to thank Robert Sanderson, who kindly agreed to become my third supervisor in early 2022. His help with technical aspects and our many insightful discussions proved very beneficial. I am also grateful for his hospitality during my fortnight stay at Yale University in New Haven in May 2023.

I was fortunate to receive financial support for most of my PhD through my work at the DHLab, as PIA was supported by the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) under the Sinergia funding programme (contract number CRSII5 193788)^[1]. Additionally, I had the opportunity to work at the Swiss National Data and Service Center for the Humanities (DaSCH), an infrastructure primarily funded by the SNSF. This support not only provided the financial means to pursue my research but also granted me access to a collaborative and well-supported environment. It enabled me to engage with current tools and methodologies, attend key conferences, and collaborate with esteemed colleagues. These opportunities have been crucial to the advancement of my work and my professional development.

I would like to thank everyone involved in the PIA project and the Cultural Anthropology Switzerland (CAS) photo archives. All those directly and indirectly involved are to be properly acknowledged: Walter Leimgruber, Nicole Peduzzi, Regula Anklin, Murielle Cornut, Birgit Huber, Fabienne Lüthi, Véronique Hilfiker, Miriam Kull, Laura Citaku, Andrea Suter, Charlotte Nachtsheim, Alexandra Tschakert, Peter Fornaro, Heiko Schuldt, Vera Chiquet, Adrian Demleitner, Fabian Frei, Christoph Rohrer, Florian Spiess, Ulrike Felsing, Daniel Schoeneck, Lukas Zimmer, Max Frischknecht, and Tobias Hodel. I am especially grateful to the fellow PhD candidates and software developers with whom I have forged close friendships, whether through Traubenlese at Fabienne’s, ‘Dumpling Days’ in Biel and Basel, our retreat in Alpstein, looking after my cats while I was on holiday, or having regular lunches together.

My gratitude also goes to the DHLab team, including head and professor Lukas Rosenthaler, as well as the administrative support provided by Irène Kälin Heiniger and Gabriela Kuster Vettiger. Many thanks to past and present fellow PhD students from the DHLab, particularly Béatrice Gauvain, Cristina Loi, Victoria G. D. Landau, Marian Clemens Manz, and Christian Weber. I would also like to thank the staff of DaSCH, particularly Rita Gautschy, for her tireless support, which enabled us to organise a IIIF 3D event and working meeting in Basel in October 2023.

Many thanks to Julia Büchele, coordinator of the University of Basel’s Graduate School of Social Sciences (G3S), for her support and organisation of fruitful writing days. From the University of Basel, I also want to thank Alain Müller for inspiring me to read Bruno Latour’s works, and both him and Marion Schulze for their enlightening seminar on Donna Haraway. Special mention goes to Ivan Giangreco and the collaborators and students from the University of Basel’s Department of Mathematics and Computer Science who created and maintain the Basilea LaTeX template^[2] that I used and slightly amended to compile the PDF version of this thesis.

I am thankful as well to the Swiss Federal Archives, particularly Audray Sauvage and Stefan Nellen, for placing their trust in me and hiring me as a Data Scientist before the completion of my doctorate. Their flexibility allowed me to work three days a week, and later four, enabling me to finish writing my thesis.

I would also like to acknowledge the following individuals I met at seminars, workshops, or conferences, who inspired me and with whom I was able to discuss anything and everything: Yumeng Hou, Giacomo Alliata, Valentine Bernasconi, Dario Negueruela del Castillo, Rémi Petitpierre, Rahaf Orabi, Shabnam Pasandideh, Pauline Junginger, Karina Rodriguez Echavarria, Zoe Schubert, Lozana Rossenova, Raphaël Grolimund, Baptiste de Coulon, Sol Martinez Demarco, Jasmin Schmidlin, Brittny Lapierre, Tugce Karatas, Moritz Mähr, Rebecca Rochat, Anna Janka, Margherita Schellino, Immacolata Iaccarino, Elina Leblanc, Pauline Jacsont, Marie Barras, Nicola Carboni, Simon Gabay, Anaïs Guillem, Antoine Gros, Francesco Beretta, David Knecht, Elias Kreyenbühl, John Kunze, Ben Brumfield, Sara Brumfield, David Newbury, Rashmi Singhal, Lise Foket, Glen Robson, Caitlin Perry, Erin Canning, Kelly Davis, Alyssa Loera, John McQuaid, Bree Midavaine, George Bruseker, Emmanuelle Delmas-Glass, David Beaudet, Edward Anderson, Tanya Gray, Kevin Page, Claire Knowles, Daniel Sissman, and Tom Crane.

My sincere gratitude is due to everyone participating in the International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) and Linked Art communities, especially those who responded to the survey I conducted in 2023. I have always felt welcomed by both communities and it is a privilege to be involved in them. This sense of community was also reflected in the warm welcome I received at Yale, and I would like to thank all those who agreed to be interviewed in the context of the LUX initiative. A special mention goes to the ‘Maddhoughna’ group, with whom we held so many Zoom calls, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. I would therefore like to express my profound appreciation to the following people: Rebecca Hirsch, Anne McLaughlin, Stacey Redick, Caylin Smith, Aliya Reich, Andy Irving and Richard Palmer.

At this point, I would particularly like to extend my thanks to the people who inspired me and believed in me before I set off on this PhD journey, and who gave me the courage to do it. I am thinking in particular of the people I knew when I was working in Oxford between 2008 and 2009, long before I started my studies, as well as René Schneider.

Finally, I would like to express my heartfelt thanks to my family and friends. Their genuine interest in my PhD progress and timely encouragement provided the perfect balance of support and distraction, allowing me to take necessary breaks and recharge. Last but certainly not least, I extend my deepest thanks to my beloved partner, Davina, for her unwavering support and constant presence throughout this journey. Her encouragement and understanding have been truly invaluable.