The digital collection is on fire to make the protection and inheritance of traditional culture more efficient

Digital collections launched by Chengdu Jinsha Site Museum.

The image comes from the Internet

Changxin Palace lamps, mortise miniature bridges, woodblock prints, Tang Sancai... These traditional Chinese cultural heritage and skills are crystallized, and users can now keep them as digital collections permanently through mobile apps. With the development of blockchain, cloud computing, artificial intelligence, expanded reality and other technologies, the new formats of digital cultural creation represented by digital collections have caught fire among young people. Experts said that the digital collection is still in the early stage of development, facing technology, integration and application, industrial ecology, law to be improved and mature and other issues, should be formulated as soon as possible relevant access system, especially to prevent transaction speculation, strengthen standardized management, and promote the healthy development of the digital culture industry.

User collection "with a sense of accomplishment"

"Look at this Changxin Palace lamp in my collection, how beautiful!" Opening a mobile app, Mr. Chen, a cultural enthusiast, displayed the 3D digital collection of Changxin Palace Lamp, a treasure from the collection of the Hebei Museum. The image of the golden palace lantern hangs on the mobile phone screen, and users can watch it from different angles.

There are also several online pavilions in this APP, displaying other digital collections collected by Mr. Chen, such as the "Women's Good Owl Zun" sold by the Henan Museum, the "Ice Pier" digital blind box officially authorized by the International Olympic Committee, etc., and users can "visit the cloud" online. Mr. Chen said that buying digital collections has become a daily habit, and occasionally giving away a collection of relatives and friends will have a great sense of accomplishment, "And when I buy this thing, it costs at most 10 yuan." ”

What is a digital collection? According to the industry definition, it refers to the use of blockchain technology, corresponding to a specific work, artwork generated a unique digital certificate, on the basis of protecting its digital copyright, to achieve a true and credible digital distribution, purchase, collection and use. To put it simply, digital collections have unique identity and ownership information on the blockchain, which is equivalent to having a virtual "ID card" on the chain, and pictures, music, videos, artworks, etc. can be chained to become digital collections.

At present, the digital collection covers the fields of cultural tourism, sports, art, entertainment and so on. The Forbidden City, the National Museum, the Hubei Provincial Museum, the Hunan Provincial Museum, the Henan Museum and other institutions have successively launched digital collection services for the collection of treasures. Relevant data show that the digitization ratio of cultural relics surveyed nationwide is 44.11%, of which the digitization proportion of precious cultural relics collections is 67.82%.

With the holding of large-scale sports events such as the Beijing Winter Olympics, people's enthusiasm for sports is high, and related sports digital collections have also come out. For example, the "Lady Keju Diagram" that embodies the ancient Chinese sportsmanship, the commemorative medals and medals of the first Beijing Marathon, the mascot of the Hangzhou Asian Games, and the "Key to the Asian Games Journey" of the Hangzhou Asian Games e-sports project.

Young people's enthusiasm is the main reason

The market is very optimistic about the development of digital collection formats. According to media statistics, there are currently more than 50 digital collection platforms officially launched in China, and Tencent and other enterprises have successively launched digital collection distribution platforms.

Why is the digital collection so "hot"? From a technical point of view, the rapid development of technologies such as blockchain, cloud computing, artificial intelligence, and extended reality has laid a technical foundation for new cultural and creative formats, including cultural relics.

The reporter noted that most of the digital collection platforms are marked with blockchain technology, such as Tencent's Zhixin Chain, Baidu's Super Chain, jd.com's Zhizhen Chain, etc. Relevant research reports believe that digital technology with blockchain as the core can standardize digital content standards, clarify the ownership of digital content rights, and improve the construction of digital museums, which will become a new generation of infrastructure for the digitization of cultural relics.

From the perspective of the audience, the emergence of digital collections allows users, especially the younger generation, to own and appreciate excellent works of art at a cheap price, which is in line with the consumption habits, social needs and value aesthetics of young people in the digital space.

Ms. Li, who works for an Internet company in Beijing, once bought digital collections such as "Dunhuang Feitian", "Once a friend saw it and liked it, so he forwarded it to her." In Ms. Li's view, collecting digital collections is like collecting "Water Margin" cards and 56 ethnic-themed stamps when she was a child, and friends often display and give each other because of the same interests, but what was previously collected was a physical object, and now it has become a digital product.

Experts believe that as a form of cultural innovation, digital collections convey the history and culture behind cultural relics in a more youthful experience, which is conducive to promoting the creative transformation and innovative development of China's excellent traditional culture.

The reporter learned that relevant enterprises have intensively launched digital collection platforms and collections, mainly focusing on the broad market prospects of digital collections and blockchain technology in the fields of copyright protection and digital art collection. Second, Generation Z (pointing to the Generation born between 1995 and 2009) who are considered "natives of the Internet" fully embrace digital art, and companies lay out digital collections to help garner the attention and traffic of "Generation Z".

Strengthen management and prevent hype

The research report "Blockchain Technology Activates Digital Cultural Heritage" released by the Central University of Finance and Economics last year summarized the significance of China's digital collections: first, compliance and controllability have created a new type of cultural consumption that can be confirmed and traced; second, enterprises have sufficient independent research and development technology guarantees, and related blockchain authorized invention patents rank in the forefront of the world; third, user scale advantages; fourth, win-win cooperation, the protection, inheritance and dissemination of traditional culture have become more efficient; fifth, digital collections have extremely low energy consumption and low carbon environmental protection.

At present, the development of digital collections is in its infancy, and some problems have begun to appear, such as the confusion of the ownership of digital collections, the uneven quality of digital collections, the difficulty of protecting consumer rights and interests, and the risk of transaction speculation.

In order to prevent the risk of speculation in virtual currency transactions, some Internet companies and platforms have recently taken the initiative to strengthen supervision and standardize the public accounts and mini programs that speculate and sell digital collections for the second time. Relevant enterprises have also reminded users to beware of fraud risks, oppose speculation on digital collections, and resist illegal acts in the name of digital collections but actually virtual currency-related activities through the establishment of industry conventions and other forms.

The development of digital collections involves creativity, the protection and utilization of cultural heritage, scientific and technological innovation, copyright, data and other aspects, and it is necessary to find the goal and breakthrough. During the two sessions of the National People's Congress this year, some members of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference suggested that the system of laws and regulations related to digital collections should be improved to clarify the essential attributes of their relevant business activities; relevant departments should formulate an access system for digital collection trading platforms, raise the administrative approval threshold for the construction of trading platforms, and supervise and manage the application of blockchain algorithms and transaction data generated by trading platforms, so as to avoid some lawbreakers from violating laws and regulations through digital collection trading platforms and infringing on the legitimate rights and interests of consumers.

Yan Dongsheng, secretary of the Party Committee of the National Art Museum of China, believes that it is necessary to clarify the respective relationships and interests of the government, cultural units, enterprises and the public in the development of digital collections, solve the problems of co-construction and sharing of cultural resources, intellectual property protection, etc., and promote the healthy development of the digital cultural industry.

Source: People's Daily Overseas Edition