Page 4 - AC/E Digital Culture Annual Report 2016

4Following the excellent reception of the rst two editions of the AC/E Digital Culture Annual Report (2014 and 2015) – more than 5,000 copies of each have been distributed over the past two years – we are pleased to share with culture sector professionals the third edition, which sets out to analyse the impact of new technologies on artistic creation and their use at cultural festivals.AC/E, a public agency whose purpose is to facilitate the promotion, development and internationalisation of Spain’s creative and culture sector, has teamed up with Dosdoce. com, a private organisation specialised in studies on adapting the sector to the digital environment, to analyse in the three editions of the report the main technological trends that cultural managers will need to bear in mind in the coming years in order to have a better understanding of the impact of new technologies on their culture organisations.To achieve this aim, the broad-ranging content of the third edition of the report has been divided into two main sections to make it easier to read for the di erent audiences at whichit is aimed. ‘Smart Culture’ is the overarching theme established by the Advisory Committee of the AC/E Digital Culture Annual Report 2016 as a basis for choosing the six articles that make up the rst part of this year’s edition. Just as the rst report’s Focus dealt with the impactof the Internet on the performing arts (theatre, opera, dance, ballet, etc.) and that of the second edition analysed the use of new technologies in the world of museums, for this third edition it conducts a thorough analysis of the use of new technologies at some 50 Spanish and foreign cultural festivals.Both sections of the AC/E Annual Report speak of a hybrid realm halfway between technology and art; of blending between the physical and digital words; of vanishing boundaries between industries; and of the use of smart analyses and algorithms to give value and meaning tothe often too much but never enough data. The chosen topics explore the pathways of the new collaborative economy; analyse its impact on artistic creation; examine the new spacefor interaction between people, machines and industries; and explain the changes that have taken place in markets and in how artworks are produced and sold.One of the cross-cutting themes of this year’s report is the use of smart devices in artistic creation. The Internet of Things is going to pervade many aspects of our lives, and culture is no exception. As well as bene tting industrial processes, it has begun to yield visible resultsin the eld of artistic creation. An exampleis the wearable musical gloves mentioned by Pepe Zapata in his article on the impact of the Internet on the performing arts, which allow musicians to interact with computers through gestures. Should we envisage a robot audience? he wonders.Other themes enthusiastically analysed in this year’s report are the maturity of 3D printing, robotics, drones, augmented reality, new interfaces and the popularity of virtual reality devices. Their use is illustrated with many examples by Lara Sánchez Coterón in her in- depth analysis of new practices in videogames and by Montecarlo in his study on the new ways of telling audiovisual stories in the digital age.But it is not all technology. The report also deals with issues such as the digital access gap, an issue explored in Iván Martínez’s article on the emergence of Wikipedia. Mariana Santos takes a di erent approach to a di erent rift – the digital gender gap – in her article on the impact ofthe Internet on artistic creation and introduces readers to Chicas Poderosas, the community she heads with the aim of closing it.The economy of subscription is, as stated earlier, another theme that cuts across many of the articles in the report. This phenomenon is not alien to cultural enterprises, which, in some eldsINTRODUCTIONSmart Culture: Impact of the Internet on Artistic Creation