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A short history of the shutdown of Culturenet Sweden - and its relaunch
Culturenet Sweden was the result of a government-appointed IT committee, working 1995-97. In 1997 the investigation was finished, and the committee report (SOU 1997:14) was published. The web site Culturenet Sweden was also started at this time. (A 39 page English summary of the committee report is available here as an image-on-text PDF file. Size: 8.1 Mb) In 1999 the government proposed that the project phase was over and that the Culturenet was to be turned into a permanent governmental commitment. At this time the editorial office of Culturenet Sweden was moved to the Swedish National Council for Cultural Affairs. In their finance bill - presented in September 2004 - the Swedish government proposed that Culturenet Sweden should be shut down as of December 31, 2004. All of a sudden they claimed there was no need for it anymore, since there are so many search engines on the web. Thousands of people - both in Sweden and abroad - protested against this by signing petitions and protest letters to the Swedish government, the Swedish parliament etc. The protesters felt that Culturenet Sweden was not just a search engine, but a highly refined and systematised link catalogue using a similar system of classification as those used by libraries - plus lots of other services, such as a mailinglist hosting service, a notice board where anybody could advertise their cultural events or achievements, a unique press release service, a co-operative effort called "Ask a librarian", run jointly by Culturenet Sweden and several Swedish public libraries, "What happens?", an online event calendar, and much more. The protests did not make the parliament refuse the bill, however, so the decision to shut down Culturenet Sweden was finally taken on December 8th 2004. But already on December 12th a group of supporters of Culturenet Sweden, among them several that had been active back in the mid 90's when the Culturenet was a governmental investigation and project, held a meeting at the Milles Garden in Stockholm and formed The Association for Culturenet Sweden. The primary goal for the association is to be able to save Culturenet Sweden, to take over the responsibility for it, run the web site with all its services, and develop the whole idea further. Since then the new association has been negotiating with the former hosting organisation about how this take-over could be realised. Finally, on May 16th, this process was over, a contract was signed, and The Association issued the below press release to the media.
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Press release
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May 16, 2005
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Culturenet Sweden moves and restarts As of today, May 16th, all things are finally set for a move and relaunch of Culturenet Sweden, under a new host organisation. The Association for Culturenet Sweden will, starting today, continue to run the activities and services in the same spirit of public service as earlier. The Swedish National Council for Cultural Affairs has been the host organisation for Culturenet Sweden during the years 2000-2004. Before that, Culturenet Sweden was a government initiated project at the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences (IVA) between 1997 and 1999. The move from The Council for Cultural Affairs to new premises starts now and goes on this entire week. Unfortunately, this means that our web site will not be accessible, and our old email addresses won't work any longer. During this time of transition you may reach us through the email addresses below. We hope to get our web site up and running again by next week. Until more permanent dwellings can be found, the Royal Institute of Technology together with SUNET (The Swedish University Network) will provide physical space as well as Internet access for Culturenet Sweden's web servers. The Association for Culturenet Sweden is a non-profit organisation. Its aim is to develop and run Culturenet Sweden. The Association is religiously and politically independent. Authorities, agencies, organisations, and businesses, as well as individuals may become members. The Association for Culturenet Sweden welcomes suggestions for specific collaborative efforts together with authorities, organisations, businesses, or individuals. An agreement has already been made regarding cooperation with Natverkstan Kultur i Vast (The Net Workshop Culture in the West of Sweden) and the Cultural Server of Skane, in the South of Sweden. Culturenet Gavleborg and Culturenet Sweden have collaborated earlier regarding the online event calendar "Detta hander" (What happens). Our intentions are to continue this joint operation. More information is available at the web site of the Association for Culturenet Sweden. You may also email the contact persons of the Association, see addresses below. Ana Maria Durán, chair
The Association for Culturenet Sweden
The web sites of Culturenet Sweden:
Contact persons:
Dan Abelin, boardmember
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