The International Steering Committee is pleased to announce the publication of two reports:

First off, there's the Culturemondo 2009 report ‘Five Years On', with many of the insights shared at the 4th International Roundtable in Taipei in 2008, as well as the history and further development of the network itself.

Download the report in pdf format here: Culturemondo 2009 report Five Years On

This is an interesting time in the development of the internet, and for cultural websites in particular: The report aims to give a good grounding in the challenges we face as online cultural sector publishers, and the ways in which we might develop in the future. The report is written by Katherine Watson from Lab for Culture with support and input from our chair Jane Finnis and the International Steering Committee.

There is also a survey of 'cultural portals', 'The Place of Cultural Portals in the context of converging digital culture' conducted and analysed by Aleksandra Uzelac from Culturelink (Croatia). The survey was carried out over the summer of 2009 and key finds have been incorporated into the report above. This survey looks at the working realities of portals around the globe: Their funding, their structure and their development and potential directions for future growth.

Download the survey in pdf format here:The Place of Cultural Portals in the context of converging digital culture

Both make very interesting reading, and shed light on the future direction of Culturemondo itself, as well as the wider context of the operation of cultural portals and the web at large. We'd love to know your thoughts and we're looking forward to some lively discussion on the Google group!

We are also beginning to make plans for the 6th International Roundtable which is due to take place in Europe during Autumn 2010. Please send any ideas and expressions of interest to Jane Finnis (jane@culture24.org.uk).

Thanks to the continued support of TELDAP, Culturemondo, NZLive.com and Te Ara: the encyclopedia of New Zealand hosted the 5th international roundtable in Wellington on Wednesday 25th November 2009.

The roundtable focussed on two major items of discussion:

• How do we measure the economic and social value of cultural websites? This will raise issues of metrics, evaluation etc.
  Speaker:Seb Chan, Powerhouse Museum
• A report on the recent survey of sites carried out by Culturemondo.
  What trends, issues and future directions are suggested by the survey?
  Speaker: Jane Finnis, Culture24

Attendance at the roundtable was from a mixture of those running cultural websites and services within New Zealand, plus several international guests from The Netherlands, Taiwan, Australia and Luxembourg.

The roundtable took place the day after New Zealand's National Digital Forum