To optimise digital content marketing for broadcasters, the Horizon 2020 funded ReTV project developed an end-to-end process termed “Trans-Vector Publishing” and made it accessible through a Web-based tool termed “Content Wizard”. This paper presents this tool with a focus on each of the innovations in data and AI-driven media analysis to address each key step in the digital content marketing workflow: topic selection, content search and video summarisation. First, we use predictive analytics over online data to identify topics the target audience will give the most attention to at a future time. Second, we use neural networks and embeddings to find the video asset closest in content to the identified topic. Third, we use a GAN to create an optimally summarised form of that video for publication, e.g. on social networks. The result is a new and innovative digital content marketing workflow which meets the needs of media organisations in this age of interactive online media where content is transient, malleable and ubiquitous.

To fully reap the benefits of digitisation and sustainably create value for their audiences, cultural heritage institutions (CHI) need to implement and monitor digital, data-driven strategies that touch upon all aspects of how organisations operate. This can range from staffing and skills development to adoption of metadata models, novel audience engagement approaches and methods for collecting and using user data. We introduce the concept for the CHI Self-Assessment Tool that enables institutions to assess their strategy and plan against several aspects of digital transformation. The tool proposes a novel approach on how CHIs can continuously gather data on their activities and use insights from this data to adjust their strategies and increase their digital maturity. Equally, this data can be used by policy-makers to implement more effective policies and support the sector with targeted capacity building.

Social VR offers new possibilities for parent-child co-play through immersive and embodied interaction, but still little is known about how game design shapes collaboration in these environments. This study investigates how 1) game design impact parent-child interaction and collaboration in a social VR game – The Space Archivists – and what 2) the perceived added value is by parents and children experiencing social VR games together. We conducted closed and open tests of the game with ten parent-child pairs (N=20), and explored how they collaborate and interact in the virtual environment. Findings show that collaboration combined family interaction patterns with new forms of coordination introduced by immersive VR. Parents often organized tasks and provided guidance on how to complete them, while children frequently developed greater expertise with VR controls, resulting in flexible exchanges of leadership and expertise between parents and children. Participants used verbal- and embodied communication, for example describing the physical space to each other, pointing, avatar positioning, and proximity to establish shared attention and coordinate actions. However, difficulties in handling VR-controls, disengagement, and external assistance at times disrupted direct parent-child interaction. Overall, the findings suggest that the added value of social VR lies in creating opportunities for parents and children to collaborate, exchange complementary expertise, and connect through embodied communication. Social VR therefore extends joint media engagement by combining familiar family dynamics with new spatial and embodied forms of shared play.

Motivated to create a children’s VR game for the Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision (NISV), this research asks how might we design an immersive game for children to meaningfully interact with media and metadata in cultural heritage contexts? First, during a ‘design salon,’ 13 data and heritage experts challenged children’s ability to interact with metadata. In response, we ran workshops with 19 children focused on understanding abstract media and data. We found that while (1) metadata has many challenges, (2) children understand abstract data when it is grounded in concrete experiences, are (3) motivated to interact with archival media through in immersive and collaborative contexts, and (4) are interested in exploring media diversity through categorisation games with high-level narrative goals. These findings inform our game concept and three core insights for designing immersive experiences for cultural heritage: Considering the Contextual Complexity of Data and Audience Needs, Connecting Data Abstractions to Embodied Narratives Through Categorisation Mechanics, and Supporting Abstract Meaning Making Using the Immersive Affordances of VR.