Credits: Pedro Andrade Socological Collection

The topics within the problematic of these knowledge areas and modes are organized into rhizomatic networks of content, as one of the possible paradigms. Gilles Deleuze (1986, 1987) defines the rhizome as a configurationof knowledge including closely related topics together in a decentralized and not hegemonic network, that is, not privileging a central point ad eternum.

In this perspective, the following three site sections articulate multiple possible different paths, which are available for the site creators and users, in order to develop research via entertainment, an idea that may be named RESEARTAINMENT.

You may travel the site sections from let to right, that is, searching information, researching knowledge and disseminating communicative content, in this way:

1. You search within a LIBRATORY, an hybrid concept and process that signifies a laboratory within a Library or Archive.

2. You (re)search inside a KNOWEB, a fusional term and tool that means a Knowledge Web or Network. 

3. And you may disseminate communicative content within a DISSEMINATORY, i.e., a blended keyword and instrument that defines a laboratory on dissemination, be it about social sciences and digital humanities, media arts and new methods, urban territories and tourism.

Alternatively, you also may circulate from right to left within these site sections, or following any other rhizomatic path.

1. LIBRATORY

A Digital Library & Archive, for content selection and collection

In this light, the first section of the Platform, the Virtual Library / Archive, will gather:

·      the State of the Art on the Heritages Observatory topics;

·      and texts written by  the Heritages Observatory members or by external contributors.

 2. KNOWEB

A Knowledge Web or Network on Heritages, Media/Urban Arts and Cultural Tourism, for content curation, creation and re/de/interpretation

This section informs about the main nodes or poles of information and research that can be disseminated (content curation) or undertaken (content creation), within the Web Lab. This may take the form of projects (for example, during 1 to 3 years); or present the shape of panels (a periodical study on a given matter); but as well within the configuration of ‘mini-projects’ (for urgent social questions, such as the critic of fake news or the war in Ukraine, or the use of a particular sociological method: inquiry, interview, video for a social network).

Put in another way: a Knowledge Network in general and a particular Knowledge Base not only gather INFORMATION data and facts, but also circumscribe and reformulate KNOWLEDGE. This is achievable through means and methods available today not only to experts but also to ordinary citizens.

Knowledge Webs are defined as instruments for deconstruction and reconstruction of knowledge, that focus on the analysis and interpretation of materials and archival sources concerning various areas, among other things in order to transform the respective information into knowledge. Therefore, knowledge of cultures and cultures of knowledge are extracted from the seminal social fabric, as well as methodologies developed not just by experts but also by laypeople.

For data collection, specific softwares facilitate that de/re/construction of knowledge, via the semi-automatic treatment of questionnaires, interviews, direct observation, biographies, action research, etc. An example is Atlas-ti software. In fact, this and other software’s provide a more efficient treatment of qualitative and quantitative data by a team responsible for the knowledge web, and the sharing of comments and suggestions among the team and its users, even during the actual work in progress.

Such strategy may be founded on: (a) participation and collaboration within digital social networks in Web 2.0 or Social Web (Facebook, Twitter/X, Instagram, Pinterest, etc.);

(b) and or by organizing cooperation in Web 3.0 or Social Semantic Web. Web 3.0 means a recent age of the Internet, proposed by Tim Berners-Lee, who had already implemented the key components that led to the World Wide Web in 1990.

In a synthetic way, the differences between these versions of the Internet are the following: at the beginning of the implementation of the World Wide Web, later named Web 1.0, users only read information and usually were not able to write, except the programming professionals or other computer technicians. In social networks of Web 2.0, since the first decade of XXI century, users are able both to read and write information. In regards to Web 3.0, via websites, wikis, networks or other means, the users, rather than just sharing sources, data and relatively little structured content (as they did within Web 2.0), at Social Semantic Web 3.0 they seek to clarify the profound meaning of information and of the links that they perform. For example, in some networks of knowledge, both expert’s participants and laypeople, under certain conditions, can build collectively poles or nodes of Knowledge. 

3. DISSEMINATORY

A Virtual Gallery and Mobile Museum, for content dissemination

Finally, the platform’s 3rd section, Virtual Museums & Galleries, propose interactive virtual exhibitions of contents previously analyzed and interpreted under an open access regime. These contents may be inscribed and written within texts and materials in 2D but also in 3D virtual worlds or metaverses. Among the e-museum /e-galleries dissemination formats, the following stand out: scientific repositories, digital social networks, virtual exhibitions and showrooms, digital storytelling, educational games, augmented reality, mobile devices, physical computing, etc. In short, virtual museums & galleries aim the encouragement of digital social meetings in virtual contexts, that provide a deeper interpretation of both physical and digital cultural heritages.

The Heritages Web Lab intends to sensibilize and fidelize diverse audiences’ segments: researchers, teachers, students, citizens in general, as well as other potentially disadvantaged visitors, such as pensioners, disabled, immigrants, refugees, etc. In short, it is central to sensitize such audiences for scientific, technological and artistic events and products, related to the themes above discussed.

It is also crucial to measure the impact of knowledge on these public profiles, through sociological studies on social actor’s networks and about means / modes of dissemination / advertising content.

The next platform pages are more practical, and intend to give some suggestions and tips on how to implement content tools and tasks.