For years, while working on museum and collection management systems, we have kept running into the same situation: digitisation projects mostly focus on recording objects. Inventory numbers, photographs, dimensions, storage locations and display information are managed with great care. And unfortunately, many museums still reduce digitisation to a virtual museum.

But does what we call cultural heritage really consist only of objects and software that lets you walk through them virtually?

A copper coffee pot (cezve) displayed in a museum is an important part of our cultural heritage. But how that pot was used, the social culture that grew around coffee, and the traditions and stories handed down from generation to generation are at least as valuable as the object itself.

The Invisible Side of Cultural Heritage

UNESCO defines Intangible Cultural Heritage as the knowledge, skills, practices and cultural expressions that communities pass on from generation to generation. The 2003 UNESCO Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage aims to protect this field at an international level.

Intangible cultural heritage covers traditional crafts, folk dances, music, oral traditions, rituals, festivals, local culinary culture and craft knowledge.

Interestingly, the coffee pot mentioned at the beginning is a tangible object, yet "Turkish coffee culture and tradition" is inscribed on UNESCO's list of Intangible Cultural Heritage. In other words, what is really safeguarded is not the pot itself, but the sharing woven around it over the centuries.

The skill of a tile master, the storytelling style of a meddah (a traditional storyteller), or a tradition kept alive in a region for centuries can be far more fragile than an object that can be physically displayed. When this knowledge is not passed on, it can disappear completely.

Digitisation Is No Longer Enough

Today many institutions are moving their collections into the digital world. This is a very important step. But for the museums of the future, creating a digital inventory alone will not be enough.

To safeguard a cultural practice, video recordings, sound archives, interviews, master–apprentice relationships, geographical context and information about its social use also need to be documented. What we really need to preserve is not just the “object”, but the knowledge and experience that the object represents.

The New Role of Museum Software

As a company that develops museum technology, we have seen an important change in recent years. Collection management systems must now be able to manage not only objects, but cultural processes as well.

For example, a record of a folk dance should hold not only photographs of the costumes, but also:

• The region where the dance is performed,
• The communities that perform it,
• The music used,
• Video recordings,
• Training processes,
• Tradition bearers

All of this information needs to be stored as well.

In the same way, for a traditional craft it is essential to record not only the finished product, but also the production process and the craft knowledge behind it.

Why Does the Classic Inventory Structure Fall Short?

Here we want to touch on a technical but critical point. Classic collection management systems have a fixed data structure, designed essentially to record physical objects: inventory number, dimensions, material, weight, condition, storage location…

This structure is perfect for recording a copper coffee pot or a tile plate. But when you try to record a folk dance, an oral epic or a master's production knowledge with the same fields, the model breaks down. A folk dance has no "size" or "weight"; it has a region, a performing community, music, a video recording and tradition bearers.

Trying to squeeze intangible heritage into a template designed for objects either loses information or makes it unrecognisable.

The data structure should be defined by the museum itself, not by the company that makes the software.

Every cultural expression should be recorded with a data model that suits its own nature.

How Muselera Contributes

This was exactly our starting point when we developed Muselera: every museum, every collection and every type of object is unique.

That is why a flexible object type engine lies at the heart of Muselera. Instead of being limited to ready-made fields imposed by the software, an institution can freely define its own object types and their fields. For intangible cultural heritage this means you can create record types that are entirely your own, such as "Folk Dance", "Traditional Craft", "Oral Tradition", "Ritual" or "Local Cuisine", and decide which fields each of them needs.

• Data models for cultural processes: Think of the folk dance record described above: region, performing community, music, training process and tradition bearers can each be kept in their own field. In a craft record, the production stages and the craft knowledge can be stored separately.
• Predefined and multi-select fields: Using standard lists instead of free text keeps the data consistent, comparable and searchable, which creates an invaluable resource for researchers.
• Rich multimedia records: Video, audio, photo and interview archives can be kept as an integral part of the record. In intangible heritage, knowledge often lives not in text, but in images and sound.
• Geographical context: With the map and location module, the region where a tradition lives and how it has spread can be marked on the map.
• Linking and grouping: A tradition can be linked to the masters who keep it alive, to related objects, regions and records. In this way, it is not isolated records that are preserved, but the real network of context around the culture.
• Data integrity: Blockchain-based integrity checks secure who documented what and when, keeping cultural records unchanged over time.

And of course, it is not enough for these records to stay in the archive. With kiosk and online exhibition tools, the living culture that has been documented can be shared with visitors and with future generations.

Technology and Cultural Sustainability

Technologies such as artificial intelligence, digital archiving, multimedia management and data standardisation offer new opportunities in the field of cultural heritage.

A tradition that is properly documented today can be studied by researchers, used in educational materials, passed on to future generations and support cultural tourism projects. The aim of technology is not just to store data, but to keep cultural memory sustainable.

Conclusion

In the future, the success of museums will be measured not only by how many objects they hold, but by how fully they can preserve cultural memory.

Because cultural heritage is more than the objects displayed in showcases.

The true wealth of a society lies in its stories, traditions, rituals and crafts, and in the knowledge it passes on from generation to generation.

The next step in digital transformation is to do much more than preserve objects: to preserve living culture.

And the technology that makes this possible lies in flexible systems that hand the data structure over to the institution. This is the vision with which we develop Muselera.