Mandela archive now online
INTERNET
By BiztechAfrica – March 28, 2012, 8:02 a.m.
Google and the Nelson Mandela Centre of Memory (NMCM) have made the new Nelson Mandela Digital Archive live online.
Google gave a USD1.25 million grant to the Johannesburg-based NMCM in 2011 to help preserve and digitize thousands of archival documents, photographs and videos about the South African statesman.
Along with historians, educationalists, researchers, activists and many others around the world, users can now access a wealth of information and knowledge about the life and legacy of this extraordinary African leader, says Google.
The new online multimedia archive includes Mandela’s correspondence with family, comrades and friends, diaries written during his 27 years of imprisonment, and notes he made while leading the negotiations that ended apartheid in South Africa.
The technology used for the Mandela Archive allows for hosting of mixed-media material, making those materials searchable and browsable, and also allows curators to curate the materials into exhibits. It uses Google Search, Google+ Photos for image serving, and YouTube for video streaming and serving.
