The European Library is actively working to make more data freely available, through APIs and the release of an open data set later this year as well as via cooperation with projects such as Enumerate.

For that reason, we were particularly interested in the recent release of Counting What Counts, a report that examines how cultural bodies approach data.

Authored by Anthony Lilley and Paul Moore, the report highlights a limited understanding of data within the cultural sector.

"For many, the potential of data in the cultural sector is at best a 'known-unknown' or worse goes entirely unappreciated. For some, the idea of using data in the the arts is controversial or even anathema."

They also highlight the value data can bring to cultural organisations.

"Without question, the effective use of big data (so-called data-driven decision-making or DDD) has the potential to deliver operational and financial benefits to individual cultural organisations in obvious fields such as marketing and development and, in turn, through the ways in which it might inform artistic decision-making."

Download the report.