Albania represents an interesting case of a newly emerging destination in the international tourist market, with intensive pressures coming from seasonal visit flows and the related impacts on the environment. The Albanian Culture Marketing Strategy, while correctly focusing on heritage for the de-seasoning of visits in congested areas and for awareness-raising about the country's cultural identity among tourists and residents, presents some limitations in the definition of application patterns and concrete solutions. In particular, the active contribution of potential users, of ICTs and, in particular, the potentialities of widespread tools such as mobile apps seem to be overlooked. In this article, the current scenario of the Albanian tourism sector, with particular emphasis on the cultural segment, is presented through a detailed analysis of relevant program documents in order to outline strengths and weaknesses of the underlying approach. Then, the potential contribution of mobile apps to the sustainable development of destinations are analyzed and the market of available technologies is presented through a taxonomy of a consistent number of representative cases. Finally, the SOS-Tirana app is presented and its adequateness to the context is discussed.

Abstract:The relevance of local knowledge in cultural heritage is by now acknowledged. It helps to determine many community-based projects by identifying the material to be digitally maintained in multimedia collections provided by communities of volunteers, rather than for-profit businesses or government entities. Considering that the search and browsing of texts, images, video, and 3D models related to places is more essential than using a simple text-based search, an interactive multimedia map was implemented in this study. The map, which is loaded on a single HyperText Markup Language (HTML) page using AJAX (Asynchronous JavaScript and XML), with a client-side control mechanism utilising jQuery components that are both freely available and ad-hoc developed, is updated according to user interaction. To simplify the publication of geo-referenced information, the application stores all the data in a Geographic JavaScript Object Notation (GeoJSON) file rather than in a database. The multimedia contents-associated with the selected Points of Interest (PoIs)-can be selected through text search and list browsing as well as by viewing their previews one by one in a sequence all together in a scrolling window (respectively: " Table", "Folder", and "Tile" functions). PoIs-visualised on the map with multi-shape markers using a set of unambiguous colours-can be filtered through their categories and types, accessibility status and timeline, thus improving the system usability. The map functions are illustrated using data collected in a Comenius project. Notes on the application software and architecture are also presented in this paper.

The site of the 'Balsignano village' in Modugno (Italy), for some years has been the object of attention by scholars. Recently renovated, its valuation is nowadays the main objective for that Municipality. The aim of this article is describing our approach in integrating digital data, virtual tours and 3d models of the village elements to produce an interactive tool available on the internet, stimulating the desire to physically visit the settings. Our findings can be generalized to any context in which a link between a website and a physical site represent a challenge for low-budgeted Administrations.