Canadian Heritage committee  Virtual reality.... It's coming fast.

Canadian Heritage committee  Thank you.

Canadian Heritage committee  Luc Courchesne, from Montreal, the one who created SAT, the Society for Art and Technology.... Twenty years ago now, he started creating immersive experiences on 360 degree screens. Then he did them in spheres, and he has always continued with his experiments. His company is now large-scale with IMAX and all kinds of other formats.

Canadian Heritage committee  I want to say good luck to the committee. You have quite some work to do, and I appreciate having met you today.

Canadian Heritage committee  It won't be long.

Canadian Heritage committee  Yes. A few years ago, there were correspondence courses, but they don't exist anymore. They were offered by the federal government, the Canadian Museums Association and a few provincial museum associations. They gradually disappeared but, these days, with the technology that's available, universities offer distance education courses everywhere.

Canadian Heritage committee  I would talk to the students or to a museum director in Yellowknife, for example. It's done informally, of course, through networks that we create among ourselves. However, there could be a structure to bring it all together, a kind of training program, a tele-university or a “tele-something”, that would make content available to volunteers, to retirees and to people at home.

Canadian Heritage committee  There aren't fewer challenges elsewhere. They are similar pretty much everywhere. But things vary here. I have done a lot of work in Inuit and Cree communities. Clearly, because of the cold, it is more expensive to preserve objects at 20 degrees Celsius and at 55% humidity. It costs more than if you were in a place like where the Ak-Chin Indians live in Arizona, where you don't even need a system because the climate is dry.

Canadian Heritage committee  It's the Rubicon.

Canadian Heritage committee  There are a few.

Canadian Heritage committee  This regional museum does exist, but it has to be relocated because it is much too cramped in the building it currently occupies. It needs three times the space. It does a fairly good job with contemporary art and regional art, but it is also the legatee of the Québec-Téléphone collection, which is one of the most interesting technological collections of telephony in Canada.

Canadian Heritage committee  Yes. It's more difficult to cross the Ottawa River than it is to cross the Atlantic.

Canadian Heritage committee  I would have liked to have been better prepared before testifying before you today.

Canadian Heritage committee  Afterward?

Canadian Heritage committee  Okay. I will.