I like the silent church before the service begins, better than any preaching. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

My favorite time to volunteer at the Indianapolis Museum of Art is on a Friday night when museum hours are extended to 9pm.  You know that feeling of peace that you have right before a soft spring rain starts to fall?  Or the sensation you feel the moment that you first see the ocean when you arrive on a beach vacation?  Yeah.  That’s my cheesy analogy for the feeling I get when I sit in a quiet, serene gallery on a Friday night.  As a volunteer of the IMA, I have the luxury of feeling like the permanent galleries of the museum are my private sanctuary.  My personal church.  I suppose I should pause for a moment and explain who I am and why I’m lucky to be blogging here…

My name is Jessica Hancock and I’ve been a volunteer for the IMA since the fall of 2008.  At that time, I was going through a particularly challenging time in my life.  It was a time when I felt like, even though I had a million friends and a million different options for a Friday night, all I wanted to do was be still.  One day I reverted back to my roots, so to speak, and I thought about the days when I used to strut around the old IMA galleries alongside my Busha (polish for Grandma).  Busha was a museum docent, post retirement, for over 20 years. She used to bring my cousins and me around the museum, educating us through every twist and turn we’d take through the galleries.  I remembered how proud I was of her, how I wanted to have that substantial knowledge about art.  So I walked right into the museum on a Sunday afternoon in November and started volunteering.

Hands down, it was the best decision I ever made!  Four years later, I volunteer once a month on the first Sunday of every month at the guest services kiosk.  The months that I do not volunteer, I feel anxious.  Art does something different for everyone.  One of my favorite questions that I get when I’m volunteering is usually from an eager parent asking, “Where do I start?  Which gallery would my kids enjoy the most?”  It’s an exhilarating and proud moment when I get to share my expertise and personal favorites in the museum!

To volunteer means to make yourself useful to others.  In whatever way you choose to do so, volunteering can be humbling and a reminder you of who you really are.  For me personally, there is an attracting element to knowing art and being able to share it with others.  Being present and giving my time to the IMA once a month was my way of feeling close to something I love.  I have the endless opportunity to educate myself and museum guests every time I’m there.   So if you find me still and in a “moment” at the museum on a Friday night, just know that I’m just enjoying my personal sanctuary.

In a gathering that could ostensibly have been about how technology and social media have changed the landscape of museum practice, I was so thrilled to find that almost all of our discussion focused on how museums and libraries can make significant and lasting changes in our local communities. Working in a museum, I’ve taken that as my context, but many of these issues have important corollaries in libraries as well.

Perhaps the most useful change in my own thinking is an understanding that the era of participatory culture is not a new thing, but rather – enhanced by recent trends in technology – one that has its roots in the very reasons why museums exist in the first place.  While technology, social media, and mobile adoption influence the ways that we engage museum audiences and the expectations they bring into the museum, an attitude that invites participation has the potential to transform individual and community experiences that enhance the public value of the work we do.

Why is your community better off because it has a museum?

I’m challenged by the courage and convictions of colleagues I met in Salzburg, who take a commitment to their local community very seriously. Whether helping neighbors recover from devastating storms in the Philippines, reaching out to the homeless and poor communities in Sao Paulo, or bringing libraries to rural Kenya on the backs of camels, I found myself inspired to think about how a museum in Indianapolis can learn from such tangible demonstrations of public value.

In his book “Making Museums Matter,” Stephen Weil talked about a mandate for museums to demonstrate real value within our communities:

“Why is your community better off because it has a museum? [The answer] must necessarily be something more than, because otherwise it wouldn’t. Museums matter only to the extent that they are perceived to provide the communities they serve something of value beyond their own mere existence.”

The Occupy Museums protests demonstrate a growing frustration with the way museums see their role in today's society

This topic surfaced repeatedly during the conversations about participatory culture in Salzburg. The consensus among the group coalesced in an assertion that museums have an inherent mission to deliver public value driven by a universal right to cultural access.

It is clear to me that although museums have long enjoyed a privileged place in the public’s confidence, societal and economic changes, as well as the public’s expectation of museums, have significantly augmented the landscape of public value.  New questions about what constitutes public value and who sees the benefits of that value need to be considered seriously by those museums that want to see real impact from their effort. Lest we think that the value of museums is secure, the nascent ”occupy museums” movement reminds us that a growing frustration exists with the way museums think about their role in society.

The real test for public value is not what the museum says it is, but rather the value attributed to us by our communities and stakeholders. Simply declaring that the museum is valuable isn’t a substitute for actually demonstrating that value on a consistent basis.

At the heart of the issue is the museum community’s willingness to take a harsh look in the mirror and ask hard questions about whether or not we actually do a good job of bringing value to our constituents. In my opinion, a more wholehearted embrace of participatory culture may be the tonic we need to really delve into the ways that museums can change their current practice.  To realize the benefits of participatory culture will require an openness to welcome new opinions about the museum.

Serhan Ada, from Istanbul Bilgi University had a wonderful way of framing the difference. He notes that, “Participation occurs when someone welcomed as a guest feels as though they have become a host.” Are visitors to your museum truly guests in this sense? Perhaps the benefits of participatory culture are most easily witnessed with such a shared sense of ownership.

Access is about more than just digitization

When museums talk about access, we typically mean one of two kinds of accessibility: 1) The digital availability of collection objects with correct metadata and quality digital imaging, and 2) a set of provisions to accessing collections for those with physical or cognitive disabilities. Throughout the conversation in Salzburg, I was repeatedly struck by the fact that my own ideas about access are too small.

As we developed the concept more completely, it was clear to me that a truly accessible museum will provide appropriate and comprehensive support to the physical, intellectual, and attitudinal facets of a museum visit that allows guests to engage most successfully. Of these facets, the attitudinal changes in museums seem to be the most challenging. As we discussed in the previous blog posts, are museums really ready to embrace and value the inclusion of all audiences?

In Brazil, Gabriela Aidar works with the Pinacoteca do Estado de Sao Paulo in the museum’s department of social inclusion. Rather than focusing only on those audiences the museum is already successful at reaching, Gabriela decided to pursue so-called “non-audiences” who are typically marginalized by museums and therefore miss out on the rich cultural offerings contained there. During her presentation in Salzburg, Gabriela highlighted a number of quotes that really piqued my thinking. First, from Annamari Laaksonen of the International Federation of Arts Councils and Culture Agencies:

“Participation in cultural activities, together with access to them, forms the backbone of human rights pertaining to culture. Access is a precondition for participation and participation is indispensable to ensure the exercising of human rights.”
Laaksonen, Annamari, Revista Observatório Itaú Cultural, n.11 (jan./apr.2011). São Paulo, SP: Itaú Cultural, 2011, pg. 50.

“… any organization that is not working to break down barriers to access is actively maintaining them. Neutrality is not possible.”(p. 34)

“If social inclusion means anything, it means actively seeking out and removing barriers, of acknowledging that people who have been left out for generations need additional support in a whole variety of ways to enable them to exercise their rights to participate in many of the facilities that the better off and better educated take for granted.”(p. 37)
O’Neill, Mark, “The good enough visitor”. In: Sandell, Richard (ed.) Museums, society, inequality. London & New York: Routledge, 2002, p. 37.

These points have really challenged my own thinking about how museums seek and pursue our local audiences. I think it’s true that there are whole segments of individuals that don’t feel the same right to access the museum as those of us among the “better off and better educated.” There’s frequent coverage in the press about the consequences of a widening “technology gap,” but is there also a corresponding “culture gap” that carries many of the same consequences? Much of the beauty and power of museums lies in their ability to level the playing fields of society and to offer a place for discourse and exchange with diverse audiences. Sadly, much of this potential beauty is latent and waiting to be activated by museums with a vision to change the status quo.

The changing role of Authority

All this talk about participatory culture eventually ends up begging an important question about how the changes we are witnessing will eventually impact the role and authority of museums. The care and creation of knowledge has always been an important part of the mission of museums, and continues to be so.  However, with today’s ubiquitous access to information that is afforded by the web, museums are keenly aware that we are not the only producers of content related to our own collections, and many times not even the best source of content. Perhaps this has always been true, but technical advances are only highlighting a reality that has long been hidden.  In any case, museums are struggling to understand their relationship to an ecosystem of information that sometimes defies categorization and authority.

While discrete sources of information seem to be ever expanding, it’s reasonable to assert that unique and high-quality sources are becoming relatively more scarce. In an information landscape that privileges the popular over the credible, low-circulation-high-quality results can be easily lost.  Couple this idea with what’s been written about the state of digital media literacy and critical thinking skills among the general public and you quickly see the problem.  While it’s never been easier to discover a diverse variety of information about virtually any topic, discriminating quality between those sources is becoming more and more difficult.

This is – in my opinion – is where content specialists in museums can play an important part. Reference librarians are specifically trained in how to support researchers and scholars who dig through a litany of resources to find the information they need.  These skills transfer directly into a similar role for information-seeking on the internet.  The principles and practice remain the same, even though some of the tools may be different.  Museums would be well served to include their library staff as consultants to efforts of web design and information delivery both online and in the galleries, as they are perhaps better equipped than most staff to make sense of such a diversity of source material.

Secondly, as the true content experts in the museum, curators have an incredibly significant role to play in connecting both scholars and the general audience with the important concepts, facts, and narratives that drive the mission of the museum. With their knowledge of primary sources and their expertise with the museum’s collection, curators can be an incredible facilitator for the audience, especially when well supported by an enthusiastic staff of educators.

On the surface, this doesn’t seem terribly different than the standard operating procedure for museums. The difference, however, lies in an attitudinal shift among museum staff concerning an approach to authority as it relates to participatory culture. An authoritarian approach requires the museum to assert its authority by definition and then leaves us scratching our heads when the crowd of followers starts to thin. Conversely, an authoritative approach demonstrates the expertise of the museum’s staff in a participatory context that recognizes the museum’s role in facilitating access to cultural objects and information. The difference between authoritarian and authoritative is subtle, but crucial. In the latter case, authority is ascribed to the museum by the audience, and not the other way around. You may notice that this is similar to the earlier assertions about public value. In both cases, the audience is the central determiner of value, but the museum is responsible for building an appreciation for cultural access and preservation.

 Final thoughts

The shifts in our culture that result from a technology and information surge are pervasive and persistent. A rise in participatory expectations among communities around the world offers a variety of opportunities and challenges for museums to deal with. I’m hopeful that the conversations spurred by the Salzburg Global Seminar and the online conversations concerning these issues will prove as challenging for you as they have for me. Museums and libraries are home to the best stories the world has to offer, how we determine to manage, share, and cultivate those stories will determine the relevance and value we bring to the public in years to come.

With the hustle and bustle of life and meetings swirling around us all, it’s a rare occasion that we get to step outside of that pace and reflect on “big issues.” Contemplating an approach for the challenges that face museums given the changes in popular culture can make the difference between an organization that significantly impacts its community for good, and those that simply succeed at keeping the doors open.  Given the economic challenges many museums are encountering, keeping the doors open is – in and of itself – a challenge.  I’m a firm believer that times of challenge can be the best possible times to seize the opportunities at hand and make big changes.

I’m grateful for an opportunity to join a small group of museum and library experts in Salzburg next week for a meeting at the Salzburg Global Seminar entitled, “Libraries and Museums in an Era of Participatory Culture.”  I’ve agreed to participate and blog about my experiences from my perspective as a museum executive and a technologist.  I thought that in the spirit of “participatory culture,” I could ask a number of my friends and colleagues their opinions about the biggest challenges facing museums and libraries today.  I’ll bring those ideas and insights to Salzburg with me and represent those thoughts in the discussions there.  Please feel free to join the discussion on Twitter (#museumchallenges) or post your thoughts in the comments here.

The responses I’ve received via email and twitter have been pretty amazing! Several of my colleagues pointed out that museums are still adjusting to a perceived shift in our relationships with visitors.  Museums want to engage visitors and provide a variety of deep experiences, but don’t quite know how to sustain those efforts over a long period of time.

Shelley Bernstein, Chief of Technology from the Brooklyn Museum of Art asks the critical questions about how museums can build consistency in their efforts of engagement.

“How do we create engaging experiences consistently, so that visitors feel participation is part of the overall culture of the institution?  I’ve seen a lot of one-offs, where there’s a burst of activity around one single project, but the challenge is creating a consistency so that valued participation is always part of the museum experience.  In addition, these projects too often just exist online and not within the walls of the institution when people visit. The challenge is creating an overall experience that works both online and off and one that consistently allows visitors to participate in meaningful ways.”

Rich Cherry, Director of the Balboa Park Online Collaborative, points out that this goal of engagement and interaction with visitors both online and in the gallery carries with it some different expectations from public audiences and funding agencies that make planning for sustainability more difficult on the museum.

“Museums are in a difficult transition phase because of changing media consumption.  While young audiences are consuming social media and online content, older audiences are making that transition more slowly.   Unlike past shifts in media, this one is more interactive and limits the ability to simply re-purpose content.  This creates unique staffing and budgetary issues that are compounded by the recent economic downturn.  Funders are pushing museums to engage these new audience behaviors while not recognizing that a significant audience does not use these new methods and [museums] must support a dual track for some time to come.”

Nina Simon, Executive Director of the Museum of Art and History Santa Cruz, makes the point in her book about The Participatory Museum that,

“Participatory projects are like gardens; they require continual tending and cultivation. They may not demand as much capital spending and pre-launch planning as traditional museum projects, but they require ongoing management once they are open to participants. This means shifting a larger percentage of project budgets towards operation, maintenance, and facilitation staff.”

In addition to this fact, when I asked Nina what she saw as the challenges for museums seeking to embrace a participatory culture, she raised an important issue about museums’ strategy for funding these initiatives. Nina asks, “How do [museums] use participatory techniques to support more diverse and equitable use of our resources (as opposed to providing more for the people we already serve well)?”

It was a happy coincidence that Nina also covered a similar topic on her Museum 2.0 blog recently (What are the Most Important Problems in Our Field?, October 3, 2011).  I highly recommend reading through many of the excellent comments in response to that article for more great insight on the topic.

Ed Rodley, from the Museum of Science in Boston echoed some similar thoughts in questioning whether museums have really come to grips with the profound changes that we have all experienced in the rise of digital culture and the ubiquitous access to information afforded by the web.

“The digital challenge is that we are still conflicted about how to be citizens of a global information network. When all digital content has the capacity to reach people all over the planet, why are we still building websites based on the 1995 paradigm of “make a virtual simulacrum of the building”? The sway museums could have in this ecosystem is vast, given the breadth and depth of content we sit on.
…
Digital is ceasing to be a separate thing, and is becoming (if it hasn’t already become) part of the information ecosystem that our visitors use daily. [Museum] practice certainly doesn’t reflect this yet. How can we re-imagine ourselves in such a way that museums not just recognize, but embrace the online and the digital in ways that remain true to our core competencies as repositories for authentic experiences with culture?”

I was curious about what the potential overlap between these issues might be for libraries and museums.  In many ways it seems that some of the challenges addressed here are similar for both kinds of institutions and others are more unique.  I asked Martin Kalfatovic, Associate Director for the Digital Services Division of the Smithsonian Libraries for questions he would like to ask at the forum.  Martin asks,

“How can libraries, museums, and archives more effectively collaborate to cross-pollinate their collections? (i.e. a museum object with the associated printed text and archival materials that led to its collection). Can participatory culture (crowdsourcing) be used to help make links or show relationships that are not otherwise possible?

He raises an interesting issue about potential areas of collaboration that exist between these organizations that are as yet, unexploited.  These institutions have recognized relatively recently that many of the challenges faced by one kind of organization are faced in some way by all the others.  Collectively these “memory institutions” face questions about the changing role of authority, scholarship, and access in an age that offers vast amounts of information at the click of a button.  As Martin points out,

“How does the role of the museum library, particularly in the area of reference, change when museums begin to bring in crowdsourced content? Can the library play a knowledge management role for this content and perform the same information curation that is done with traditional print and archival sources?”

Rodley also touches on the new challenges of being source of authority in our current culture.

“Participatory culture doesn’t do away with the need for authority, but it will privilege a different kind of authority, a more transparent, more engaged one.  I believe people still want a trusted voice they can listen to, particularly in the digital realm.

… [Museums] must be less like the Great Oz, hiding behind our artifice and erudition. That doesn’t mean that we abandon our position, but it means we have make being questioned, being challenged, being called out, even being heckled part of what it means to be a museum. To be an authority in the current century will require a level of engagement that we can scarcely imagine.”

The pervasive nature of the web and information changes the game for museums and libraries. What is the relevance of an object in our collection, or a book in the stacks, if the information about that artifact can be accessed from the phone in my pocket?  This is not a trumped up argument about whether or not people will come to museums if we put great images of our collection online, but a more substantial concern about the pipeline of knowledge management that defines the collections we care about.

Kalfatovic continues,

As increasing amounts of library content becomes information online, where will the museum of artifacts and the museum of books as artifacts merge/overlap?”

It seems that the very nature of the artifact, or the object that is collected is changing.  What will this mean for museums and libraries who – in addition to creating new knowledge – are dedicated to preserving artifacts of history and culture?  Cherry points out an interesting conundrum,

“The changes we are witnessing in technology and culture are the ways cultural institutions work together. One seemingly benign artifact of this current age is going to cause enormous headaches in the years to come: email.  30 years ago when a museum director, or curator worked with an artist/collector/dealer/estate on an exhibition; that correspondence was captured on paper and was likely to be physically archived.  Today that correspondence is taking place in email and is unlikely to be archived effectively, if at all. The amount of information that is lost in that process is terrible for future researchers.  Museums and libraries need to research this problem on two fronts:  1) finding cheap effective ways for museums to create long term archives of electronic messages and 2) developing software capable of mining these messages to collate information about significant events in an organizations historical record.”

A litany of challenges to be sure! Ultimately, there seemed to be consensus among everyone I talked to that the place in our culture reserved for museums and libraries is changing to be one that is more integrated and important to the lives of the communities we live in.

Rodley,

“Making museums places that you go to in order to be an active citizen is something I’d love to see more museums attempt. That means making space available, making time available, and making our ears available to hear what matters to our constituents. Rephrased as a question, I’d say ‘How can we re-shape our buildings, staffs, and offerings in ways that support our local communities, not as temples where visitors come to consume culture, but more like agoras – meeting-places where our visitors can come to exchange ideas and culture?’”

For many of you that work in the field of museums, libraries, and archives, I’m sure that much of what I’m saying is repeating a familiar refrain.  I’m very impressed by the level of conversation that I encounter from my peers when we talk about these topics.  With very few exceptions, most of my colleagues understand that museums and libraries face a relevance issue to demonstrate the continued and enduring value of what we do in the face of changing cultural norms and expectations. The inherent value of museum and library collections is not a sure thing.  As Nina points out, it’s a garden that we tend through lots of hard work towards a set of common goals.

The key question then, is whether or not we are ready to do that hard work of authentic engagement? Or, are we instead seeking the ‘quick-hit’ payoffs to be gleaned from the current crop of cultural fads? Nancy Proctor is Head of Mobile Strategy and Initiatives for the Smithsonian Institution and puts the question in context:

“The move towards a more participatory culture in museums has been underway for a couple of decades now, and seems finally to be impacting daily practice among museum professionals on a wide scale. However even as we achieve greater openness, transparency, and collaboration among museums and “the people formerly known as the audience,” I am increasingly wondering if we are truly changing the fundamental structure of museums within society, or simply putting new faces into power in the old system? It won’t take us far if, to use a simplistic shorthand of stereotypes, “old guard” academics, curators, directors and other power-holders in the existing hegemony are simply swapped out for perhaps younger, more social media-savvy, museum “rock stars.” This may offer a temporary “revolution,” but is not a truly sustainable radical museum practice and will last only until the next group of upstarts overturns the establishment in their own turn. Modernism and capitalism of course depend on this kind of illusion of “progress” through revolution, because each depends on a constant supply of fresh “innovation” to fuel the markets. But I think we need to be very suspicious of the fetishization of the new in this period where there is a constant stream of shiny new toys to dazzle us with the promise of starting over in a Brave New World. Let’s make sure we don’t deceive ourselves, like Columbus discovering America, but rather undertake the much harder, less sexy, but ultimately more sustainable task of radically restructuring our museums and practices even as we work within those very institutions.”

Thanks to all my friends and colleagues for chiming in on the topic!  I’m very much looking forward to continuing the conversation with you all in the comments, on Twitter (#museumchallenges), and in Salzburg next week. Stay tuned for new posts and insights as the conversation progresses!

Statue of Rocky outside the Philadelphia Museum of Art.

A group of us here recently attended the annual Museums and the Web conference, held this year in Philadelphia.  The conference brings together museums from around the world to explore the role of technology in our various initiatives – whether they be online, in the galleries, or even in how our museums function.  Between lunch runs to Reading Terminal Market (amazing), the references to Ben Franklin (ever-present), and meeting with colleagues old and new (always a highlight), we each came away with a list of projects/ideas/encounters that grabbed our attention and will inspire our work throughout the upcoming year.  Here are our top takeaways from this year’s conference:

Rachel Craft:

1) The meeting kicked off with an opening plenary from Kristin Purcell of the Pew Research Center.  She gave a great talk about the actual usage of a lot of the tools we all are focusing on – mobile technologies, e-readers, social media usage, etc. – and shared stats that, for me, helped frame the rest of the conference. Knowing how our audiences are consuming information helps us to better shape how we deliver our content. (If you’re interested, check out her presentation here).

2) This segues nicely into my second takeaway, which is that approach to delivery – how are we streamlining what we produce to accommodate multiple channels (mobile, apps, website) without duplicating our efforts, while still tailoring the resulting media for each need?  I really enjoyed SFMOMA’s presentation on their approach.

3) Philadelphia’s cultural institutions was a huge part of the experience for me, and definitely one of the most inspiring.  The Mutter Museum with its incredible collection (seriously, check it out) also has a really great, dramatic way of conveying the story behind these objects.  Albert Barnes hung his collection in a way that specifically highlighted the (often unconventional) relationships he saw between paintings and objects, creating a powerful visual experience at the Barnes Foundation.  The arrangement of works cross time periods, geographies, and styles for the purpose of comparison and study – which is an interesting approach to consider for multimedia, as well. If we explored different approaches to storytelling, what kind of new, revealing connections could be made?   And at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, well, I could have stayed in this room all day.

Charlie Moad:

1) Drupal, the open source content management system that the IMA uses extensively, seems to have really taken its place within the museum community. I had a nice chat with George from Palantir who has been attending Museums and the Web for several years now. He stated that a few years ago he constantly had to explain what Drupal was. This year however, he was accompanied by a handful of other vendors who were also focused solely on Drupal based services.

2) There was another subtle theme that I picked up on across several sessions. Museums are starting to recognize the inevitability that much of the online interactions that occur with its content won’t necessarily happen on their websites. There was even an unconference session questioning the amount of effort that museums place on their websites redesigns due to this fact. As social networks and search engines provide web visitors with more and more of the information they seek, how can museums ensure they are making the most out of the online efforts?

3) Finally, it was a joy to have people walk up and show me their own TAP-based applications on their iPhones. Seeing others benefit from and use the tools we release has a reinvigorating quality.

Matt Gipson:

1) Mobile is the way of the walk. Mobile was definitely a heavy theme throughout the conference. Everywhere I looked somebody was using an iPad. The Mobile Parade was a great chance for museums to briefly show off their mobile achievements. It was especially great to see how the MFA took TAP and ran with it. The re-design touches they put on their app are superb!

2.  Museum tech people, in the flesh! I got to meet several art/tech people in person who I normally only see “online.” Surprisingly, I recognized several faces just from seeing their Twitter avatar. Looking forward to seeing you all at the next museum conference(s)!

3. How to launch a beta site. During a talk on museum collections on the web, the always brilliant Tate’s James Davis slyly dropped a link to their new art collection browser. There are a lot of subtle and smart things going on here. Also, there is a great paper describing their process here.

Honorable mentions: Mutter Museum, late-night back-room karaoke, cheese steaks, Chifa, Philly micro-brews, and disco naps.

Rob Stein:

1) One of the things I like the best about attending the Museum and the Web conferences are those happy surprises when you learn about work from a different part of the field that compliments your own.  This year was no exception!  I was sitting in a conference session on social tagging as I have so many times before, and was completely caught off-guard by some wonderful work coming out of the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST).  Gunho Chae, and Jungwha Kim presented their work on faceted tagging with the Gyeonggi Museum of Modern Art (GMOMA) and how other museums might improve their own tagging systems by adding facets.  It was so nice to see new quality work extending on earlier work of the steve.museum project.  Gunho, and Jungwha presented really solid work, a well written paper, AND were delightful colleagues at the same time.  What a wonderful occasion! You can read their paper here.

2) While our team from the IMA presents our work often at these conferences, I think we will all agree that the most valuable interactions are those where we get to pick the brains of our peers from other museums.  This year it was so great to meet and talk in more depth with Michael Parry from the Australian Center for the Moving Image.  Michael’s museum was the recipient of the Best Overall Site award from the conference this year for their work on the ACMI Generator, a site that teaches media storytelling techniques through the creation of user-generated storyboards.  Generator is a really sweet tool that provides a nice set of features for storytelling without confusing the users.

Recently, at the IMA, we’ve been working on similar projects related to the ArtBabble and finding that digital storytelling is a skill that’s not well understood in the states.  Michael was gracious with his time and honest with his critiques of our efforts.  In short, a great peer.  A second of my favorite moments was a sort of group review of some in-progress work for ArtBabble.  Michael Parry, Len Steinbach, Paolo Paolini, Nicoletta Di Blas, and students provided good critique and encouragement!  By the way, Paolo and Nicoletta’s paper about reusable exhibition content is a good read.

3) Lastly, I was proud to be a part of a community that can on one hand be very technical and scholarly, but on the other work for and support basic and fundamental human rights.  Supporting the arts, and the work of artists puts museums at the crux of all kinds of political, social, and moral issues.  It’s one of the wonderful reasons to work or volunteer for your local cultural organizations.  Leading up to this year’s conference we saw the arrest of the Chinese artist Ai Weiwei.  It was great, therefore, to see the Tate’s project for Ai Weiwei’s Sunflower Seeds exhibition win an award for the best use of social media. A great project no matter the circumstance, but especially poignant this year!  Along those lines, it was wonderful to see the Guggenheim step up and issue a Call for the Release of Ai Weiwei and for a number of museums (including the IMA) using their blogs to share with our audiences about why this matters.

As a technologist, and software guy by training, there are many places in the world for me to work.  I’m continually happy to be a part of one field that has so much potential for impact and long-term change.

While investigating the exhibits and schedules on the Shedd’s website, I found an intriguing interactive called SheddHeads. Visitors to the aquarium can upload their photos and videos, rate them, and enter them in contests. It inspired me to bring my camera along, and while I was there I noticed quite a few other folks taking pictures with everything from cell phones to digital SLRs. I have to admit that I got in the groove taking photos and forgot to check the labels to see what it was I was observing a few times. So, is this a missed educational opportunity… or a successfully engaging experience? Something to consider.

What do you think? Can an interactive experience be too engaging?