Again – raw notes from a session……

MW 2008 Closing Plenary 4/12/208

Clifford Lynch – Coalition for Networked Information www.cni.org

Digital databases of objects, etc. – great opportunity there to reach out to visitors, scholars, etc. To get beyond the restrictions of available exhibition space.

Have to be honest – sometimes these virtual ways of getting at an object are better than the actual ways – when the object is monumental and cannot see the whole – when the gallery is too crowded

This is not to say that the real is not important – but these surrogates – nay, complements are very important. There is great power in that – we are able to see things we cannot see when we engage physical collections esp in the way normal people access them – the non-privileged access.

Provocative areas of compromise – better stewardship, protecting collections, issues with repatriation.

Digital surrogates are great insurance – if something is stolen, looted, destroyed then it is still available.

There comes a time that you have to give a high priority to a really good collection of digital surrogates and their propagation around the world in various safe havens as a good insurance strategy – good stewardship

Mashups and such are important – but we do need to be realistic about them

Look at the new way we can compare different versions of a Shakespearean play – new things become possible – finding new information, new meaning is now possible where it would not have been before.

Imagine doing the same sort of thing to your own collection – then comparing with other such collections – finding new meanings, new information

Open access – how broadly do we believe there is some base human right to access this – and most importantly how serious are we about breaking down barriers that hold back such access –

Through collections – that’s where we are beginning to converge with libraries and archives.

Exhibitions – the fascinating prospect of being able to extend exhibits in virtual form – the potential of creating virtual exhibits that you could not do physically – the potential displacement of curation – where meaning is constructed by others – other curators, visitors, etc. – as well as the curator.

Most virtual exhibits only take you a little way – then leave you there. We don’t have really good connections with collections – nomenclature and naming authority differences, all sorts of barriers.

Pivot points that present all sorts of opportunities

what does a scholarly monograph turn into in the digital world? Some books should never have been books – they are far more suited now to the digital world. You can do so much more in a networked environment than you can in print.

Relationships between exhibitions as represented in digital form, with catalogues, and scholarship produced in conjunction with an exhibition in digital form – and how that links out to the outside world. Have to look at the viability of the traditional exhibition catalogue and where is it best suited for?

Interactivity - should be looked at critically – because some of it is interactive for the sake of being…interactive.

Visitors creating their own tours – very much like the old pick your own ending

then there is interaction that leaves trails – like leaving comments, reactions stories behind that establish a bond around a cultural institution. Well-received – and useful tools, but not sure in the long run that they make that much of a difference.

Social Networking Fatigue phenomenon – as these communities get busier, advertisers come in, spammers….people get socialized to death. How much do you really have time for – what’s the emotional, social, etc. return for you? How much time do you have to put towards it?

Museums may find social network sites useful – but when they fail it is important to remember that it is not the museum’s fault – just people have moved on.

Tagging – can be used as a diagnostic – to understand that you do need cross-references – that the visitors vocabulary is not the museum’s vocabulary. Tagging also allows the user to discuss the information in ways that they want – and in ways the curators do not intend. Much of this is easily absorbed – but other parts are deeply idiosyncratic, interpretive and don’t translate well from one interpretive frame to the next – but they still remain important to people. And is tagging a quick-win phenomena – how do we manage the evolution of a tagged collection over a long period of time? Will need a great deal of maintenance as do other systems of taxonomy. Is tagging very much of the hour? Will it decay after time passes? How will they remain fresh? Need to be mindful that what we are seeing today for tagging is the early win and not the maintenance side which will need some consideration as well.

There’s a form of interaction where people want to interact with the materials – the collection – and they may want to interact in a variety of ways depending on who they are – correct errors, annotate, answer questions, etc….raises deep questions about authority, responsibility, audience, institutional strategy and priorities. For most museums, their mission prizes public engagement. Interactions with image material – it’s wonderful what happens – people want to tell you who those people are, who the dog belonged to, what that machine is, etc……there are some institutions doing this in a deliberate way – giving them to the public and having the public identify, react to, create meaning around. The phenomenon of the orphan photo. Who are these people – where are they from, what did they do. These questions were largely unanswerable until the advent of the web.

Were does authority reside – do you dilute it if you open it to all – and remember that all the crazies and folks with axes to grind are out there waiting to help as well. And what does this do to the authority of the institution? How do you balance this – and where do you priorities lie – is it truly public engagement if this is what public engagement means? Museums may need to revisit their priorities. It may be useful for museums to enter into dialogue with library and archives – and with their fellow cultural institutions.

Question – what does an institution in Australia owe to an audience in Atlanta – esp. if their funding is a local funding. Online is global – funding may be local. ILL is a good example of this – technology has made it easy to locate items and thus a greater demand is there – and this may bedetrimental. Also – these global users don’t just ask a question, get an answer and then go away – they come back for the next question – they stay. This can be good. And bad.

Changed conversation with the audience – important to continue to redefine the conversation.

So this is just an experiment – I’m uploading my raw notes from the session I’m sitting in right now.

MW 2008 Working with Teens 4/12/2008

ArtPad- A Collection. A Connection. – Glenbow Museum

Teens are: Interested in themselves

Interested in their relationships with peers

Interested in adapting and improving their skills

Used a teen focus group – showed them six works of art with no context, then showed six works with a bit more context. Found that giving them skeletal information was not enough – but provoked questions that could then be used in the interactive. Ultimately found that providing context for the work was needed.

Students really want to know scale in the virtual context, want to see pictures of the artists

All of the works of art have the same categories: Looking at this work, Insight from the artist, how was this made?, finding meaning, talk back, more stuff, artist’s biography, credits

Students want different kinds of media – audio, video, etc. But when the students were asked about downloading podcasts – they thought that was a bad idea – would be boring. but they would watch the video online. RSS feeds not of interest.

Project also includes interviews with teens, and also enlisted design students to assist in the project

TalkBack section is moderated

Privacy concerns with login – use non-identifiable user names, no email info displayed – and still they ran up against certain area school board regulations that kept students from being able to register at school – but they could do it at home.

Young Peoples’ Laboratories for Art

www.smk.dk/ulk Anne Nielsen

Hired 90 teens – had 400 days

all they knew that there needed to be an on-site and online presence

Now – almost 500 profiles online with no advertising – and have created and engaged this target community

Concept –

Every profile is a laboratory

‘New knowledge’ – a collaboration between staff, artpilots, audience and artists

The ‘new knowledge is presented in entries on the website – related to the contributing profiles

Why try? There are so many communities already out there. Because sometimes teens think they are the only ones who like something in the world – they are alone in their classes – here they find others, find new inspiration

Advantages –

It’s non-commercial – no ads, no fear that the site will be bought out or content regrouped

It’s in Danish

It’s democratic – If I give a lot to this community it will grow – I can improve it

It’s a small and safe community – and exists on-site as well

It’s serious- it’s not just flashy show off stuff.

There’s room for different kinds of users and user behaviour

The context of the museum – gives some authority and identity

Challenges

Education – teachers are not as enthusiastic about the community as the students are. Teachers are not using it. Don’t care that there is a teen site.

Continuum from museum to community – where is the balance? For staff – where is the ROI?

Community members grow “too old” – original community was for ages 12 – 25. What do you do when they age out? Where do they go?

Resources – time and funding

The internet ecosystem – do you link out to the rest of it? Some teens want it to stay a closed system because there their nerd side can be displayed – not so much on MySpace or Facebook

From Boring and non-offensive to

Walker Art Center – visual arts

http://teens.walkerart.org

This is for teens in their after school time – important to make that distinction

Citywide scavenger hunt – decode clues and find bands in secret venues

Original website was designed really for museum staff and educators – not for teens – not for the target audience

Where are teens? On MySpace, Facebook, other social networks. And what are they doing?

Messaging privately and publicly

posting links

shows/events

trading videos

showing their work

customizing – form of self expression

Walker has a total of 7 institutional blogs – launched in 2005 – has become more popular than even the front page of the site sometimes.

Site needs institutional info, projects archive, application, sponsorship logos, maybe teens can be enticed into doing reviews and criticism

Two distinct tiers of information – teen driven content, playful, fun, fresh set of views AND institution driven content

Site should also be an open vessel – ready for expansion and ability to add other content that has not even been thought of yet.

SO – the site is split in half – literally. The boring, institutional stuff on the left – and the teen site on the right side.

Are using del.icio.us – one shared account at the moment – RSS feed into site

upcoming.org

Using outside services really works – use RSS feeds

Users can customize the look of the page – just like MySpace, etc.

Make teens a part of the process – not just the product.

Risk – no moderation – but, there are guidelines which they have to agree to – and most feel empowered by it.

Think about the site as an educational program – don’t focus on marketing. The marketing will flow from the site – but it isn’t the site. Authenticity is better marketing than any ad you can do.

Easiest if you create partnerships at the beginning – with schools, school systems, etc.

Look at the sites that teens go to – have them show you what they like and draw from those suggestions. They don’t have to be heavily involved in the design process – but should be consulted along the way.

Walker Art Center – while the WACTAC group is teenaged – the onsite programs are not limited to an age group – while the program might have been created by teens for teens, there’s no exclusion of others – remember, that teenager might like to keep coming to those events when he’s 23…..

job security training, originally uploaded by sumi37.

You just can’t take Anne Marie anywhere without the waiters gravitating to her. Case in point – we were having breakfast this morning at the Montreal Hilton and in between the pain chocolat and the oatmeal, she got a free tutorial on how to carry lots of plates at once.

So we documented the event, uploaded it and now here it is, for your viewing pleasure and edification.

Well – we made it to Montreal and the Museums and the Web conference – albeit a bit too late to do any conference thingies tonight because we were deeelaaayed at both airports. Go figure. Anyway – some lovely smoked salmon and a Canadian beer later and I’m ready to crash and not think of things binary until the morrow…..