Museum 2.0

AUGUST 20, 2009

I'm working on a section of my book about sharing social objects and am writing about the most common way that visitors share their object experiences in museums: through photographs. Revenue Streams: Museums want to maintain control of sales of "officially sanctioned" images of objects via catalogues and postcards.

Museum 54

Museum Photo Policy Open 54

Museum 2.0

JANUARY 16, 2013

It's not every day that a visitor buys pizza for everyone in the museum. Then again, Saturday was hardly normal at the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History. The museum itself was well-integrated into the event. Or that visitors form a spontaneous "laugh circle" on the floor. Online to onsite migration isn't always easy.

Reflection 43

Reflection Community Museum Participatory 43

Museum 2.0

APRIL 4, 2012

Museums have been grappling with this question for years ( here's a 2007 roundup of such projects ), most aggressively in zoos and natural history museums where staff hope to inspire conservation and in history/concept museums that focus on civic engagement and activism. No small task for a museum exhibition.

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Story Participatory Museum History 47

Museum 2.0

JULY 9, 2009

Seb Chan has a lovely, long interview up at Fresh+New with Helen Whitty about the Powerhouse Museum's new mini-exhibition, the Odditoreum. The Odditoreum is another wrinkle in the study of visitors' understanding and interpretation of authenticity in museums. I enjoyed listening to it (virtually, not at the museum).

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Museum Alternative Portland Artist 22

Museum 2.0

MARCH 21, 2012

How do you help visitors know what they can and cannot do in your museum? Most museums have this figured out: they have signs, they have guards, they have cases over the objects. And this works pretty well in science museums, where designers talk about "hardening" exhibits to withstand the more aggressive touchers among us.

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Museum Denver Artist Milwaukee 49

Museum 2.0

NOVEMBER 30, 2009

This guest post, written by Philippa Tinsley, Collections Manager for the Worcester City Art Gallery and Museum (UK), describes the innovative Top 40 exhibition they mounted in the summer of 2009. In my experience, museum professionals aren’t big reality TV viewers.

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Museum Chart Picture Arts 23

Museum 2.0

JULY 20, 2010

Last week, I gave a talk about participatory museum practice for a group of university students at UCSC. During the ensuing discussion, one woman asked, "Which audiences are least interested in social participation in museums?" So what's a museum to do--especially one that is funded to encourage youth and teen participation?

Teen 49

Teen Social Museum Participatory 49

Museum 2.0

SEPTEMBER 7, 2010

For years, I've been fascinated and a bit perplexed by the Elsewhere Collaborative , a thrift store turned artists' studio/living museum in Greensboro, North Carolina. By calling ourselves a museum, we respond to those cultural institutions that have separated practice from production, exhibition from process, and work from play.

Collaboration 36

Collaboration North Carolina Museum Artist 36

Museum 2.0

JANUARY 15, 2008

The presumed answer is "yes" your museum needs a blog, a pony, or a set of comfy couches. Does your museum need a custom online social network? Many museums have been experimenting in these spaces by creating institutional profiles, museum affinity groups, and connecting with visitors and other museum professionals individually.

Museum 20

Museum Social Network Case Study Discussion 20

Museum 2.0

NOVEMBER 7, 2010

Last week marked four years for the Museum 2.0 People--especially young folks looking to break into the museum business--often ask me how I got here. This seems like an appropriate time to share the story. Ed Rodley recently wrote a blog post about museum jobs entitled "Getting Hired: It's Who You Know and Who Knows You."

Museum 52

Museum Boston Participatory Job 52

Museum 2.0

MAY 5, 2009

I just returned from the American Association of Museums (AAM) annual meeting in Philadelphia. I led two sessions, one on visitor co-created museum experiences, and the other on design inspirations from outside museums. what is the value of the exhibition experience to non-participants, that is, regular museum visitors?

Slides 20

Slides Participatory Museum Children 20

Museum 2.0

JUNE 12, 2012

It was exhilarating to see them inspired to create their own meanings in response: lovers whispering together in alcoves, people of all ages writing and drawing on walls and post-its, children painting, everyone sitting rapt before screens. This post focuses on one aspect of the exhibition: its participatory and interactive elements.

Participatory 51

Participatory Museum Blackboard Game 51

Museum 2.0

SEPTEMBER 24, 2019

This month we’ve been thinking about “What is a museum?” (I'm I’ve been visiting museums my whole life. Does that make me the best judge of museums? People are the defining characteristics of museums. I’ve worked with and at plenty of museums that can sometimes feel empty. I'm not alone there.

Museum 36

Museum Place Life Ohio 36

Museum 2.0

AUGUST 25, 2009

When you want visitors to spend a long time reflecting and sharing their thoughts, you need to design spaces for response that are comfortable and minimize distractions. Rabinowitz commented that "as a 40-year veteran of history museum interpretation, I can say that I never learned so much from and about visitors."

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Design Goal Difference Platform 31

Museum 2.0

JULY 2, 2009

How would you design a recommendation system for a museum? When it comes to museums, recommendation systems are a natural solution for the problem of the customized tour. When it comes to museums, recommendation systems are a natural solution for the problem of the customized tour.

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System Design Movie Museum 22

Museum 2.0

AUGUST 9, 2007

I got thinking about this the other day with regard to museums. More and more museums are putting resources into floor staff who are trained to connect visitors with content, to serve as interpreters and informal teachers. If they rely minimally on staff, they can be scalable to all visitors in the museum at a time.

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Museum Tools Participatory Discussion 20

Museum 2.0

MARCH 24, 2010

This is the third in a four-part series about writing The Participatory Museum. This post covers my personal process of encouraging--and harnessing--participation in the creation of The Participatory Museum. Check out the other parts here. The challenge was to figure out how to do it and end up with a high-quality book.

Participatory 33

Participatory Museum Process Experiment 33

Museum 2.0

MAY 16, 2007

into the museum is the potential to encourage more positive in-museum interactions among strangers. I want in-person museum experiences to be more like experiences on social sites like Flickr, where strangers connect and form relationships around content. We do that with staff all the time.

Museum 20

Museum Myspace Facilitation Social Network 20

Museum 2.0

APRIL 6, 2011

Community processes are both exciting and time-consuming. In many cases, once the final project is launched, it's hard to detect the participatory touch. The exhibition or program is of high quality, and from the visitor perspective, it may look like museum as usual. Not every participatory process has to scream "look at me!"

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Participatory Process Museum Children 48

Museum 2.0

DECEMBER 20, 2010

On a recent trip to the Children's Museum of Pittsburgh, I noted a discussion board in the "Nursery" gallery. and Drive @ night: -go during their longest sleep time -split driving w/ someone and take turns napping -You'll be tired the next day but getting there faster is worth it! The museum doesn't have to have all the answers.

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Museum Children Discussion Childhood 41

Museum 2.0

NOVEMBER 6, 2012

I'm thrilled to share this brilliant guest post by Marilyn Russell, Curator of Education at the Carnegie Museum of Art. In a straightforward way, Marilyn explains how her team developed a participatory project to improve engagement in a gallery with an awkward entry. It is great to feel more of a part of the museum!" "All

Museum 45

Museum Arts Problem Design 45

Museum 2.0

JUNE 2, 2010

This year, the American Association of Museums annual conference was in Los Angeles (my hometown). I hosted two sessions, one on design for participation and the other on mission-driven museum technology development. He started with museums as a "place to go"--to see things, consume experiences.

Slides 22

Slides Museum Los Angeles San Jose 22

Museum 2.0

OCTOBER 26, 2009

Here's the basic idea: while you are at the museum, you save digitizable content--either content you make (photos of yourself) or content you collect (museum-supplied text or media of interest). The personal webpage has many adherents, and some institutions, like The Tech Museum in San Jose, have been offering them for almost a decade.

Personal 34

Personal Museum Pledge San Jose 34

Museum 2.0

JULY 3, 2008

I've written before about techniques for talking to strangers, looking at how buttons , buses , and dogs and can all be tools for participatory design. I used that instruction recently to kick off a meeting at a museum planning a participatory education space. Interestingly, at the City Museum in St.

Participatory 20

Participatory St. Louis Museum Game 20

Museum 2.0

JUNE 15, 2009

At any time, there were two facilitators in the exhibit--one for the advice booth, and the other for the buttons. They reminded me of street vendors or great science museum cart educators, imparting an energy to the space without overwhelming it. This is a good lesson for museum talk-back design.

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Advice Museum Facilitation Student 31

Museum 2.0

FEBRUARY 23, 2009

As many of you know, I’m writing a book about participatory design for museums. The book is intended to be a practical guide to participatory museum experiences focused on design strategies, case studies, and activities. The WHY of participatory design is really important.

Participatory 26

Participatory Design Museum Wiki 26

Museum 2.0

JULY 24, 2012

When we talk about making museums or performing arts organizations more participatory and dynamic, those changes are often seen as threatening to the traditional arts experience. What if historic arts experiences were actually a lot more participatory? Proper audiences were like docile children, seen and not heard.

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Greece Arts Industry Participatory 51

Museum 2.0

NOVEMBER 25, 2008

Why do you care about and or work in museums? I don't work in museums because I love them. When I visit a new city, I don't clamor to visit museums. And while I'll visit museums out of professional (and occasionally personal) interest, I don't do it because of a deep emotional connection. And check out the comments.

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Museum Alternative Education University 29