The Museum of the Future - Latest Comments

Re: Now that Wikipedia is perfect, 3 opportunities for your institution to shine

Jan — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 19:04:10 -0000

Dear Jasper
Nice article and I agree,
But you also have to accept the criticism you get when you think out of the box.
Many museums will not take the risk and therefore avoid a more daring approach.
I can know, we were loved and hated for an audioguide we did in Antwerp
http://www.ravi-artguides.com/...
So it's i my opinion not about who wins or loses, it's about telling stories.
Wikipedia shares knowledge not stories.
It's just a different tool.
And qwiki, it's technically brilliant, but Try Peter Paul Rubens e.g ?
If you want to kill all passion, this is the way to do it

Re: Now that Wikipedia is perfect, 3 opportunities for your institution to shine

Jasper Visser — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 09:00:26 -0000

I had never heard of that website before, but it's GREAT! (I fear we've just become redundant.) Made me think about the great scene in Wall-E where the captain is "googling" earth.

Thanks a lot for sharing!

Re: Now that Wikipedia is perfect, 3 opportunities for your institution to shine

David van Zeggeren — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 08:53:55 -0000

Qwiki is partly doing what you advocate, although it is generated Wikipedia content (without humour and emotion) in a video. It is like using Google Translate on an entire text, instead of translating and interpreting it yourself. But it is quicker and more fun than reading these long (and perfect) articles. www.qwiki.com.

Re: Now that Wikipedia is perfect, 3 opportunities for your institution to shine

Jasper Visser — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 03:20:29 -0000

Thanks Lori, and thanks for your great reply. I left a little comment, because we agree. Wikipedia has already won. It's the others that need to accept that and take their position relative to that.

Re: Now that Wikipedia is perfect, 3 opportunities for your institution to shine

Lori Phillips — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 19:17:27 -0000

Hold on hold on one second. So even as Wikipedians are still battling misconceptions with educators about vandalism and accuracy... now the museum field is criticizing us because Wikipedia is too perfect? We just can't win!
:) A serious response is on my blog. I do hope you'll read and respond: http://hstryqt.tumblr.com/post...

PS: I LOVED THIS POST! (But you could've guessed that.)

Re: The social network for museums in 2012: StumbleUpon

LoveLondonMuseums — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 11:30:10 -0000

I'm boycotting googles +1 function. the more people use it the smaller the Internet becomes i agree. In fact I don't like Googles current ethos of taking over the internet by the back door at the moment and so i have moved to bing.

I encourage others to use an alternative like your suggestion of stumbleupon.

Re: The social network for museums in 2012: StumbleUpon

Rolin Moe — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 13:08:55 -0000

That's a great perspective, Catherine. I have not used StumbleUpon before, but saw direction here via several museum blogs I follow.
Is the issue with social media in museum spaces that the interaction as designed is periphery? Existing social media works to point out an artifact, collection or exhibit...but the potential seems so much greater. How can museums create virtual community that gets past the "Oh, this is on display" paradigm?

Re: The social network for museums in 2012: StumbleUpon

Jasper Visser — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 03:03:16 -0000

Hi Catharine, thanks for your comment. In my experience SU users have similar behavior as you tell about, only length of visit is normal (higher than twitter, even). Also, but I don't know about this for sure, I feel they are more engaged, at least on SU.

Curious to hear what other people's stats say!

Re: The social network for museums in 2012: StumbleUpon

Catherine S — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 11:54:03 -0000

Thank you for this blog post--I've been thinking about StumbleUpon quite a bit lately as they consistently shoot both our blog and our website quite a bit of traffic. I've found it interesting to look through which blog posts and collections tend to go viral on this particular social network, and I think that it could potentially be used to help us brainstorm about what collections we should highlight on our blog or through other outreach programming.

That said, StumbleUpon users consistently have much higher bounce rates, fewer pages/visit, and spend less time on our sites than other users. Of course, I'm only speaking about our own experience--it may vary across the institution I work in, or across museums, of course. But for us, StumbleUpon users tend to drop in quickly, leave, and then not come back. I can see how spending some time interacting with the community might change this, but Facebook and Twitter from our own Facebook page and from other Smithsonian streams, as well as Flickr and Wikipedia, tend to feed us more engaged/returning traffic. It's not to discount StumbleUpon, but just to note that for us, when we all have a lot on our plates and have to make difficult decisions about how much time we have for a limited number of social media networks, it pays to look through at the nitty gritty of the numbers. That said, it may become a part of our strategy moving forward--just some food for thought.

I'll look forward to seeing what others have to say about the subject and to hear more about how people are using it!

Best.
Catherine Shteynberg
Smithsonian Institution Archives

Re: The great misconception: Value

ninthestars — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 09:43:22 -0000

we tend to forget that value worth more than price. Nice post.

Re: 30 do’s for designing successful participatory and crowdsourcing projects

Anthony Quinn — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 03:56:47 -0000

Thanks for a really useful article. There's a nice mix of instantly applicable, practical tips, as well as some thought provoker 'big picture' ideas in here. I discovered this post from a link on Nina Simon's blog. You both inspired me to reflect on my own learnings and to thank people for participating in my own project. http://anthonyquinnartist.com/...

Re: The great misconception: Value

Jasper Visser — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 05:06:29 -0000

I'm pretty sure it will be a great programme, considering the high quality of the proposals. Also, I'm more than willing to host an informal value discussion in any of the nice bars in Gracia, with a cocktail, at night, or at the beach!:-)

Re: The great misconception: Value

David van Zeggeren — Thu, 22 Dec 2011 18:16:49 -0000

Thanks for this great post Jasper. Love to see who you and Jim are bringing up on stage at MuseumNext this year.

Re: 30 do’s for designing successful participatory and crowdsourcing projects

Jasper Visser — Tue, 13 Dec 2011 16:06:35 -0000

Hi David! That's so good to hear. I'm sure you've discovered most of this in your great work. See you around!

Re: 30 do’s for designing successful participatory and crowdsourcing projects

David Klevan — Tue, 13 Dec 2011 14:42:23 -0000

Great list, Jasper. It's rewarding to see some of our work reflected in your advice, and it's humbling when I see areas where we need to improve. Thanks for sharing!

Re: 30 do’s for designing successful participatory and crowdsourcing projects

Jasper Visser — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 04:22:50 -0000

Thanks David, yours are essential lessons as well! The removing of contributions can always be a tricky part, but - as you say - you should design your project so that users can remove their contributions. (We occasionally solved this with moderated removal, letting people remove at will, but checking if nothing truly valuable was lost).

Re: 30 do’s for designing successful participatory and crowdsourcing projects

Nina Simon — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 21:05:20 -0000

Nice. I'm hanging this on the wall.

Re: 30 do’s for designing successful participatory and crowdsourcing projects

David Haskiya — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 13:54:23 -0000

Very basic ones but still:

Don't base your contribution forms on your museum collection management systems metadata entry formsDon't redact user contributions to "improve quality"When interacting with people on the site never ever use an anonymous institutional account or avatar. Always be a person.
Allow users to remove their contributions themselves should they want to

Re: Reflections on the beauty of austerity in Kunstmuseum Kolumba

Martin van de beek — Mon, 21 Nov 2011 05:28:00 -0000

I visited the Kolumba museum last Saturday during a weekend stay in Cologne. Designed by one of the few architects with the right sence for- and knowledge of material, space, light and proportion, Peter Zumthor, I agree the spatial experience is in perfect balance. Hope to visit the Neues Museum in Berlin, designed by another of those few architects, David Chipperfield, soon.

Re: Will your next hire work towards a great future for your organisation?

Jasper Visser — Sat, 19 Nov 2011 04:29:18 -0000

Hi Lynda,

Like with everything, I guess there are Directors who talk about this, and those who don't. From the Dutch museum reality, for instance, I know that places like the Amsterdam Museum actively scout young talent, hire many of them, and have them grow within the organisation. Another well documented case is the Museumnight (n8), where the organisational staff has to be young and can only stay on for 3 years.

I'm curious about your paper and blog post! Thanks and all the best,

Re: Will your next hire work towards a great future for your organisation?

Lynda Kelly — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 16:19:21 -0000

Nice post Jasper. Charles Handy looked at this several years ago in his book The Elephant and the Flea, which talked about future workers being fleas, flitting in and out of jobs/orgs/careers but that they still relied on elephants for this.

I recently wrote a paper (with the prof community's help called "Can we build the 21st century museum with 19th century skills which (like Seb) I'm about to blog also.

This is a great conversation to have. Am wondering whether Directors are having this??

Cheers,

Re: Will your next hire work towards a great future for your organisation?

Jasper Visser — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 11:53:52 -0000

This is another discussion, but I do believe there are areas (countries, but especially certain cities) that foster innovation and change better than others. As well as moments, by the way. With sufficient power and ambition, one can create such areas and moments. I believe innovation is a choice, not a lucky break when all the conditions are right.

The Dutch are known to travel internationally, but I guess Holland looks different from the inside. Our journeys to discover and bond with different cultures are long gone. Most of us now travel because the beaches are nicer elsewhere. It's the Dutch you meet as a foreigner that are the fortunate exception and by no means the average. I guess the same holds true for all other nationalities.

Re: Will your next hire work towards a great future for your organisation?

Seb Chan — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 06:36:01 -0000

I don't really think there are 'more innovative countries'.

There are just 'more innovative moments' where the right people, place, ideas and capital to implement them have converged. You can probably try to set up a system to generate a greater chance of such moments but there's never any certainty.

At least the Dutch are known for their international travelling. Unlike some other highly developed countries I can think of where under half the population doesn't have a passport.

Re: Will your next hire work towards a great future for your organisation?

Jasper Visser — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 06:17:53 -0000

I like the idea of a mentor programme. This summer, when I had the opportunity to visit the great people at Tate, I realised how lucky I was to have that opportunity, and how much I would love to offer that to more people in the sector. I'd love to be a mentor to new cultural rebels, as well as welcome visitors whenever possible. It shouldn't be difficult to set up such a system...

And of course we need predictable people as well. I'm happy the guy paying my salary is predictable!:-) I just think there's way to much focus on that in the Netherlands. I'm sure it's better in more innovative countries.

Re: Will your next hire work towards a great future for your organisation?

Seb Chan — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 06:05:04 -0000

I'm working up a very similarly flavoured post right now.

I think the reality is that you need a mix of both - but the role of 'the safe and predictable ones' is to shield and shepherd the passionate experimenters and create a work environment where they can flourish.

There's always a need for 'wise counsel' and one of things I find terribly lacking in the sector at the moment is a strong mentoring programme for young entrants, not from the late career generation, but from the mid-career generation (who in turn should be mentored by the late career generation). These mentors, now we have 'teh Internets' should and can easily be international.