... it was the same GLAM wiki event you mention below here Nick of course.
Adrian
On 6 Jun 2013, at 17:01, Adrian Stevenson wrote:
> Hi Robert, Nick
>
> I don't know if this directly relates to the points being made here, but it reminded me how struck I was by Lizzy Jongma's talk about the Rijksmuseum online at a recent Glam wiki event, and how the virtual/digital experience of art can in some cases surpass the physical experience in the physical space. She makes this point in the video of her talk available at https://uk.wikimedia.org/wiki/GLAM-WIKI_2013/Schedule#Fri-Jongma from about 13mins in. Lizzy admits that when she saw one of the paintings in real life for the first time when the museum opened recently, she found she was disappointed.
>
> Adrian
> _____________________________
> Adrian Stevenson
> Senior Technical Innovations Coordinator
> Mimas, The University of Manchester
> Devonshire House, Oxford Road
> Manchester M13 9QH
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>
> On 6 Jun 2013, at 16:12, Nick Poole wrote:
>
>> Dear Robert,
>>
>> Many thanks for your response. As ever, you raise a very useful and interesting point!
>>
>> To me, the greatest strength of digital content is also one of its most significant challenges - which is its essential non-linearity. The power of the hyperlink opens up the capability for everything to connect to everything else. This unlocks tremendous opportunities to create new relationships between bodies of knowledge, but it creates an immense challenge in creating coherent experiences for users.
>>
>> A book is a linear and bounded object. You open it, and in the process you accept the rules of engagement - pages are (generally) in a numbered sequence. The knowledge is (generally) sequential and incremental. The knowledge contained in the book is the knowledge contained in the book and once it is imprinted on the page, it doesn't change.
>>
>> These rules of engagement do not exist in a digital context, and to my mind most efforts to create structured virtual experiences are variations on the theme of trying to create boundaries and interfaces which in some senses constrain the freedom of the format but which do so to make the experience more coherent for the user. At one end of this might be, for example, a wholly constrained gallery interactive at the other end might be something like Google's 'Exquisite Forest' (http://www.tate.org.uk/context-comment/video/tateshots-exquisite-forest).
>>
>> This is important for museums in particular because so much of the 'unspoken' value and impact of a museum experience resides in the nature of the interaction and the way that it is bounded by an existing way of behaving. In essence, when people walk into our museums, they are accepting a particular type of stylised experience - walk here, look at that, touch this, learn that - within which we can create coherent narratives about history.
>>
>> Museum theorists will, I am sure, argue endlessly about how *valid* those narratives are (and the impression of linearity and progression they give), particularly given their slightly mono-cultural nature, but I have always been happy to accept that our professional deontology means that even if not perfect, our narratives strive for balance.
>>
>> I was very struck by Mike Edson's recent presentation on 'Scale, Scope and Speed' at the GLAM WIKI conference at the British Library. One of his postulates is that things which are unbounded (like a wiki) scale much better than things which are bounded. I am not sure that museums are at liberty to create completely unbounded/dynamic experiences because trust and authority are such a key component of our social function, and they depend to some extent on constraint.
>>
>> The capability of technology has undoubtedly outstripped our understanding of how best to deploy it, but I think that's ok. I think the tremendous potential here is to be able to use the flexibility of digital content to create many beautiful things from the same body of knowledge, each of which will be bounded in its own particular way. Hence, technology allows us to make beautiful books, beautiful experiences, beautiful apps, beautiful websites and beautiful products in museum shops, all from the same material.
>>
>> In other words, I'm not sure the goal is to find a way of using digital to create an alternate that is as coherent and bounded as a book, but to open up the capability of museums to create books and a potentially infinite range of other outputs as well, each of which serves its own potential use case.
>>
>> I'll stop there I think!
>>
>> All best,
>>
>> Nick
>>
>>
>> Nick Poole
>> Chief Executive Officer
>> Collections Trust
>>
>>
>> 2-3 July 2013, The Kia Oval
>> www.openculture2013.org.uk
>>
>>
>>
>> Linked
>> Join CT's Collections Management Group
>>
>> Visit Collections Trust online
>> www.collectionstrust.org.uk
>> www.collectionslink.org.uk
>> www.culturegrid.org.uk
>>
>> Company Registration No: 1300565 Registered Charity No: 273984
>> Registered Office: Collections Trust, WC 209, Natural History Museum, Cromwell Road, London, SW7 5BD
>>
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Museums Computer Group [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Bud Robert
>> Sent: 06 June 2013 15:33
>> To: [log in to unmask]
>> Subject: Re: Digital Trends in Museums 2013 presentation
>>
>> To me as a curator, and I think to several others of my colleagues the central question remains, how can one create a real work of art analoguous to the wonders of a book in a previous age using a combination of digital resources and textual interpretation. The book was essentially a text based medium and the coffee-table book relied on images of beautiful things. The digital media enable the really smart and illuminating cross-relationships of different digital things and text as well. With the possibility of user engagement. That makes the museum a much more central to the new media but also raises the challenge of how one creates the compelling product.
>>
>> Dr Robert Bud
>> Sarton Professor, 2012-2013, University of Ghent Keeper of Science and Medicine The Science Museum, Exhibition Road, London SW7 2DD
>>
>> ________________________________
>>
>> From: Museums Computer Group on behalf of Nick Poole
>> Sent: Thu 06/06/2013 14:28
>> To: [log in to unmask]
>> Subject: Digital Trends in Museums 2013 presentation
>>
>>
>>
>> Dear colleague,
>>
>>
>>
>> I thought you might be interested in a new presentation on 'Digital Trends in UK Museums 2013' which we have just posted to Slideshare - http://www.collectionslink.org.uk/discover/sustaining-digital/1938-digit
>> al-trends-in-museums-2013.
>>
>>
>>
>> The presentation was developed for a meeting with Oxford ASPIRE, and we would really welcome your views and comments. Have we captured the main current issues? What have we missed?
>>
>>
>>
>> Please tell us what you think using the comments on the page!
>>
>>
>>
>> With best regards,
>>
>>
>>
>> Nick
>>
>>
>>
>> Nick Poole
>> Chief Executive Officer
>> Collections Trust
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> 2-3 July 2013, The Kia Oval
>>
>> www.openculture2013.org.uk <http://www.openculture2013.org.uk <http://www.openculture2013.org.uk/> >
>>
>>
>>
>> <http://www.twitter.com/collectiontrust>
>>
>>
>>
>> Linked
>> <http://www.linkedin.com/groupItem?view=&gid=3280471&type=member&item=12
>> 7734931&qid=f3e77705-7ec2-44c7-99db-7fe325bb16fc&trk=group_most_recent_r
>> ich-0-b-ttl&goback=%2Egmr_3280471>
>>
>> Join CT's Collections Management Group
>>
>>
>>
>> Visit Collections Trust online
>>
>> www.collectionstrust.org.uk <http://www.collectionstrust.org.uk/>
>>
>> www.collectionslink.org.uk <http://www.collectionslink.org.uk/>
>>
>> www.culturegrid.org.uk <http://www.culturegrid.org.uk/>
>>
>>
>>
>> Company Registration No: 1300565 Registered Charity No: 273984
>>
>> Registered Office: Collections Trust, WC 209, Natural History Museum, Cromwell Road, London, SW7 5BD
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
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