Mike,
This is not an issue of "us and them". James Durston is clearly one of the "us" as far as museums are concerned: a white, male, senior journalist for a global corporation. He doesn't have any problems getting to museums in far-flung places, paying the entry fee, or buying gift-shop presents for himself. His allegations of a 'climate of snobbery' ring as hollow as Tory accusations of liberal 'elitism', and his actual criticisms of museums are trite and clichéd (see his other fantastically original thinkpieces on topics like why 'photography his ruined travel').
Which is to say that if we are to listen to our potential audiences talking about why they find museums difficult (which we beyond the shadow of a doubt should be doing), it's not privileged whiners like Durston that we should be listening to but people who face much more serious issues of exclusion from museums. Aamer Anwar's keynote at last year's Museums Association conference was inspirational in this respect:
http://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/ism/about/aamer-anwar.aspx
The questions he raises about class, race and social justice are far more difficult for museums to deal with than the problem of simply not being 'fun' enough for rich white people on holiday; and this is of course precisely why they are of infinitely greater importance.
Danny
-----Original Message-----
From: Museums Computer Group [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Mike Ellis
Sent: 05 September 2013 11:20
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [MCG] Who could hate Museums ?
I've been pondering this since I read the article. Seems to me that the important thing is that we keep making the effort to step outside the "us" and think about what it means to be "them". It's easy seeing and thinking about what we do and why we do it in a closed group of "us's". It's harder looking from the outside in. I don't think it's self-flagellation, and I think we can be rightly hugely proud of the extraordinary things we all do every day. We'll also obviously run into lots of people who hate what we are and what we do - that's fine. I don't like some stuff too :-)
..but IMO it's just worth spending time thinking differently and talking to people who feel differently.
tt
Mike
_____________________________
Mike Ellis
Thirty8 Digital: a small but perfectly formed digital agency: http://thirty8.co.uk
* My book: http://heritageweb.co.uk *
On 5 Sep 2013, at 09:42, Nick Poole <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Dear all,
>
> There's an awful lot of people out there - some love what museums do, some hate it and some just haven't tried us yet.
>
> For the ones who love museums, I think our industry does a pretty incredible job of creating new and interesting things for them to get involved in. Just read any local paper, listen to local radio, look at the posters in train stations etc to see the massive range of exciting stuff we offer to the public every day.
>
> Not only this, but I think we do a reasonable job of handling the fact that every visitor brings with them a different set of expectations, interests, habits and knowledge of their own. We're not going to please everyone all of the time, but there aren't many places that can offer your choice of fun, scholarship, engagement, reflection and even respite under one roof, while at the same time protecting, conserving, researching and communicating about the entire history of the world.
>
> For the people that hate museums - well, that's a pity. Maybe the journalist had a terrible experience, maybe he found one of the museums which wasn't as good as it could be. Maybe the collection didn't pique his curiosity or maybe the story wasn't particularly well-told. There are still places, people and collections that are introspective rather than customer-facing, but there have been tremendous improvements in the past 10 years, and these improvements will continue for many decades to come.
>
> There's a bit of a habit at a policy level to downplay the extraordinary flourishing of the UK's museum community in the past 2 decades, and within some quarters to focus solely on the impact of Local Authority cuts or the way we're failing to address our social and political activism. I'd like to call BS on all of that - we're an extraordinary, creative and diligent industry capable of delivering different kinds of meaningful experience to millions of different kinds of people every year.
>
> Can we do better? Undoubtedly. Should we put in the effort to reach out to people who aren't engaged? Absolutely. But first, I think we ought to celebrate an extraordinary community doing a fantastic job.
>
> Not very digital - apologies! I'll add 'and of course one way to reach out to those non-engaged people is through their laptop/tablet/phone/watch....'
>
> Anyone put a museum collection on a Galaxy Gear yet?
>
> Nick
>
>
>
> Nick Poole
> Chief Executive Officer
> Collections Trust
> Join the Collections Trust's Collections Management LinkedIn group - 6000 collections professionals worldwide!
>
> Follow us on twitter: http://www.twitter.com/collectiontrust
>
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>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Museums Computer Group [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of
> John Williams (NMC)
> Sent: 05 September 2013 09:11
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Who could hate Museums ?
>
> It's entirely natural that we might respond to criticism by suggesting it's misplaced or the result of ignorance or prejudice but that doesn't mean that the content of the criticism has no value.
>
> Our Museums have target audiences in groups that do not regularly visit and who, whether we like it or not, have different expectations to those visitors who naturally relate to our collections.
>
> We need them to visit as well.
>
> And when they take the trouble to comment I think we ought to listen carefully.
>
> John
>
>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Museums Computer Group [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of
>> Andrew Lewis
>> Sent: 05 September 2013 08:41
>> To: [log in to unmask]
>> Subject: Re: MCG Digest - 3 Sep 2013 to 4 Sep 2013 (#2013-182)
>>
>> I'm with Danny,
>>
>> this guy doesn't like museums, but who cares? Many more millions of
>> people do get culture and it's not like the issues about
>> visitor-motivation and the need to understand what people want are new to anyone.
>>
>> Understanding changing needs arising from social trends etc. and
>> developing services to meet to them is what we all do, all day long.
>>
>> Andrew
>>
>> Andrew Lewis
>> Acting Head of Digital Media
>> Digital Media Team
>> Victoria and Albert Museum
>> South Kensington
>> London SW7 2RL
>>
>> 020 7942 2373
>> [log in to unmask]
>> www.vam.ac.uk/digitalmedia
>> linkd.in/andrewlewis ( www.vam.ac.uk/digitalmedia ) @rosemarybeetle (
>> https://twitter.com/rosemarybeetle )
>>
>>
>>
>>>>> MCG automatic digest system <[log in to unmask]> 05/09/2013
>> 00:00 >>>
>> There are 3 messages totaling 264 lines in this issue.
>>
>> Topics of the day:
>>
>> 1. More on iBeacon and "the end of NFC"
>> 2. Why I hate museums
>> 3. Data Protection Act - Compliance Without Headaches, practical
>> workshop
>>
>> **********************************************************
>> ******
>> website: http://museumscomputergroup.org.uk/
>> Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/ukmcg
>> Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/museumscomputergroup
>> [un]subscribe: http://museumscomputergroup.org.uk/email-list/
>> **********************************************************
>> ******
>>
>> ---------------------------------------------------------------------
>> -
>>
>> Date: Wed, 4 Sep 2013 14:24:54 +1000
>> From: Scott Brewer <[log in to unmask]>
>> Subject: Re: More on iBeacon and "the end of NFC"
>>
>> Hi Joe, see answers inline below for those interested.
>>
>>> Whats the range of Bluetooth LE and can you adjust it?
>>
>> About 50 meters max in clear line of site. It works on a dB signal
>> strength so anything past about 5 meters quickly fades into similar
>> ranges (eg. -90 dB could mean you're 10 or 20 meters away, it really
>> depends on the room you're in and the angle you're hitting the beacon
>> with). If you want to adjust for distance you can either do it on
>> the device (eg. only pay attention to ranges that are < -50 dB) or
>> you can adjust the strength of the beacon, both have pros and cons
>> depending on what you wish to do.
>>>
>>> I'm imagining two different scenarios here.
>>> In scenario 1 visitors are looking a big object - like a bus - and
>> might be
>>> 3 or 4 metres away from it so we need the system to work at that
>> range.
>>> In scenario two we have a narrowish gallery - say 4 metres wide with
>> small
>>> objects on both sides. Visitors will get closer to the objects so we
>> would
>>> need to reduce the range so that their phone tells them about the
>> object in
>>> front of them - not the one behind them.
>>
>> The system we use provides your location, instead of using one beacon
>> and associating with an object we associate each beacon with a
>> coordinate and then calculate your position based on the beacons you
>> can see and their signal strengths (although there is a bit more to
>> it than that). So in short our system works for both of these scenarios.
>> If you're using pure proximity on the other hand then you need a lot
>> more beacons and (due to reflections and surface noise in rooms)
>> you're not always guaranteed that the strongest beacon signal is
>> actually the one you're closest too.
>>
>>> As far as I can see Bluetooth LE currently works on iPhone 4S and
>> above,
>>> but doesn't yet work on Android although Google say that they will
>> support
>>> it in the future. Is this correct?
>>> If so, it looks like, at the moment most visitor's phones won't work
>> with
>>> this system. Scott, how did you handle this issue in your gallery?
>> Did you
>>> give out devices to visitors?
>>
>> Our apps run on both iOS and Android. On Android we currently use
>> WiFi triangulation to get your location, on iOS this isn't possible
>> due to the lack off API calls made available by the OS so we use bluetooth LE.
>> Android APIs have started supporting BTLE as of 4.3 but not all
>> manufacturers have pushed out with updates to it yet. We offer loan
>> devices onsite for visitors who don't have their own. We've worked
>> with Nexus 7s, iPad minis and iPod touches.
>>
>> Hope that helps.
>>
>> Cheers,
>> Scott.
>>
>> **********************************************************
>> ******
>> website: http://museumscomputergroup.org.uk/
>> Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/ukmcg
>> Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/museumscomputergroup
>> [un]subscribe: http://museumscomputergroup.org.uk/email-list/
>> **********************************************************
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>>
>> ------------------------------
>>
>> Date: Wed, 4 Sep 2013 11:20:39 +0000
>> From: "Birchall, Danny" <[log in to unmask]>
>> Subject: Re: Why I hate museums
>>
>> Ugh! I don't mind that some CNN hack has phoned in 1500 words about
>> how he didn't enjoy his holidays, but why does the museum sector so
>> often take rubbish like this as an excuse for orgies of
>> self-flagellation? And why are 'curators' everybody's whipping boy?
>>
>> Danny
>>
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Museums Computer Group [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of
>> Rebecca Atkinson
>> Sent: 03 September 2013 11:16
>> To: [log in to unmask]
>> Subject: Re: [MCG] Why I hate museums
>>
>> Maurice Davies has written a blog in response to the article entitled
>> Stupid curators
>>
>> http://www.museumsassociation.org/maurice-davies-blog/28082013-stupid
>> - curators-why-we-should-listen-to-the-public
>>
>>
>> Rebecca Atkinson
>> Online publications editor - Museum Practice and Museums Journal
>> Museums Association
>> 42 Clerkenwell Close, London EC1R 0AZ
>> Tel: 0207 5667820
>> Twitter: @rebeccaa_ma
>> email: [log in to unmask]
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Museums Computer Group [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of
>> Mike Ellis
>> Sent: 03 September 2013 11:14
>> To: [log in to unmask]
>> Subject: Why I hate museums
>>
>> http://edition.cnn.com/2013/08/22/travel/opinion-why-i-hate-museums/
>>
>> This is a great piece. Great as in - you'll hate it :-)
>>
>> Comments are good too:
>>
>> "I suspect Mr. Durston is a product of our modern fast paced society,
>> where 24 hour information falls like rain in short bullet statements,
>> devoid of nuance and meaning; where Honey Boo-Boo and her ilk reign
>> supreme over a court comprised of uneducated and unwilling fops.
>>
>> Perhaps he is more suited to watching a youtube video of someone's
>> genitals being struck by a soccer ball."
>>
>> ..IMO it's useful to read stuff as obviously provocative as this as
>> it forces us to think about things in different ways.
>>
>> ..or maybe it'll just make us cross...
>>
>>
>>
>> _____________________________
>>
>>
>> Mike Ellis
>>
>> Thirty8 Digital: a small but perfectly formed digital agency:
>> http://thirty8.co.uk
>>
>> * My book: http://heritageweb.co.uk *
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> **********************************************************
>> ******
>> website: http://museumscomputergroup.org.uk/
>> Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/ukmcg
>> Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/museumscomputergroup
>> [un]subscribe: http://museumscomputergroup.org.uk/email-list/
>> **********************************************************
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>>
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>> website: http://museumscomputergroup.org.uk/
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>>
>> ------------------------------
>>
>> Date: Wed, 4 Sep 2013 13:33:44 +0100
>> From: Samira Teuteberg
>> <[log in to unmask]>
>> Subject: Data Protection Act - Compliance Without Headaches,
>> practical workshop
>>
>> Few Places Remaining: Data Protection Act - Compliance Without
>> Headaches
>>
>> Led by professional Archivists/Records Managers working in the field,
>> this workshop takes a practical view of the Data Protection Act,
>> 1998, exploring the issues involved and outlining the key steps
>> necessary to achieving compliance in the workplace, with particular
>> regard to the Arts & Heritage sector.
>>
>> When: 17 September 2013 Where: The Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in
>> British Art, 16 Bedford Square, London, WC1B 3JA Cost: £150 (£90
>> unwaged) Organised by:
>> The recordsmanagementconsultancy Facilitators: Charlotte Brunskill,
>> Archivist & Records Manager at the Paul Mellon Centre and Samira
>> Teuteberg, Records Manager at the National Portrait Gallery.
>>
>> Workshop content: Are you:
>>
>> * unsure what the Data Protection Act covers?
>> * concerned about what information you can disclose to the public?
>> * confused about how to collect and manage personal data?
>> * unclear how to comply with the Act?
>>
>> This training workshop explores the eight principles of the Data
>> Protection Act and examines what these principles mean in the
>> workplace. By using real life examples, the sessions will provide a
>> practical step-by-step approach to Data Protection helping you to
>> mitigate risks and ensure compliance within your organisation. The
>> workshop is highly interactive and tailored specifically to the Arts
>> & Heritage sector.
>>
>> The facilitators are experts in the field who have between them over
>> 20 years of experience managing records and advising on DPA
>> compliance in a variety of Arts & Heritage organisations. They
>> present the highly successful 'Nuts & Bolts of Records Management'
>> training programme offered by Renaissance & the London Museums Hub.
>> Charlotte Brunskill is co-author of Records Management for Museums &
>> Galleries: an introduction (pub. Chandos 2012).
>>
>> Who should attend: Administrators, Archivists & Archive Assistants,
>> Information Managers, Development and Personnel staff, Librarians,
>> Curators and anyone responsible for managing records and personal
>> data in an Arts & Heritage environment.
>>
>> For further information
>> see:<http://www.recordsmanagementconsultancy.co.uk/> or to book a
>> place e-mail [log in to unmask]
>> <mailto:[log in to unmask]>
>>
>> **********************************************************
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>> website: http://museumscomputergroup.org.uk/
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>>
>> ------------------------------
>>
>> End of MCG Digest - 3 Sep 2013 to 4 Sep 2013 (#2013-182)
>> ********************************************************
>>
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