Session to be held at the AAM conference on 2 May 2009, exploring the potential of handheld digital technologies to mediate a more personalized, memorable and rewarding museum experience, with particular emphasis on a variety of international perspectives on innovative technology, and how these can inform US museums in an increasingly globally connected world.

Featuring James Bradburne, Director General, Palazzo Strozzi, Florence; Loic Tallon, independent researcher specializing in digital media initiatives in museums and the evolution of visitor-museum dialogue (and co-editor of book and currently on world tour exploring international perspectives on museum tech); Bruno Vianna, interaction designer at Universidad Autónoma de Barcelona; Isabel Froes, Copenhagen Institute of Interaction Design; and myself.

I will give a keynote speech at the NODEM conference 3-5 Dec 2008. Also serving as judge for best digital design for museums communication, in the accompanying exhibition.

Further details to come...

Museum educators recognise the power of handling objects and tactile learning, but of course handling sessions must be supervised lest the objects go home with someone.

But why shouldn't they? A great site for handling objects is the shop, and this has been reinforced to me recently on three separate occasions.

I co-organised this on behalf of London Knowledge Lab where it was held 16-17 Oct 2008, with CABE and Architecture Centre Network. I also ran a workshop on Embedded Technologies. Further details about the event here.

Edited by Loïc Tallon and myself, published by Alta Mira Press. Publishers blurb:

The biggest trend in museum exhibit design today is the creative incorporation of technology. Digital Technologies and the Museum Experience: Handheld Guides and Other Media explores the potential of mobile technologies (cell phones, digital cameras, MP3 players, PDAs) for visitor interaction and learning in museums, drawing on good practice to identify guidelines for future implementations.

For further info and to order go here.

There is an increasing interest in visitor-generated content in museums. Non-digital solutions such as sticky notes on a wall not only result in visitor contributions but prompts conversations with other, co-located visitors, reports McLean (2007).

The Massive Change exhibition by Bruce Mau had a good idea for making visible visitor contributions: clear plexi boxes for voting, which immediately showed results. See photo here.

Labar (2006) describes an ‘exhibit commons’ at Liberty Science Center, in which visitors are able to give their opinions about scientific topics.

Salgado and Kellokoski (2005) describe a system in which visitors use PDAs to leave ‘audio traces’ in an exhibition, in order to facilitate a dialogue among visitors who are not there at the same time. In fact, the system was created primarily for visually-impaired visitors, but works for everyone as ‘universal design.’

Love it - a different artwork served up daily. Details here.

Building Information Modeling "involves representing a building as a full, three-dimensional computer model, with an associated database. It is as big a leap forward from conventional CAD as a computer is from a slide rule..." more

See for example the solar powered Arduino I successfully tested in my back garden! Also designed a couple of posters. Photos here.

Londoners may rightly ask why one would pay £10 to ride buses and tube trains and cross crosswalks, when one could do that for slightly cheaper outside. The reason, of course, is that the trains and buses in the museum work a lot better than the ones in the city.

No matter. It was great fun climbing on board the old buses and trains, pretending to go to Barking or Tooting Bec. Especially if you're a five year old, or you happen to be with one, as I was. Beautifully redesigned by Ralph Appelbaum & Associates, the Transport Museum, they've retained the most popular stuff from the old museum like the tube simulators and punch card trail.