Content from AAM: Virtual Worlds and Eye on Design slides (and more)

My more complete thoughts and reactions to the AAM (American Association of Museums) conference are forthcoming in a longer post soon. Today, I want to share slide presentations and interviews you might be seeking related to the sessions I chaired this week.

First, Charting New Territory in Virtual Worlds, which featured Paul Sparrow (Newseum), David Klevan (US Holocaust Memorial Museum), Chris Lawrence (NY Hall of Science), and Nora McCartney (NY Hall of Science). We talked honestly and openly about a range of virtual worlds projects, ranging from the funded to the unfunded, the small (serving 20+ students) to large. Chris bravely served as our "applause-o-meter" (see right) so that we could prioritize which questions to answer first. In fact, the slides (while minimal) contain content that was not covered in the session, since we focused only on the questions of most audience interest. You can view the slides here, or download them by clicking "view" in the player below.

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After the session, Jonathan Finkelstein, author of Learning in Real Time and blogger behind Real Time Minute, interviewed the panelists (sadly, I was rushing to session #2 and could not join them). You can read Jonathan's post and hear the panel interview here. Jonathan also interviewed me separately--to listen directly to the interview, click play below.

Download Interview with Nina as MP3

Next up was Eye on Design: Inspiration from Outside the Museum, which featured Emily Sloat Shaw (Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden), Jennifer Rae Atkins (Andrew Merriell and Associates), Eric Siegel (NY Hall of Science), Penny Jennings (West Office Exhibition Design), Brianna Cutts (IDEO), Darcie Fohrman (Museum Exhibitions), and John Chiodo (Chiodo Design). The AAM blog covered the session, and you can download the slides here.

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This session was extremely well-attended and audience members shared some great comments. One man, upon seeing Smart Studio's use of a flashlight-like device to reveal interpretative content in a historic space, talked about how his museum used cheap flashlights as a "do it yourself" lighting source for small, intricate jeweled artifacts. Another woman talked about how the use of visitor-manipulated art (in her case, blocks of clay) transformed a quiet university museum space into an active, social opportunity for creative expression and exploration.

For those who want to explore the design inspirations in the slides further, here are some useful URLs:

• The Fenway Victory Gardens (presented by Emily)
• The Albuquerque Isotopes (presented by Jennifer Rae)
  
• Mandolin Brothers guitar shop (presented by Eric)
  
• 826 Valencia (presented by Nina), related post here
  
• Nike+ (presented by Nina), related post here
  
• World Without Oil (presented by Nina), related post here
  
• Body Movies (presented by John)
• Smart Studio (presented by John)
• On Air (presented by John)

What questions or thoughts did these sessions, explorations, and inspirations bring up for you?