What's the True Cost of Live Facilitation?

In honor of tomorrow’s book club post on Elaine Gurian’s essay, Free at Last, a preliminary post on the ecomonics of high quality interactive experiences.

I now reside next door to the most popular attraction in Santa Cruz County: the Mystery Spot. Spend enough time driving on the west coast, and you’ll see more of their yellow bumper stickers than I BRAKE FOR VEGANS. Every day, there are hundreds of cars waiting for the privilege to park in the Mystery Spot parking lot, filled with tourists waiting to experience its strange wonders.

What makes the Mystery Spot wondrous? For the unanointed, the Mystery Spot is one in a string of roadside “gravity holes” and “vortexes” that claim to turn Newtonian physics on its head. Balls roll uphill, tall people become short, and GPS navigation systems go out of whack. How is this “mystery” demonstrated and explained? It’s not high-tech. Most of the mystery resides in the simplest of items—a hill, a compass, a carpenter’s level. And yet the experience is enthralling, memorable, and strangely educational. Why? Because of the guides. The guides pull you, teach you, challenge you, and entertain you. They are magicians who turn simple illusions into truly engaging mysteries.

Live facilitation has a varied role in museums. In children’s and science museums, explainers are everywhere. In special immersion exhibits like Dialogue in the Dark, in which visitors are led through a pitch black experience by a blind guide, or live action games like Operation Spy, facilitators are a necessary part of the experience. From a financial and management perspective, however, many museums try to minimize live facilitation as much as possible. Exhibit designers think of their products as needing no introduction—especially not from some high school volunteer in a blue jacket. Hiring, training, and scheduling floor staff is expensive. Operating officers want to keep the bottom line down. Development costs are one-time; operation lasts forever.

And yet. There are some great bottom line reasons to invest in floor staff. One is about guest attraction and retention. Many peoples’ most memorable museum experiences come from interactions with staff. In the hospitality world, positive interactions with staff are the single greatest factor in establishing guest loyalty and increasing word of mouth advertising. Likewise, in museums, these interactions turn first-time visitors into repeat visitors, and repeat visitors into members.

And it’s worth doing a little cost-benefit analysis on different forms of interactive content distribution. Interactive exhibits are expensive to develop and maintain. A good interactive might cost $80,000 to take from concept to the floor, and twenty of them might keep a $60,000 per year IT/maintenance person busy. Add in-house developer/designer time and you have roughly $2M over three years of development to get interactives live on the floor of the museum. Amortized over those same three years of operation, and assuming a (sadly) generous $12/hour for live facilitators, museums could take half of that exhibition development budget and hire ten full-time facilitators who could be on the floor within 3 months, delivering content. Which investment will provide better return in terms of education and guest engagement?

I’m not suggesting that live facilitators replace interactive exhibit development entirely, but I think we’ve been closing our ears to visitor voices about their value for too long. Imagine your average science museum explainer, who unlocks the secrets of cool exhibits, who answers your questions, who approaches you as you gaze at some pretty phenomenon and challenges you to think about what’s really going on. Why aren’t there such staff members in art or history museums? Yes, I could take the 2pm tour, but what if I’m wandering through, disaffected, not yet engaged enough to even consider taking the tour? Who’s going to help me get there?

A few years ago at ASTC, Eddie Goldstein from the Denver Museum of Natural Science spoke about a very simple, highly effective element they added to their in-gallery offerings; a roving staff person with a laptop computer connected to the internet. The staff person was available to answer questions, but also to help visitors find websites of interest related to the content (which were then emailed to the visitor at his/her request). Why did the DMNS choose to make this a facilitated experience instead of just plopping down a computer at the end of the exhibition? This simple facilitation exercise turns the exhibit experience, in which the museum pushes content at the visitor, into an interactive, personal one, in which the staff member helps the visitor pull out the parts that are of most interest to them. It's hard to make that leap as a visitor on your own from a passive recipient to an active researcher. The staff member is an informed partner in that transition, and hopefully an enabler of more active engagement by the visitor.

This desire relates to another benefit of live facilitators which connects directly to ideas out there about "Museum 2.0." 2.0 design means prioritizing users and social connections among them, and it means flexibility to be responsive to their interests and needs. The more money we sink into exhibit development, the more locked museums are in static content distribution and interpretation. Staff are the ultimate flexible, modular content distributors. Investing in staff can create museum spaces that are more adaptable to current events and visitor interests. Implementing 2.0 experiments via staff rather than through new exhibition models and web/database development can be relatively cheap and quick to develop, and can adapt or be terminated easily (plus, there's the added employee benefit of involving floor staff in exciting new projects). Of course, this requires a new respect and reliance on floor staff as valuable members of the content creation team. Some museums are already struggling with this in the question of who is allowed to blog on behalf of the museum; similarly, museums might ask themselves who is allowed to educate, to design, and in what ways.

Floor staff may also be the most efficient vehicle for transforming museums into social spaces. Web 2.0 succeeds by focusing on the personal interests of users and connecting users to each other via their interests. If we truly want museums to become places for social engagement among visitors, why not re-envision floor staff, who are trained to interpret the collection, as community organizers, trained to encourage and support interactions among visitors?

You may be thinking, "most visitors don't come to museums for a social experience." And it's true that many current museum-goers may be turned off by the interjection of staff into contemplative, personal experiences with content. But the whole point of this 2.0 stuff is to envision and create new kinds of museum experiences that will excite and connect the great unwashed for whom, right now, museums do not provide a valuable experience. No matter how fabulous your exhibit or interactive is, disaffected visitors may pass it by as "just another museum thing." A live person, engaging you personally and connecting you to the content, is much harder to ignore.

Game Friday: When Barriers Become Benefits

This week, a cute, deceptively simple activity called Just Letters. Just Letters is an online version of refrigerator magnets in which you use your cursor to move around letters to make words. There's no particular goal. No score to shoot for. Instead, what makes Just Letters special is the fact that you aren't playing alone. Just Letters is a multiplayer activity; log on, and you are shifting around letters with 20 or 30 strangers. Sometimes it's collaborative, but more frequently, you'll find yourself exclaiming the game's tag line: "Someone keeps stealing my letters..."

And that's what makes it unpredictable, lively, and fun. The online interface enables strangers to do something that would be considered rather rude in person--to steal and swap without asking. If you encountered a similar experience in a museum--a giant magnetic poetry wall, perhaps--it's likely that people would interact with the wall singly or in their pre-determined groups, reading and creating their own poems. But I doubt that visitors would often interact real-time with other users of the wall--even to ask nicely if they could borrow a word. The social barriers to interaction among strangers are too high.

Thus, Just Letters is great example of the ways that technology (web or otherwise) can be used to promote, rather than discourage, communication among users. The fact that individual users engage from the safe dominion of their own computers empowers them to play games together, debate each other on discussion boards, and connect on social networking sites. Plus, the anonymity of the web decreases the chances for social stigma and judgment. Of course, there's a downside to these technology-based interactions; the same disassociation that makes users comfortable enough to share with one another makes them comfortable enough to "flame" each other with cruel remarks that would never pass muster in the real world. However, when the context is respectful and/or the interaction limited, most experiences are positive. (Check out the collaborative jigsaw puzzles and drawing boards offered by the same design team as Just Letters for more examples.)

It's interesting to think about how the same trick that makes Just Letters work could be employed in museums to help people overcome discomfort in interactions with strangers. There are many interactives in which multiple inputs from different visitors can affect the output; however, it's rare that the input of strangers is construed positively. Usually, you're just staring frustratedly at that kid who's "screwing it all up" by interacting in a way that doesn't support your vision or goal.

But there are some examples that work, and they usually work by encouraging visitors to interact with one another through the lens of technology. Consider, for example, robots. If you put a bunch of visitors in a pen and asked them to try to grab the most balls, few would aggressively steal balls from others. But give those same visitors remote controls for robots in a pen, and all bets are off. The robot, like the online persona, serves as an "extender" that imparts your energy and motivation without making you or other visitors uncomfortable.

I'd love to see more interactive design that focuses on promoting social behavior, whether collaborative or competitive. Imagine a real world version of Just Letters where there are two magnetic walls, back to back. They look disconnected, but as soon as you move a word on one side, a word on the other side moves too. Suddenly, you start peeking around the wall, wondering what the heck that other person is doing. The literal barrier between you creates a social environment for play, a bridge for stranger-to-stranger interaction.

How simple can the technology be and still create enough emotional distance for people to be comfortable playing with strangers? And once people start playing with the aid of the technology, what happens when the technology is removed?

Mall Science: Lessons in Consumer Appeal

A museum experience I’ll always remember: In 2002, I worked at the Boston Museum of Science with a program in which high school students from a nearby charter school spent half their school time at the museum. They took regular classes, museum-specific classes, and had internship-style museum jobs. One day when we didn’t have the students, I was walking the floor with another staff member. We ran into two of the kids, sitting on a bench outside an exhibit, talking. “What are you doing here?” my coworker admonished. “Shouldn’t you be at school?”

They shrugged, sheepish. And it dawned on us: these kids were cutting school to come to the museum. It was the best and worst of problems. The museum had achieved something I thought only possible in malls and skate parks: it had become cool.

Okay, I admit it. I haven’t been in a mall in years, mostly because I dislike and am overwhelmed by them. But I grew up in L.A. I’m a valley girl. And like most kids, I spent a lot of time at the mall. We ice skated. We ate in the food court. We tried on clothes, listened to new music, and threw pennies in the fountain. We brought our roller blades and zipped through the cool, dark parking lots until security threw us out.

Why do Americans love malls? Part of it is about consuming, but that’s not the whole story. People don’t hang out at Target the way they flock to malls. Malls are safe, stimulating public spaces for casual social interactions. They are open to everyone. There’s no minimum purchase requirement. Malls feature lots of seating in open, bright spaces. They provide entry points to a collection of discrete, varied content experiences. And the mall experience is entirely user-oriented. You choose which of those experiences/stores to dip into. You choose how long you stay and what you do. In most stores, you can “try” the content in some way without making a purchase. Part of the mall experience is aspirational, but it’s also deeply personal—the stores are there to sell to you, to (supposedly) improve and support you and your interests.

Plus, malls are cool. It’s ironic, when you think about the great pains that museums and libraries go to to create spaces that are “teen-positive,” that malls attract kids effortlessly with fluorescent lights and lousy music.

I don’t think that museums need a full mall facelift, but there are some good lessons from their successes. Malls are places where visitors are repeat users who feel ownership over their experiences. They have successfully cracked a number of obstacles that hinder most museums from becoming true user spaces. For example…

Malls are open to all sorts of experiences. Above, I mentioned the lack of barriers to entry in a mall. Malls, more than retail stores, are open to anyone—whether you have cash in your pocket or not. Malls support browsing. They support eating. They support pointing at things and laughing. You can’t get violent or egregiously offensive in a mall, but beyond that, it’s a space that you can use as you wish. I’d love to imagine that museums are the same way, but they aren’t. Museums both implicitly and explicitly set expectations about what kinds of behaviors and interactions are appropriate in the galleries. (Many) museums put an admissions desk at the door and charge you for the experience before you even get to wander in and see what you are buying. With the possible exception of children’s museums, there are few museums in which you enter the door and feel as if the world inside is entirely yours to explore in your own way. There are things you “ought” to see and do. There’s no such feeling at the mall.

Malls put the customer first. The basic question consumers ask when they enter a store is: “What does this place have for me?” If the answer is, “nothing,” there’s no hope for a sale. How clearly and compellingly can museums answer this basic question? There’s a lot of debate about museum branding and advertising that can promote strong value propositions for museums. I think museums would do well to think of each visitor/consumer and their “me” desires. What does each exhibit in your museum have to entice visitors? Does the collection of experiences constitute a place that has something for all kinds of people? It’s not just a question of whether museums have something good to sell; it has to be something that visitors want to buy.

Mall content connects strongly to people’s lives. The mall has the stuff that you need to be a hip, attractive, up-to-the-moment person. Even if you don’t have interest in some of the content, it’s there “for you,” and the retail structure is focused on providing for your needs. Staff will go out of their way to help you find things that particularly interest you, rather than rattling off the day’s specials or providing a predefined cart demo or exhibit presentation. Museums are about “push” communication; retail is about pulling out that which will most excite the consumer.

Malls offer changing, contemporary content. If you want to keep up with movies or fashion in a physical space, you go to the mall. Malls offer consistently branded experiences, but the seasonal cycle of fashion means that you have to keep coming back to see what’s new and stay on track. Museum exhibits don’t have that same pressing connection to our personal lives such that we care whether the Blue Hall has changed or the Impressionists got a facelift.

Mall architecture supports users. There are open central spaces with ample seating. There are private dressing rooms. There are big windows in each store so you can see out onto the main area. Whereas museums often send you down twisting pathways behind walls, malls keep everything close to the main thoroughfares out of respect for consumers’ desires to get into and out of stores as quickly as they like. I’m surprised that more malls don’t put their food courts right in the middle of the action so people can sit and enjoy the beehive of action around them.

Malls offer competitive content. Every store in the mall advertises their content in the window, trying to draw people in. Museum exhibits, on the other hand, are not designed to compete with each other, so visitors don’t get a lot of information at the outset as to whether an exhibit will be of interest to them. They have to buy first, then browse, rather than the other way (the mall way) around.


The good news is that none of these things that make malls user-centered are particularly complicated to enact or achieve. “What does this place have for me?” Let’s focus on finding exciting, easy ways to answer the most basic consumer questions, and perhaps the museum can become as relevant, as personal, and as social a place as the local galleria.

Summer Book Club: Elaine Gurian's Civilizing the Museum

Over the last two months, I've been slowly poking through Elaine Gurian's collected works, Civilizing the Museum. From inclusion to admission, from objects to exhibit design, Elaine's essays cut to the core of many museum design issues. While the pieces were collected over her last thirty years of work, it's not a dusty museum piece: there's a ton of potent content worth considering and batting around in the context of the future of museums. Many of the pieces end with a call for a new generation to take up the battles and debates. So, heck. Let's get started.

Beginning next Tuesday, I'll be adding a weekly segment over the next couple months, writing a commentary on a chosen essay from the book. I invite you to pick up the book (cheaper here if you are an AAM member) and join the conversation.

Next week, I'll be writing about Free at Last, Elaine's essay on the use, abuse, and overall impact of admissions fees on museums. Page 127. Enjoy.

The Voluntary Apprentice

You've taken the classes. You've done the internships. But all those AVISO ads hang heavy with the same paradox: they all want years of experience for entry-level positions. How are you supposed to get experience when the jobs that should give it to you require it?

Whatever your degree (or your opinion about museum graduate programs), the thing that continues to be highly valued (and sought after by employers) is experience. Which is why I speak today on behalf of the apprenticeship—hands-on professional education—which has, sadly, fallen by the wayside.

I’m not talking about internships, which are as plentiful in museums as label copy. As anyone who has ever managed an intern knows, internships are not exactly mutually beneficial arrangements. They are often short-term, unpaid, and explicitly branded as “learning experiences.” The museum person can’t hold the intern to the same level of responsibility as an employee, and the intern often finds him or herself either doing crap work or an isolated project, neither of which necessarily connect the intern to the institution or to better understanding of the field itself. Sure, some things get done, but there’s an expectation that the intern is there for a fixed amount of time, and therefore, little effort put into developing that person as a member of the team.

Apprenticeships offer more powerful learning and professional development experience than internships. Why? Because an apprentice is a person who is invested in as a future employee. Apprentices are not people who are “checking out the field.” They are people (as I assume many graduate students are) who express a serious intent to contribute to the museum field professionally. And when that intent is realized and supported by the institution, the museum provides mentoring and education. Apprentices are perceived as people with current and future value to the institution and are treated as such.

Of course, with these benefits comes responsibility. Whereas interns may do a focused project, apprentices are expected to shadow, assist, and jump into a variety of efforts, whether of interest to them or not. Apprentices have to be humble, to offer themselves up and say, “I see what you are doing here is good. I want to be part of that good.” As an intern, you are tapping into the institution’s services; as an apprentice, you are a contributor—which means both dirty work and deeper learning.

Maybe you’re nodding and thinking, “Sure, sounds great. But I’ve never seen a museum advertising for apprentices. How the heck can I make this happen?”

And that’s the trick. YOU have to make it happen. Apprenticeships are no longer in our professional lexicon. But if you approach a museum with a proposal for an apprenticeship—one in which you will commit yourself to the institution and work reliably and responsibly in exchange for mentoring and development—I imagine you’ll raise some eyebrows and get some people taking a second look at your resume.

And it can be that simple. Here's my "getting started in museums" story:
When I decided I wanted to work in a science museum, I went to two in my area--one giant, one tiny. I didn't look to see if either was hiring. I didn't even consider what my dream job would be. I found departments/people that were interesting, and made the same speech to each: I want to volunteer for you, part-time, for three months. I have X, Y, Z qualifications, but no direct museum experience. At the end of three months, I want us to sit down and assess whether you will hire me for pay or not.

That's it. In both cases, my offer was accepted. And within three months, I was getting paid (though not much) for real work. Both experiences were educational, experience-building, and got me "in the door" for future opportunities.

When I tell this story, the most common reaction I get is, "Wow. That was bold." But it doesn't have to be. One of the things that distresses me about graduate school--and about school in general--is the way it sets up the expectation that you, the young person/student, are a consumer of experiences offered to you by teachers and employers. You are allowed to express yourself, but only in trying to excel by the terms given by the institution. And then, when you do excel, there’s a secondary problem—that you leave school impatient to get THE great job, rather than ready to connect yourself to an institution in which you can learn and grow. The story is that teachers know what’s best—and they’ll help you get there.

But in my case, I felt that the internships, graduate programs, and entry-level positions being offered to me were not best. I thought I could create an educational strategy that would be more useful both to me and to my employers. So I asked for it. I asked for mentoring. I asked for review. I asked to be taken seriously as a potential contributor. I asked for responsibility.

Over the last few years, I’ve continued to seek out opportunities to apprentice myself to others, to find mentors from whom I can learn and under whom I can go in new directions. It doesn’t matter if it’s welding or game design; I learn best and go farthest when I get to partner with my mentor and can become an asset to them. I’d love to see museums and museum professionals adopt a culture of lifelong apprenticeships, encouraging mutually beneficial relationships between learners of all kinds.

But don’t wait for museums to do the work. What do you want to learn? How can you become an apprentice, or how can you support one?

Game Friday: Can Your Museum Afford to Play?

This is a big day for me--my last one in DC. Yesterday, I turned in my keys and said goodbye to the Spy Museum and to Operation Spy, the narrative, immersive game experience I've been developing/building over the last two years. There are many aspects of Operation Spy I look forward to sharing with you (and please let me know if there are particular elements of interest to you). But today I started thinking about some of our design influences, and how we got into this thing in the first place.

There are two attractions/experiences that heavily influenced our early thinking: Tomb (Boston), and Adventure (COSI Columbus). Tomb is an interactive Indiana Jones-style 45 minute team experience in which small groups, led by a guide, confront a series of puzzles and sensory challenges as they try to escape from a pharoah's cursed tomb. (Disclosure: Tomb was created by 5W!ts Productions, whose CEO, Matt DuPlessie, has been part of the leadership team for Operation Spy.) The experience is dramatic and the games are responsive to guest abilities, but the requirement to work together with a team of potential strangers can lead to some unpleasant team dynamics.

Adventure is also an interactive Indiana Jones-style experience; however, instead of sending visitors on timed missions, the Adventure environment and challenges are more free-form, offering a flexible visitor experience. Instead of guides leading groups, there are actor/facilitators who interact with visitors throughout their experience. There's a "basic" level to the game that takes about 40 minutes to conclude, and there's a deeper level which can take tens of hours (and therefore, repeat visits) to master.

But the biggest difference between these two experiences isn't whether we're talking Raiders of the Lost Ark or Temple of Doom. It's about economics. Tomb is a stand-alone, successful for-profit venture. Adventure is a slice of a large museum, and it's been closed to the public for the last few years (only available to be rented for special events).

What keeps Tomb kicking while the lights are out in Adventure? Both offer unique, highly themed environments. Both incorporate interesting challenges into a narrative. But Tomb does something that Adventure does not: prioritizes a successful business plan to create a guest experience that is both positive and sustainable.

Live action games are expensive. They combine all the high-ticket items: heavy scenic theming, highly interactive elements, controlled AV, and live facilitation. Each of these items alone can bump up per square foot construction costs by a hundred dollars, and the addition of live guides, actors, or facilitators means operating costs are higher than average as well. Plus, most game experiences are intended for individuals or small groups (so the visitors feel like active agents rather than passive viewers) which means throughput is limited.

So how can a museum sustain a live action game?

Brand and sell the game separately from the rest of the museum. The first time I went through Adventure, I was amazed by the intricacy of the experience, the other-worldliness they successfully evoked in the space. I imagined that if I were local to the area, I might come back again and again to try to solve every single puzzle in there. So I was surprised to learn that Adventure, during the time it was operating, was not an upsell or separate ticket experience. It felt as special as a King Tut or a Titanic, but for some reason it wasn't valued at that same price point.

All museums have challenges pushing "separate tickets" for specials or traveling exhibits, and there are good arguments in many situations for putting the whole museum experience under one umbrella. But when the special is a game or narrative experience, it's not the same as an exhibition you may or may not float into on your visit. It's a focused experience, one that requires a chunk of time, a dedicated space, and specific interest/attention from the guest. Just like the Exploratorium's Tactile Dome, planetarium or IMAX shows, or simulator experiences, live action games should be treated as stand-alone, special experiences and priced accordingly.

Think very, very carefully about throughput. When designing Operation Spy, we knew that we wanted to provide guests with an intimate hands-on experience. We never wanted a guest to walk out and say, "I just watched." And we knew that that meant limiting group size and designing interactive elements such that there was a role for everyone. So we focused on designing for maximum throughput with small groups. We couldn't find a model that would support a free-form guest experience without severely compromising the number of guests we could accomodate, so, instead, we give guests a structured experience that feels responsive. There are no opportunities to leisurely explore Operation Spy; however, guests don't feel pushed or led--they are driving the mission experience. We carefully balanced the amount of time each group spends in each room so that rooms are never vacant for more than a couple minutes. We kept rooms as small as was comfortable and reasonable for a quality experience.

Keep staffing needs minimal. Development costs are a one-time hit; operating costs last forever. There are some game experiences, like mystery dinner theater, that support large staff--but do so by limiting the individual agency of each guest. When you are designing for truly interactive experiences, you need to support small group sizes, and therefore, a higher staff-to-guest ratio. Live staff can often make the experience--by sustaining the story of the game, encouraging reluctant guests to play--so the important thing is to maximize their time so that they are never "facilitating" an empty room. I'd love to see a hybrid model in which every group doesn't need their own guide and yet staff are occupied and useful within the game space.

Is it possible to design unstaffed experiences? Video games do it--at a several million dollar price tag--and they don't even have the challenge of dealing with guests interacting with physical environments (which they can deface or get injured by). Right now (as far as I know), there are no entirely unstaffed live action games (the exception being D&D-style games, where the players themselves create and facilitate their experience). Someday, someone will crack the code on needing live staff to facilitate guest experiences--probably through highly responsive video and AI-style interactions. Until then, start with the bare minimum staffing-wise, and build in additional roles as operating demonstrates feasibility.

Spend your money selectively, space by space, game by game, effect by effect. In Operation Spy, more money was spent on theming the entrance/queuing area than any other area of the experience. Why? Because during that time, all you can do is look (and wait). It's the best time to sell the story and the environment, when guests are not distracted by the challenges, the discussions, or the narrative. When you are waiting in a foreign marketplace, props, scents, and sounds are essential. When you are escaping from a hostile installation, not so much. In each space, we tried to design to highlight the most impactful part of that room--whether that be a game, a dramatic effect, a video, etc.

One of the challenges I saw at Adventure was its sheer scope--10,000 square feet of lovingly themed, open space. Because of their open design, every space is available to guests, and needs to be themed to the same level of intricacy. Sometimes, segmenting into intimate spaces can allow more design flexibility both in terms of look and price per room.


I think there is huge potential for museums to move into the live action game space. There's very little available in that arena (laser tag? paintball?), and growing demand as evidenced by the newfound popularity of bowling alleys and upscale arcades. People are willing to pay for game experiences--more, perhaps, than they will pay for museum experiences. Museum educators and exhibit designers are uniquely capable of creating evocative narratives and challenges around a wide range of content. And finally, I believe that the level of immersion captured in games and narrative spaces creates a powerful model for learning that is rare in both schools and museums.

And yet. Museums also need to be ready to think of live action games as more than just another exhibit or program. The development costs, operating costs, and sales models are different, and you can only be successful if you design for that difference. Adding a live action game to a museum is like adding an IMAX--it's a major investment in a new but related market, with potentially large gains both in terms of expanding the institutional mission and capturing new market share. Can museums afford to play? You bet. They just need to figure out which games they can win.

Google Homepage: Really, Really Simple Syndication

There are many web-based optimizers that just give you more reasons to screw around. Google Homepage is a rare exception. Not only is it the single most useful 2.0 application I employ, it's also a powerful and graceful example of the potential of disaggregated content.

So what is it? Google Homepage is a personalized landing page for the content that is most useful to you. It's a true home page in that it is a place for everything you need on a daily basis on the web. Here's how to make it happen:

1. Go to http://www.google.com/ig and sign into Google (or create an account).
2. Click "Add Stuff" to add items to your personal homepage, like local weather, top news stories, to do lists, email feeds, and specialized content. Feeds from blogs are a bit tricky; if it's not a major blog, you will have to click "Add by URL" and add the feed address, which usually ends in .xml. For example, to add Museum 2.0 to your Google homepage, you would add "http://www.museumtwo.com/atom.xml" (or you could just click on the handy "Add to Google" toolbar on the upper right of this page).
   
3. Reset your homepage to the personalized Google page and enjoy the magic.

And magic it is. For example, here's a snapshot of my Google homepage.

On the left, you can see personal content: my Gmail inbox, the Google documents I'm working on, and my del.icio.us links.

In the middle, I have standard content: top news stories, weather in my current and soon-to-be-current home, quote of the day, etc.

On the right, I have direct wikipedia search and feeds from several blogs.

If you look closely at the top left, you'll also see an additional tab, labeled "Search." I added this tab so that I have a separate page that just hosts a series of specialized search engines (eBay, Amazon, Flickr) as well as my Google search history.

Each time you click to add something, you can drag and drop it wherever you want on your homepage. If you click the X in the top right corner, that item disappears from your homepage. This isn't something that requires startup time and then is set in stone. It's flexible and easy to change as your web habits and needs change.

What makes this so great?

1. It increases your productivity by putting everything you need in one place. No more opening Wikipedia in a new tab. No more opening your calendar or keeping a todo list in a hard to remember folder. It's all accessible from one page, and that one page is accessible no matter what computer you are using.
2. It allows you to keep tabs on interesting content without wasting your time wading through full format. For blogs or content streams that are updated frequently, having a "top stories" or "titles only" view of the content is a good way to get right to the articles of specific interest to you.
3. No more guessing when feeds are updated. Most of the blogs I keep on my Google homepage are NOT the ones I look at on a regular basis; they're the ones I find valuable that only feature posts every few days (or less frequently). By having a view of the blog post titles, I can see when something new has been added, and can go to the site at that point. I don't lose track of blogs, even if there's a long gap between posts.
   
4. It meets you at your 2.0 complexity level. If you are a basic user, the content provided by the "Add Stuff" button is more than ample, and the drag and drop easy to use. If you are advanced, you can create your own gadgets using the Google API to add to your own page (and share with the world, if you choose). But there's value at every level.

Months ago, I wrote about the potential power of disaggregation for museums, referring to the concept of the "ultimate mix tape" of greatest hits and personal favorites. There are people (I'm one of them) who aren't ready to play RSS flute concertos on Yahoo Pipes or traipse through Google map hacks. Heck, I'm not even advanced enough for an RSS reader to aggregate blogs to which I subscribe. But the Google homepage is easy to use and offers a big bang for your mash-up buck. Plus, it creates a home for you on the web, one where the mail is sorted, the conversations archived, your dictionary and favorite games and diversions all in their place. Isn't it time you stopped renting and got a place of your own?

Tools for 2.0: User-Generated Exhibits Made Simple

It’s a sad irony that Web 2.0—whose applications are designed to be simple enough for anyone to use—is a term that mostly confuses and overwhelms people. The point shouldn’t be that this is something that has to be learned by reading exhaustive manuals. You should be able to grab a mic and start podcasting, hit the keyboard and start blogging, snap some shots and start Flickring.

Creating the backbone for a robust 2.0 application is not so easy. Many in-museum 2.0-style projects are major initiatives require a somewhat complicated blend of physical exhibit and digital capabilities. If you want people to be able to tag artifacts with keywords, comments, or ratings, you need a unique identifier for each artifact, a way for visitor submissions to populate a database, and automated programs for aggregation and display of visitor data. If you want exhibits to respond personally to each user, you need a way to for visitors to uniquely self-identify and to track their actions throughout the galleries.

But 2.0 doesn’t have to be complex; the architecture doesn’t have to be for keeps. Instead of getting overwhelmed by the hefty challenge of creating your own social networking world, there are ways to jump into 2.0 that are simple, low-tech, and immediate.

Consider the lowly post-it. It’s easy to use. It doesn’t scream, “write your dissertation here;” its message is more a friendly note, reminder, or tip. It’s easy to aggregate lots of them into a larger collection. It’s easy to reaggregate, layer, and move them around. You can attach them to almost anything without fear of harm.

Many museums have created short-term mapping or timeline projects that are post-it based. Slap up a map of the city and let people write memories on post-its and locate them at the site of their old apartment, school, or favorite tree. Paste up a timeline of the last hundred years and let visitors attach their own highlight moments. Post-its could be used for wiki label-rewriting projects (where visitors could add to the information provided by curators), rudimentary tagging projects (clouds of related pastel keywords?), and visitor talk back. If someone adds something inappropriate, you don’t need a webmaster to remove the comment; you just peel and toss. If you love it, you keep it. If not, repurpose the notes as lint removers and chalk up the experiment to experience.

The Swedish Västernorrlands Läns Museum mounted a show last year, The Post-it Project, in which visitors were solicited to write down comments—about anything in the museum—and post them wherever they wanted. That’s it. There are many legitimate criticisms of this kind of project. It's messy. There’s no focus nor overarching goal nor certain meaning to be gleaned. But that open-endedness also makes this kind of project a great starting point for a museum to explore the inclusion of visitor content. Startup costs and development time are minimal, and the project can be aborted at any time. Ideally, the project would run for several weeks or months so that network effects could be realized and organic growth could occur. But if staff get cold feet, risks are easy to mitigate. The technology is maximally flexible and allows staff to learn and respond on their own terms.

Similarly, designing exhibitions to include visitor-contributed content doesn’t have to be a headache. In November 2006, the London Science Museum opened Playing with Science, an exhibition about the role of toys in learning. Five cases held curated content, and seven were open for visitors’ additions. Visitors were invited to bring their own toys to add to the collection. Each visitor handwrote a label explaining the value of their toy, was photographed with their toy, and received a printed certificate with the photograph. Contributors filled out permission forms/releases, and the photos with labels were put online for perusal. The images and accompanying labels ("Bunny was made for me by my sister when I was born and has been well loved over the years." "I like making girls do boy parts because I am a tomboy.") are evocative and endearing. And simple.

Most of the time, the analogies I’m drawing to Web 2.0 have to do with the social aspect of the applications. But from a design standpoint, the simplicity of Web 2.0 is equally important. There’s a reason that the protocol for web feeds, RSS, stands for Really Simple Syndication. Web 2.0 means stepping away from fancy flash-based applications that lock content behind programmed doors and towards clear, text-based, multi-access content. It may not be gorgeous, but it’s easy to create, manipulate, and access for techies and newbies alike. The low barrier to entry makes it easy for users to transition from consumers to participants—whether in wikis, blogs, or on social networking sites.

Whenever possible, visitor-focused exhibition design should follow this lead. Most exhibition design is the antithesis of 2.0—by the time the exhibition opens, there’s not a lot of flexibility designed in, and making changes after ribbon-cutting is a painful challenge at best. But 2.0 is about organic growth, about users determining what the service/product/exhibition truly is about and what its value is. In user-generated exhibits, visitors should be able to only to contribute but to steer the final presentation of their content. If that can’t happen, then visitor elements pile up as a whole lot of square pegs trying to fit into the circles the museum has provided.

What’s the simplest way you can imagine experimenting with user-generated content in the museum? When will that experiment start?

Game Friday: Dirty Pretty Things

Thanks to Paul Orselli for the link to this week's game, "game, game, game, and again game" by Jason Nelson, self-described new media artist and poet.

The game is an odd collection of chicken-scratch drawings, Mario-esque navigation, surprising flurries of poetry and sound, and strange home videos. Distinctively, it eschews the "clean, dull, lifelessness" of standard web art and design for a messier look.

I'm a sucker for rough edges and low-tech. When does a unpolished look become a design positive? When it can invite people in without compromising quality of experience. There's a basic tension here: an unfinished, folksy design may encourage visitor contribution, or it may make visitors feel that their contributions are not worthy of "real" labels and presentation. But over-design is the norm. Often the soul of a prototype gets lost when plexi and printers replace cardboard and markers, and fancy design elements cloud over a lack of truly fabulous content.

So enjoy an opportunity to get lost in a game that's rich in content, mixed on theme, and down and dirty on style. And then check out Nelson's other work with online hypertext art. There's some pretty wild stuff shooting out of his screen.

Floor Staff Hit the Blogosphere: Exploratorium Explainers

One of the most popular posts on Museum 2.0 is about different kinds of institutional blogs. The fourth kind I talked about is the "personal voice blog," in which museum staff write honestly and openly about their institution and experiences. At the time, I referenced a blog from the top: the Walters Art Museum Director's blog. Gary Vikan has done a great job writing passionately (and reasonably frequently) about his observations on the museum and art world. If you are a management person, you're probably thinking he's incredibly brave for doing so. If you're lower on the totem pole, you might think it's easy for him to write what he wants--he's the Director. Presumably of all staff, he's the one in the best position to know what's appropriate, and to push that boundary when he thinks it's reasonable to do so.

I recently discovered another fabulous "personal voice blog" of quite a different nature. It's the Exploratorium Explainers' blog. Unlike Gary Vikan's individual blog, this one is written by a group of staff. Floor staff. Their topics range from exhibits they have crushes on to boring events they work to funny interactions with visitors on the floor. They post frequently, include lovely photos and slideshows, and generally do a wonderful job communicating their energy and love of the museum through their writing.

Check it out. And then, ask yourself, would my institution support a blog like this? The messaging is all museum- and science-positive, but the tone is irreverent. Some examples:

(on the "Mr. Fish" exhibit)
Ok, I’ll admit it. I was wrong. I used to doubt the exhibit “Talk to a Fish”. I thought it was super-lame- one of the lamest exhibits on the floor.

(on an evening event)
Kristin won the wittiest comment of the night award for telling me, as I bumped into the pictured summer camp poster, spilling water all over the floor in the process…”It’s a sign” Buh Duh Chchch

(on a DNA training session)
Eventually, Ryan found his groove with a style meshing the down-to-earth flavor of Fred Flintstone with the joie de vivre of Richard Simmons:

Maybe you're smiling. Maybe you're cringing. Maybe you're doing both at the same time and your face looks a little bizarre. But what's the source of fear about this kind of blog? This is a blog that empowers staff and communicates museum mission. I think the most commendable aspect of the blog is how balanced it is in tone--I never get the feeling that someone is going to go "over the top." But what if they do? Is there a marketing person with his finger on the trigger, ready to shut down an unacceptable post? Probably (I hope) not.

Personal voice blogs are the stickiest type for established institutions. There's potential for content that is deemed inappropriate, proprietary, or off-message to get out there, and since the point is to present a unique individual voice, it's hard to justify or even implement monitoring/censoring effectively.

But this is the other side of radical trust. It's not just about trusting our visitors and their contributions. It's also about trusting our own staff and colleagues to act responsibly when given an opportunity to join the museum mouthpiece. And not just the directors. Ironically, floor staff may be the MOST appropriate museum bloggers. They are the voice and face of the museum to visitors on a daily basis. They have the most connection with visitors' interests and therefore potentially the most relevant content to share with readers.

Encouraging staff, especially junior staff, to blog on behalf of the institution is a win-win for the staff and the museum. Giving staff a venue for their thoughts creates a high (museum-level) expectation quality-wise. If staff maintain personal blogs, who knows how kindly or unkindly they will reference their workplace. But if they are blogging under the masthead of the institution, they go from being freelancers to staff reporters. They want to further the institution. They want to know it's okay to do so without fear of being shut down or fired.

Some companies walk this line by offering their staff individual blog space (in which they can write about pretty much whatever they want) and then maintaining an aggregate, more publicized blog that pulls appropriate posts from the personal ones. Others start with internal blogs, keep those going until management feels comfortable, and then go public. And others set basic guidelines and then step away.

I'd love to see more floor staff blogs (and security blogs, and exhibit maintenance blogs, and...). These people are often the least empowered staff authority-wise. Supporting staff blogging is a great way to acknowledge the extent to which they are the ones who make memorable visitors experiences. And the Explainers' blog showcases a group of people who are dedicated to their institution and grateful for the opportunity to be one of its mouthpieces. I can only imagine that the blog is improving staff retention.

Not convinced? I'll leave the final word to the Explainers:

Finally, I want to say how proud it made me feel that the explainers, on our own, had continued the spirit of innovation that defines the special place we work at.

Good for them.