How the Google Art Project might revolutionize the physical museum experience

There were people who said the iPhone and iPad would fail. There’s even a wonderful article about how the Internet will fail from 1995. If the invention of the writing press had preceded the invention of the wheel, I’m sure we would still be reading naysayers elaborate bashing of easy transportation. Today I’m reading a lot of stuff about the Google Art Project not delivering.

Sure, not everything Google touches turns to gold (remember Google Wave?). However, like any future Apple iThing it’s silly to underestimate the impact a Google product will have on a sector. Their marketing budget, distribution channels and development budgets are simply no match for any well-intentioned alternative.

Let’s do a thought experiment and presume the Google Art Project will revolutionize the museum experience the way the iPad will change the publishing industry. Below are six complaints about the Google Art Project I’ve heard most often. What will happen if these become standard practice in our physical museums (which, as I hope to have proven by now, they very well might).

1. Navigation: The navigation in Google Art Project apparently sucks. In fact, it’s much like finding your way through an endless number of strangely connected galleries, but with the option of going to your desired gallery immediately. Beat that, big 19^th century building. Google Art Project will have your audience want to choose highly individual routes through your museum, jumping from room A to room Z back to K to see what they want to see. Just like on the computer. Read the rest of this entry »

DOK Delft, inspirational library concepts

Photo by Henk Kosters on Flickr.com (CC BY-NC-SA)

Libraries can be inspiring places, and not only because of their books. I’ve written about the public library of Amsterdam and its astounding interior design before. This week I’ve visited the public library of Delft, DOK. In 2008 the shifted librarian called it the world’s most modern library. Three years later, the “library concept center” still made a tremendous impression on me.

Five great things about DOK I took home:

1. A good understanding of a library’s future role in society

Libraries are about making information accessible to people. Libraries that are not used by the people, fail their task. Books have become increasingly cheaper and information more easily accessible. To the greater audience there’s hardly a need for the traditional library. There is, however, a need to be guided in the quest for information, to detach from the busy society, to discover new things, to meet people and learn from each other. DOK is more an “information community centre” than a library. They have an art library in the building, organize debates about literature but also finace, … This might very well be the future of more cultural institutions than just libraries.

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My twenty-ten in museums and culture – 642 words, flywheels and making change happen

Photo by RightBrainPhotography on Flickr (CC SA-NC-ND)

I think you’re great! Let me explain why.

There’s about a 50% change you’ve visited this blog before, so I think it’s safe to assume this is not the first post you read. That means you’re one of the people who helped to make this blog go from a couple of hundreds of visits a month to – recently – over 2,500. Cool! Over 7,000 unique visitors from more than 100 countries came to this blog in twenty-ten. Among you are quite some of the people whose work on innovation in the cultural sector I greatly admire. Thanks for joining.

The discussion about the future of culture and museums is happening on many blogs, forums and conferences. Mine is just a small one. The past year has given us many moments where the international community for cultural innovators came together. I think about the ash cloud unconference sessions after Museum and the Web, the comment section of Nina Simon’s ever great blog and events such as #followamuseum and #askacurator (thanks Jim!).

Jim Collins wrote one of the books that have shaped my vision on life and work, Good to Great. If you haven’t done so before, pick up a copy and memorize it. It’s gold. One of his points is ‘first who, then what’, another the flywheel.

What Mr. Collins proves is that if you get the right people together, and you make sure you work on something you really like, can be the best of the world in and earn a sustainable living while doing so, a flywheel will start turning. When you are persistent in doing that thing, the flywheel will get momentum. This momentum makes the impossible possible and will turn whatever you do from merely good, to great. Read the rest of this entry »

Telling great ideas and stories that stick

Photo by Andrew Beresford on Flickr.

Years ago I read the book Made to Stick by Dan and Chip Heath. Basically it’s about why some stories and ideas disappear and others stick with the receiver forever. What makes a successful story that is retold over and over again?

The book applied its own rules and stayed with me. Reading through a pile of unremarkable blog posts and museum brochures this week its lessons came to mind again. Here’s the slightly edited summary I wrote for internal use in 2007. I believe this message is worth sharing, even after some years. Useful for when you pitch your next innovative idea, give a presentation or simply write copy for an exhibition.

What makes a story or idea stick?

Successful communication alone is not enough to make ideas stick. An idea sticks when:

1. You can easily understand it,
2. You can remember it,
3. It’s effectively changing thoughts or behaviour.

To make sure your idea, story, pitch or presentation fits the above description, Dan and Chip propose the SUCCES criteria. Fulfilling these criteria will make your ideas powerful and successful. Read the rest of this entry »

Charming tour guide versus mobile 3D AR app

Boris Micka advocates the use of technology to make it feel as if it were human. His most innovative tech projects cannot beat the experience of Russian babushkas who know everything about a museum. So what happens when ceteris paribus a charming tour guide and one of the coolest museum apps in the world compete?

The Netherlands Architecture Institute in Rotterdam

The playground for this epic museum battle is Rotterdam. This harbour town hosts so much great architecture and stories about it, past, present and future, that it really helps if someone or something tells you where to look. Last week I went on a tour through the city called Metropolder organised by the Netherlands Architecture Institute, NAi. The exact same tour is available in NAi’s UAR app, which uses (3D) augmented reality and Layar technology to tell stories about the buildings in the city.

UAR lets you experience the history and future of architecture with photos, audio and additional information. It also contains 3D models of some future buildings, so you can get an amazing feel of what the city will look like in the future. Sometimes with dramatic consequences, but I’ll get back to that later.

The tour I did was hosted by two guides and had some 10 participants. It focused on Rotterdam’s relation with water. Polders, harbours and dikes played a central role in most of the stories. The day was cold and a bit rainy. During the tour I tried to use UAR to find additional information to the stories told by its competitor: the real-life tour guide.

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