2010 Horizon Report: Museum Edition The Web Version

Cite <blockquote cite='http://wp.nmc.org/horizon-mu-2010/sections/challenges/#1'>Any discussion of technology adoption must also consider important constraints and challenges, and the Advisory Board drew deeply from a careful analysis of current events, papers, articles, and similar sources, as well as from personal experience in detailing a long list of challenges museums face in adopting any new technology. Several important challenges are detailed below, but it was clear that behind them all was a pervasive sense that individual museum constraints are likely the most important factors in any decision to adopt — or not to adopt — any given technology.</blockquote> Permalink:
1 Any discussion of technology adoption must also consider important constraints and challenges, and the Advisory Board drew deeply from a careful analysis of current events, papers, articles, and similar sources, as well as from personal experience in detailing a long list of challenges museums face in adopting any new technology. Several important challenges are detailed below, but it was clear that behind them all was a pervasive sense that individual museum constraints are likely the most important factors in any decision to adopt — or not to adopt — any given technology.

Cite <blockquote cite='http://wp.nmc.org/horizon-mu-2010/sections/challenges/#2'>Even institutions that are eager to adopt new technologies may be critically constrained by the lack of necessary human resources and financial wherewithal to realize their ideas. Still others are located within buildings that simply were not designed to provide the radio frequency transparency that wireless technologies require, and thus find themselves shut out of many potential technology options. While acknowledging that local barriers to technology adoptions are many and significant, the Advisory Board focused its discussions on challenges that are common to museums and the museum community as a whole. </blockquote> Permalink:
2 Even institutions that are eager to adopt new technologies may be critically constrained by the lack of necessary human resources and financial wherewithal to realize their ideas. Still others are located within buildings that simply were not designed to provide the radio frequency transparency that wireless technologies require, and thus find themselves shut out of many potential technology options. While acknowledging that local barriers to technology adoptions are many and significant, the Advisory Board focused its discussions on challenges that are common to museums and the museum community as a whole.

Cite <blockquote cite='http://wp.nmc.org/horizon-mu-2010/sections/challenges/#3'>The highest ranked challenges they identified are listed here, in the order of their perceived importance.</blockquote> Permalink:
3 The highest ranked challenges they identified are listed here, in the order of their perceived importance.

Cite <blockquote cite='http://wp.nmc.org/horizon-mu-2010/sections/challenges/#4'> Far too few museums are crafting and following a comprehensive strategy to ensure that they can keep pace with even the most proven technologies. A comprehensive digital strategy should include plans to use technology not only for learning and interpretation, but also for marketing, e-philanthropy, revenue generation, digitization, and digital preservation — as well as plans for the general technology infrastructure. Funding for technology projects is too often done outside operational budgets. The recent recession brought to an end what had been a promising trend of museums allocating ongoing operational funds (as opposed to capital or project funds) for both experimental and proven technology projects. Any museum that is not making reasoned continual investment in its technological future is putting the museum’s ability to engage with ever more networked audiences at significant risk. The relationships and synergies among technology use by a museum and its staff, the ways people and organizations use technology outside the museum, and the resources a museum has chosen to place online are not well understood. Many in museums still fail to grasp the notion that audiences have high expectations with regard to online access to services and information. It is often difficult enough for museums with scarce resources to serve their physical visitors and to keep audiences in their geographical region satisfied; the notion that museums must, in addition, provide information and services via the Internet and mobile networks is too often seen as frivolous or unnecessary. Documentation of the impact of programs delivered via digital technologies is often expected as a prerequisite for adoption or even pilot efforts, creating a “chicken versus egg” conundrum. Museums are good at traditional program evaluation, and expect it as a normal component of museum activities. Too often, however, it is the technology that is the presumed focus of assessment in digitally delivered programs rather than changes in knowledge, attitudes, or skills that may result from the activities of the program. Such a focus, while seemingly resonant with standard practice, can serve as a barrier to experimentation and innovation. Advances in workflow and content production techniques in business and industry are largely absent from similar forms of content creation in museums. Museum workflows are too often ill-suited to modern content production techniques in which content is created simultaneously for multiple delivery modes. Websites, videos, podcasts, social networks, and blogs should all pull from a content management system that allows any “story,” critique, or analysis to be ported to any medium. Failure to align workflows with this model adds costs and limits publishing options for museums that are already operating under financial constraints. At a time when their role is more important than ever, too many museum educators lack the training, resources or support to address the technological opportunities and challenges they face. The lack of adequate preparation in the use of common digital technologies in university training for museum educators coupled with few choices for ongoing professional development is creating a vacuum of skills just when they are needed most. Museum education departments must find ways to keep their staffs current in educational technologies and practices. </blockquote> Permalink:
4

• Far too few museums are crafting and following a comprehensive strategy to ensure that they can keep pace with even the most proven technologies. A comprehensive digital strategy should include plans to use technology not only for learning and interpretation, but also for marketing, e-philanthropy, revenue generation, digitization, and digital preservation — as well as plans for the general technology infrastructure.
• Funding for technology projects is too often done outside operational budgets. The recent recession brought to an end what had been a promising trend of museums allocating ongoing operational funds (as opposed to capital or project funds) for both experimental and proven technology projects. Any museum that is not making reasoned continual investment in its technological future is putting the museum’s ability to engage with ever more networked audiences at significant risk.
• The relationships and synergies among technology use by a museum and its staff, the ways people and organizations use technology outside the museum, and the resources a museum has chosen to place online are not well understood. Many in museums still fail to grasp the notion that audiences have high expectations with regard to online access to services and information. It is often difficult enough for museums with scarce resources to serve their physical visitors and to keep audiences in their geographical region satisfied; the notion that museums must, in addition, provide information and services via the Internet and mobile networks is too often seen as frivolous or unnecessary.
• Documentation of the impact of programs delivered via digital technologies is often expected as a prerequisite for adoption or even pilot efforts, creating a “chicken versus egg” conundrum. Museums are good at traditional program evaluation, and expect it as a normal component of museum activities. Too often, however, it is the technology that is the presumed focus of assessment in digitally delivered programs rather than changes in knowledge, attitudes, or skills that may result from the activities of the program. Such a focus, while seemingly resonant with standard practice, can serve as a barrier to experimentation and innovation.
• Advances in workflow and content production techniques in business and industry are largely absent from similar forms of content creation in museums. Museum workflows are too often ill-suited to modern content production techniques in which content is created simultaneously for multiple delivery modes. Websites, videos, podcasts, social networks, and blogs should all pull from a content management system that allows any “story,” critique, or analysis to be ported to any medium. Failure to align workflows with this model adds costs and limits publishing options for museums that are already operating under financial constraints.
• At a time when their role is more important than ever, too many museum educators lack the training, resources or support to address the technological opportunities and challenges they face. The lack of adequate preparation in the use of common digital technologies in university training for museum educators coupled with few choices for ongoing professional development is creating a vacuum of skills just when they are needed most. Museum education departments must find ways to keep their staffs current in educational technologies and practices.

Cite <blockquote cite='http://wp.nmc.org/horizon-mu-2010/sections/challenges/#5'>These trends and challenges are a reflection of the impact of technology in almost every aspect of our lives. They are indicative of the changing nature of the way we communicate, access information, connect with peers and colleagues, learn, and even socialize. Taken together, they provided the Advisory Board a frame through which to consider the potential impacts of nearly 50 emerging technologies and related practices that were analyzed and discussed for potential inclusion in this edition of the Horizon Report. Six of those were chosen as key; they are summarized below and detailed in the main body of the report.</blockquote> Permalink:
5 These trends and challenges are a reflection of the impact of technology in almost every aspect of our lives. They are indicative of the changing nature of the way we communicate, access information, connect with peers and colleagues, learn, and even socialize. Taken together, they provided the Advisory Board a frame through which to consider the potential impacts of nearly 50 emerging technologies and related practices that were analyzed and discussed for potential inclusion in this edition of the Horizon Report. Six of those were chosen as key; they are summarized below and detailed in the main body of the report.

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