This third report on the WebWise 2.0 covers the IMLS National Study on the Use of Libraries, Museums and the Internet and the session on “The Power of Presentation” (Second Life, Pachyderm multimedia software, and Colonial Williamsburg’s Virtual Republic) from Thursday afternoon and only highlights those portions that most closely relate to historic sites. If you want to learn more, visit webwise2008.fcla.edu for the agenda and links to the demonstration projects (and there was a mention that the entire proceedings will be available on line, but so far nothing has been posted). To avoid one incredibly long post, I’ve separated it into different postings (click on the tag for WebWise and you’ll find all of them).
Power of Trust: Jose-Marie Griffiths at UNC Chapel Hill
Griffiths explored how “trust” can forge interconnections between the virtual and physical worlds by first defining “trust” (interdependence on others) and then proposing that museums and libraries are trusted institutions because they are knowledgeable, have integrity, and seek the betterment of others without personal gain. Her research of 1700 “users of information” at museums, libraries, and internet over a 12-month period showed that museums and libraries evoke consistent, extraordinary public trust among diverse adults users (rating significantly higher than Web sites for genealogical societies, government, commercial businesses, and private individuals) and found that the internet is not eroding the use of museums and libraries, indeed, it has the opposite effect. Adults who use the internet visit libraries and museums more often. In-person visits to museums and public libraries are much higher for adults who use the internet than with those who do not, and the more frequently they visit remotely, the more frequently they visit in person (almost three times more often that people who don’t visit on-line). Furthermore, museums and libraries serve important and complementary roles both on-line and in-person. In 2006, 701 million adults visited museums in person and 542 million visited remotely online, and use of the Internet to access museums increased 75 percent.
[So if you don’t maintain and expand your Web site, you’re doing your historic site a huge disservice. I don’t want to hear any more complaints that Web sites are keeping people from visiting.] For the complete IMLS National Study on the Use of Libraries, Museums and the Internet, visit www.interconnectionsreport.org.
Power of Presentation
Librarians and Second Life: Ilene Frank, University of Southern Florida
Frank strongly recommended that libraries and museums should be on Second Life because that’s where people area—35,000-60,000 people are on-line at one time—and recommended Nick Yee’s study “Demographics and Derived Experiences”. Educators can create spaces for learning, such as “classrooms” with films, web casting, powerpoint-like presentations, and “libraries” linked to books, or they can be much more creative, providing students with opportunities to build their own environment and role-playing (see SLED discussion group). Currently there are about 800 librarians involved “in-world” and 1400 friends who are building collections, creating educationally-related spaces, holding professional development training, creating exhibits, organizing concerts, holding book talks, and answering reference questions. Space in Second Life must be purchased, however, it can often be acquired through donation. [Before getting overly excited about Second Life, I’d certainly explore it yourself several times first. The place seems like a ghost town and when it does become busy, the software grinds to a halt. However, if you are a real techie, it does provide one of the easiest ways to explore the design and construction of virtual exhibits. See the presentation by Jeffrey Schnapp at the Stanford Humanities Lab in a future post for ideas.]
Multimedia for Peanuts: Larry Johnson, New Media Consortium
Johnson discussed “Pachyderm,” a free Open Source software program that helps you easily create multimedia presentations or exhibits on the Web. Movies are in Flash to prevent piracy but they are pursuing other formats (Smile) and CSS for viewing on cell phones. For institutions without their own servers, they can also host projects for a fee and developers can also modify the program for their particular needs (go to Pachyforge.org for more details). [It’s a bit hard to explain in words, so take a look at the “showcase” section of the Web site for examples from the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Grace Museum, and the Still Life Observational Guide.]
Civic Participation: Bill White, Colonial Williamsburg
White discussed how Colonial Williamsburg hopes to expand what the museum by engaging audiences with their civic responsibility through a Web site for high school students and teachers. “Virtual Republic” will combine curriculum materials and current events to create a space where students can debate topics such as freedom/equality, unity/diversity, common wealth/private wealth, and law/ethics. It will have templates for lesson plans and class assignments (identify problem, create a statement of class belief, and propose a solution) and they want to use social networking tools (e.g., blogs, wikis). Ultimately, they hope Web site will encourage students to make proposals to school boards, local leaders, congressmen; write editorials on blogs or newspapers; or engage in advocacy. [Unfortunately, this project was just funded by IMLS and has not been constructed, so at this point it’s all theory and speculation. I wish WebWise would have instead presented a project that was complete and in operation, so we could see what is possible and also discuss what worked and what didn’t.]
