museumsandtheweb.com - survey

Online Presence and the Act of Not Just Being There. The Use of Social Media by Danish Museums

nholdgaard — Thu, 30 Sep 2010 19:14:00 +0000

MW2011

Published Paper:

The Use of Social Media in the Danish Museum Landscape

Keywords:

social media

Keywords:

Facebook

Keywords:

Museum Websites

Keywords:

Denmark

Keywords:

online presence

Keywords:

survey

Abstract:

Through the last decades, a large amount of different initiatives have been set to explore, innovate and develop the presence of museums online both in an international context and in a Danish setting.

The aim of this paper is to examine how the Danish museums understand and approach online communication with a focus on the use of social media. So far, the empirical based knowledge of how museums' actually act online in terms of social media is very scarce. This study will provide new insights into the field of digital museum communication and point to challenges of the present museum website categories by and ask if we need new categories to describe the museums online presence and communication.

The paper will take its point of departure in an outline of the Danish online museum landscape through an analysis of the museums' online content. This includes the presentation of the results of a content analysis of all the 123 state-owned and state-subsidized museums' websites and a study of the museums' use of social media. The content analysis focuses on the use of images, videos and sound effects or podcasts on the museum websites. The scope is to analyze how the Danish museums present themselves online and to discuss whether or not German media researcher Werner Schweibenz' four museum website categories (brochure, object, learning, and virtual museum) cover the reality of today's online museum communication.

The main part of the paper will, with Facebook as an example, examine the museums' presence on and use of social media platforms, examining different cases of Danish museums' interaction and communication on Facebook. According to Facebook's own statistics, Denmark is one of countries with the highest percentage of users per capita and every second Danish Internet user has a Facebook profile. Hence, the outreach potentials for the Danish museums are presumably high. The initial results of the investigation of the museums' social media use show, that half of all the Danish museums are present on Facebook, typically with a 'like' page, but a marginal number of museums also have a profile or a group. The paper will also use data from interviews with museum professionals and Facebook users and a content analysis of selected museums' Facebook ‘like' pages, profiles, and groups. The final paper will analyze how Facebook as a social network site with its specific design and interface and possibilities of interacting create both great potentials and barriers for when the museums interact and communicate online.

In addition to the above mentioned survey of Danish museums online, this paper will draw on data from my Ph.D. project on Online Museum Communication from a User Perspective and on new and unique data from a national survey of the Danish Museums' Web Users (2010) by The Heritage Agency of Denmark.

Type:

Paper - in formal session

Social Media and Beyond

Authors:

Nanna Holdgaard

Going Mobile? Insights into the museum community’s perspectives on mobile interpretation

Loic Tallon — Wed, 29 Sep 2010 13:43:36 +0000

MW2011

Published Paper:

Going Mobile? Insights into the Museum Community’s Perspectives on Mobile Interpretation

Keywords:

mobile

Keywords:

research

Keywords:

museum community

Keywords:

international

Keywords:

future

Keywords:

survey

Abstract:

If the future is mobile, how is the museum community experiencing that future, what are their ambitions within it, and in which areas is further knowledge share required? It was specifically to gain an insight into questions such as these that the 2010 International Museums and Mobile survey was developed. This paper will present and analyse the responses of the 600+ museum professionals that participated in this research.

The 2010 International Museums and Mobile Survey reached out to museum professionals internationally to share their perspectives and understanding of mobile interpretation at their institutions. Dividing respondents into four categories – those from institutions that already used mobile interpretation, those from institutions that were planning to use mobile interpretation tools, those from institutions that had no plans to use mobile interpretation tools, and those from vendors working in this field – the survey sought to gain an insight into the everyday realities of developing, delivering and sustaining mobile interpretation provisions in an institution. The survey questions related to the objectives of, and target audience for, an institution’s mobile interpretation experience; the challenges faced by institutions in planning and operating a mobile interpretation experience; and what strategies were used to measure the success of these experiences. Other questions probed the aspects of mobile interpretation in which individuals felt there were insufficient knowledge share, and also about what excited them most in this field.

Over 600 museum professionals responded to the survey, sharing their views on the above questions. Responses were received from individuals working in institutions with a wide variety of backgrounds and profiles: institutions in over twenty countries are represented in the results; two thirds of all responses were from institutions that did not use mobile interpretation tools, and of which half were planning to in the twelve months, and half had no such plans. Whilst a quarter of responses came from within institutions that boast an annual attendance upwards of 250,000 visitors, more than half had annual attendance of under 50,000 visitors (and less than 1 staff member working in digital media).

Drawing on this data source, this Paper will draw out the key trends that arise, and forward analysis on their context and implications for the community. It will explore opinions on issues ranging from whether mobile interpretation should be available at an additional cost to visitors, to how to define the target audience for a mobile interpretation tool (i.e. is it just “those that like audio guides”?). And from whether in five years time museums will still be required to provide a hardware platform to visitors for the mobile experience, to the obstacles those entering the field are facing today. Through this analysis, this paper aims to provide guidance to those museums entering this field for the first time, create awareness of those areas where further knowledge share is required (and hopefully identify those institutions best placed to provide such knowledge), and ultimately provide a valuable tool on which to further inform debates in this field.

Type:

Paper - in formal session

Mobile Parade

Authors:

Loic Tallon

Isabel Froes

The impact of blogs and other social media on the life of a curator

biblio — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 22:10:56 +0000

Dicker, E. (2010). The impact of blogs and other social media on the life of a curator. (Trant, Jennifer, David Bearman, Ed.).Museums and the Web.

Why and how, multimedia - the Japanese situation

jtrant — Wed, 02 May 2007 01:06:28 +0000

Mizushima, E. (1993). Why and how, multimedia - the Japanese situation. (Lees, Diane, Ed.).Museums and Interactive Multimedia: Selected papers from the second International Conference on Hypermedia and Interactivity in Museums.

The Use, Usefulness, and Value of Museums in the U.S

jtrant — Wed, 02 May 2007 00:56:06 +0000

Griffiths, J. - M., Aerni S. E., & King D. (2007). The Use, Usefulness, and Value of Museums in the U.S. (Trant, Jennifer, David Bearman, Ed.).Museums and the Web 2007. Proceedings.