Futures of Learning

Mobile Media

Digital Media in Community Libraries, Part 1: Mobile Media

Over time we have seen how public libraries have expanded their services to provide a wider range of informational and entertainment media, such as music cds, videos and dvds, and books-on-tape.  With the widescale distribution of books and multimedia available via the Web, community libraries are once again reconsidering not only the range of services they provide, but also their mode of outreach and incorporation of new digital technologies.  This post reviews noteworthy efforts by community libraries to adapt to and make use of new mobile media. 

Mobile phone use in the U.S. has shown tremendous growth in recent years. As of 2008, there were over 260 million mobile phone subscribers, representing about 85 percent of the population (Singh, 2008). 88 percent of college students own mobile phones and 27 percent have a Blackberry or PDA (Rainie, 2008). According to a recent report by the Centers for Disease Control, 20 percent of U.S. households had only mobile phones (i.e. no landline) as of the end of 2008, and about one third of those aged 18 – 24 and one fourth of those aged 25 – 29 live in mobile phone-only households (Fram, 2009). While young people are more likely to have no landline, about one third of people who live in poverty also only have mobile phones. According to a report by comScore, as of January 2009 some 22.4 million mobile phone users were accessing the mobile web on a daily basis, and this usage had doubled since one year prior (Burns, 2009).

This shifting landscape of mobile communication use intersects with the evolving role of the library discussed in the previous post. There are three main reasons that libraries have embraced the use of mobile technologies:  (1) to expand the range of content available to patrons, (2) to offer a fuller menu of services, and (3) as a new mode of public outreach. In terms of content, the question posed is, how do wireless devices such as mobile phones and PDAs allow libraries either to distribute content in different forms or to expand the field of information about a library item?  For services and outreach, how do mobile devices enhance customer service and expand the patron base?  And yet, to argue that the use of mobile media is a NEW manifestation of the desire to expand outreach efforts (or provide a wider range of information and services) would be to ignore an important element of the history of community library efforts.

Consider the humble bookmobile. Yes, the bookmobile, the traveling RV bibliothéque that many of us remember (with delight in my case) gracing our elementary schools once a month with its glorious presence. At the bookmobile one could conveniently have access (service) to books (content) unavailable at one’s own school library, and even the kids with the most lackadaisical attitude toward reading were drawn to the bookmobile because its monthly appearance in and of itself made it special and because it was a chance to be dismissed from class for 30 minutes to go and look at books with groovy titles and fun images (outreach). Of course, the mission of many bookmobiles today aligns more closely with the vision set forth by Mary Titcomb when she came up with the idea of the traveling wagon full of books in 1905 – to provide books to those without any access to a library in their local community (http://www.whilbr.org/bookmobile/index.aspx). Bookmobiles also make available books and services to seniors and others with limited physical mobility. More recently, with his Internet Bookmobile (http://www.archive.org/texts/bookmobile.php), Brewster Kahle, director of the Internet Archive, traveled around the U.S. printing and binding books in the public domain (such as Alice in Wonderland), raising awareness of the Internet as a free digital library for all, and challenging copyright extension legislation that continues to be passed in Congress (Cisler, 2002; Koman, 2002).

Taking the bookmobile as a starting point, in what ways are community libraries engaging with mobile communication technologies to enhance content, services, and outreach for the purposes of learning? How is mobility a part of both the physical and the virtual library? It should be noted that the following discussion is by no means exhaustive and is meant to point to interesting applications and projects that are in the works. For additional links to important “mobiles and libraries” interfaces, applications, and resources (not limited to public libraries) see “M-Libraries – Library Success: A Best Practices Wiki” (http://libsuccess.org/index.php?title=M-Libraries).

Content
Mobile technologies clearly allow libraries to expand the range of forms for distributing content. For decades, libraries have offered books on tape and CD in order to provide content for those unable to read a physical book, such as the sight impaired, and for people who desire content that they could enjoy on the go (driving, walking, etc.). More recently many libraries have begun offering e-books and digital audio books for download. For example, since 2005 cardholders of the New York Public Library have been able to download audio books from the Internet any time of the day or night simply by going to the library’s website and entering their card number and a PIN (http://www.gizmag.com/go/4157/). They can check out as many as ten audio books at a time for up to three weeks and play them on their computer, CD player, portable digital music player, or cell phone. The New York Public Library and thousands of others use OverDrive’s technology, and OverDrive’s website allows users to search for libraries offering free digital downloads (http://www.overdrive.com/). Libraries have also begun offering not only digital content, but also the means by which to use it. As Ellyssa Kroski (2008) discusses in her recent report, On the Move with the Mobile Web, institutions such as the Thomas Ford Memorial Library in Western Springs, Illinois (http://www.fordlibrary.org/) allow patrons to check out iPod Nanos with audio books loaded on them.

In addition to storing digital books, mobile devices are also being used to expand the field of information around books. One way is through the use of QR (quick response) codes, which are a type of two-dimensional barcode that can store a lot of information that can then be downloaded via a mobile phone. They are already quite popular in Japan and parts of Europe where they are used mostly for promotional/marketing reasons. However, QR codes could have multiple uses in libraries. As librarian Lex Rigby explains, currently in libraries while conventional barcodes are used to link an item to its catalog record, the information is limited and it can only be accessed by scanning the barcode at the check-out desk. On the other hand, QR codes could be used to store descriptions, images, useful links, etc. for all types of library materials. A library patron could use their mobile phone to scan the QR code to access this information (http://www.lexrigby.com/2009/03/26/qr-codes-in-libraries-and-higher-education/). The library at the University of Bath is at the forefront of using QR codes to link to their catalog (http://blogs.bath.ac.uk/qrcode/2009/03/23/uni-of-bath-library-including-qr-codes-in-catalogue/). This expanded range of information available at the click of a (camera phone) button is obviously time-saving and efficient. Thus far, however, the use of QR codes in public libraries in the U.S. does not seem to be widespread although such two dimensional barcodes have been generated for the web spaces of each branch of the Brooklyn Public Library (http://natehill.wordpress.com/2008/07/27/the-physical-internet-10-at-not-your-library/).

Services
In addition to providing a new mode of content provision, mobile devices are also being used to enhance library services. In this regard, text messaging (or SMS – short message service) is an obvious means of inexpensive and efficient communication, and several public libraries have implemented message options for their cardholders. Orlando, Florida’s Orange County Library System (http://www.ocls.info) allows patrons the choice of receiving text message reminders about upcoming due dates for materials and start dates for courses (Kroski, 2008). The Skokie Public Library in Skokie, Illinois offers such alerts as well as updates on holds placed and the option of renewing items via SMS (http://www.skokie.lib.il.us/s_about/mobile_services.asp). For similar purposes, some libraries are also using Twitter (http://twitter.com/about#about), a micro-blogging service that allows users to send updates (tweets) to their “followers” and receive tweets from those they signed up to follow. Posts can be viewed on a computer or an Internet-enabled mobile phone.

In addition to using mobile-enabled messaging, many libraries are designing their websites to be mobile friendly, which involves making the information concise, limiting the number of links, using descriptive icons, and including “home” and “parent-link” icons (West, Hafner, & Faust, 2006). At the current moment, however, there are still issues with display quality across different devices (Liston, 2009). Again, among community libraries the Skokie Public Library emerges as an exemplar as the library has designed a version of its website specifically for viewing on the small screen of a mobile device. The library catalog can also be browsed using a phone or PDA (with AirPAC, a mobile version of OPAC). In a recent presentation, Megan Fox (2009) has outlined numerous types of library friendly applications designed for the iPhone and other smartphones. Such applications enable users to find public libraries, organize notes, and conduct mobile searches. For example, the Washington D.C. Public Library has an iPhone application specifically designed to navigate its services. Some libraries also provide audio tours via mobile phones (http://www.folger.edu/template.cfm?cid=2383). A final mobile service deserving mention is the WorldCat Mobile pilot project (http://www.worldcat.org/mobile/default.jsp), which enables users to search for library materials as well as libraries, maps, and directions.

Outreach
In 2008, 62 percent of those aged 18 – 30 years old visited a public library for a range of purposes, including checking out books, using computers, seeking reference materials and the like (Rainie, 2008). Despite this figure, public libraries feel it is imperative to continue to reach new users and to maintain the users they have. The mobile content and services mentioned above are offered as opt-in choices for patrons. However, outreach generally means reaching out to those not already enjoying the library. Mobile phones may not be the most ideal devices for this purpose because of their extremely personal nature and people’s profound disdain for mobile spam (due to cost and irritation factors). However, some libraries are finding success using Twitter via mobile phones to make more connections in their communities and to promote their services and programs
(http://lis5313.ci.fsu.edu/wiki/index.php/Twittering_Libraries#Libraries_Using_Twitter). Such tweets might concern everything from pointers to the library website, to information on upcoming events, to research about the library’s role in society (Milstein, 2009).

Many libraries have also created Facebook and MySpace pages, such as the West Palm Beach Florida Public Library (http://www.facebook.com/pages/West-Palm-Beach-FL/West-Palm-Beach-Public-Library/27487304991). While many users view such pages on desktop or laptop computers, accessing social networking sites via mobile phones is becoming a popular activity and one that is growing rapidly (Burns, 2009). For this reason, Rainie (2009) recommends that libraries try to become “a news node for information and interaction” in the lives of young people. As Rainie adds, “The internet is ‘personified’ in some people’s lives and [libraries] can provide information and social support in the same ways that social networks can.” Since people often build their social networks via social networking sites such as Facebook through “friending” their friends’ friends, libraries could tap into this networking function as a form of outreach. Dempsey (2009), however, questions whether users will be motivated to participate in such networks.

Conclusion
There are clearly several interesting projects and applications joining together libraries and mobiles at this current moment. As library professionals participate in Google groups (http://groups.google.com/group/mobilelibraries), blogs (Gerry McKiernan’s http://mobile-libraries.blogspot.com/), and conferences (http://m-libraries2009.ubc.ca/) dedicated to exploring mobile libraries, the future promises to bring more ways that mobile phones and PDAs can be used to serve the library’s mission in terms of expanding content, services, and outreach. However, one word of caution should be added in this conclusion. Aside from text messaging services, most of the initiatives highlighted above necessitate a mobile phone with Internet access. Considering that most data plans are only compatible on more high-end phones and cost upwards of an additional $20 per month, clearly not everyone can participate in such mobile-enabled initiatives. As Horrigan (2009) discusses in his recent report, The Mobile Difference, only 39 percent of the U.S. adult population are “motivated by mobility” and have “largely positive and improving attitudes about how mobile devices make them more available to others” as well as high levels of usage for “non-voice data applications such as text messaging and internet browsing” (25). However, 61 percent are defined as “stationery media will do,” meaning they do “not feel the pull of mobility – or anything else – drawing them further into the digital world” (4). As Horrigan emphasizes that “the bar that qualifies as high-tech among users has risen” (p. 16), we must continuously ask whether such mobile services and applications will broaden participation in libraries or perpetuate an insurmountable knowledge gap.

References

Cisler, S. (2002). Letter from San Francisco: The Internet bookmobile. First Monday [Online] 7(10). Retrieved May 2, 2009, from http://firstmonday.org/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/999/920

Dempsey, L. (2009). Always on: Libraries in a world of permanent connectivity. First Monday [Online] 14(1-5). Retrieved March 2, 2009, from http://firstmonday.org/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/2291/2070

Fox, M. (2009, April 1). Mobile practices and search: What’s hot! Paper presented at the Computers in Libraries Annual Conference. Arlington, VA. Retrieved May 8, 2009, from http://web.simmons.edu/~fox/mobile

Fram, A. (2009). More cell phone users dropping landlines. The San Francisco Chronicle. Retrieved May 8, 2009, from http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2009/05/06/national/w090056D59.DTL&type=tech

Horrigan, J. (2009, March). The mobile difference: Wireless connectivity has drawn many users more deeply into digital life. Pew Internet & American Life Project. Retrieved April 10, 2009, from http://www.pewinternet.org/Reports/2009/5/-The-Mobile-Difference-Typology.aspx

Koman, R. (2002). Riding along with the Internet bookmobile. Retrieved April 10, 2009, from http://dir.salon.com/story/tech/feature/2002/10/09/bookmobile/index.html

Kroski, E. (2008). On the move with the mobile web: Libraries and mobile technologies. Library and Technology Reports 44(5). Retrieved January 11, 2009, from http://www.techsource.ala.org/ltr/on-the-move-with-the-mobile-web-libraries-and-mobile-technologies.html

Liston, S. (2009). OPACs and the mobile revolution. Computers in Libraries 29(5), 6-16.

Milstein, S. (2009). Twitter FOR libraries. Computers in Libraries 29(5), 17-18.

Raine, L. (2008, April 17). The role of libraries in a networked world. Paper presented at the Texas Library Association Annual Conference. Dallas, TX. Retrieved March 8, 2009, from http://www.pewinternet.org/Presentations/2008/The-role-of-libraries-in-the-digital-age.aspx

Raine, L. (2009, January 14). How libraries can survive in the new media ecosystem. Paper presented at the HELIN Library Consortium. Bryant University, Smithfield, RI. Retrieved March 8, 2009, from http://www.pewinternet.org/Presentations/2009/How-libraries-can-survive-in-the-new-media-ecosystem.aspx

Singh, S. (2008). U.S. raises $19b in spectrum sale. The Times of India (March 25). Retrieved March 8, 2009, from http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/US_raises_19b_in_spectrum_sale/articleshow/2896443.cms

West, M. A., Hafner, A. W., & Faust, B. D. (2006). Expanding access to library collections and services using small-screen devices. Information Technology and Libraries 25(2), 103-107.

Author Bio
Cara Wallis recently completed her Ph.D. at the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. Her research interests include the social and cultural implications of new media technologies, particularly as these relate to issues of identity, power, and social change.

Mobile Experiences in Art Museums

Museums today seek a balance between the one-way transmission of curatorial expertise and the pluralistic modes of interpretation by visitors. New multimedia tours with their diverse voices and interactive functions are one way that museums are literally passing control into the visitors’ hands, providing a greater array of potential connections that require the visitor to select, categorize, and create. A result of emerging technologies in the mobile industry, mobile experiences in museums today encompass the traditional handheld audio guide, the cell phone tour, iPhone/MP3 players, and the newer multimedia handheld tour as well as a variety of mobile applications that go behind the tour model. This posting will first briefly discuss the current state of mobile tours and review noteworthy studies on the subject conducted by major US art museums and presented at conferences and in publications. It will then explore future possibilities for mobile tours as well as other uses of mobile devices in museums, including GPS for geotagging, QR codes, and downloadable content specifically suited to handheld wireless devices.

Some of the questions we can ask as we review these mobile tools are, do they provide visitors with more information, and if so, what kind of information? Is there any knowledge or skill required to use them, and do they teach specific learning tools and goals? Do they reinforce a curatorial narrative and order? Do they empower the visitor with more choices to create personal meaning, and if so, in what ways do they affect the traditional museum experience? Peter Samis from the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) talks about an Interpretive Goals questionnaire that their institution adapted from the Getty that helped them to integrate multimedia into programs and exhibitions across all departments (Samis, Museums and the Web, 2009). The form included the following questions:

• Please list one to three main ideas visitors will take away from viewing the exhibition. What objects or didactic components of the exhibition will help them learn this?
• Describe the rationale and originality of the project. Is the exhibition bringing new scholarship to the field, exposing an under-recognized subject, etc.? Why is this exhibition important now at SFMOMA?
• Please note other interpretive, multi-media components that should be considered (audio-tour, in-gallery videos, interactive features, blogs, etc.). Are you aware of existing media created by other organizations on this topic? 

All these questions reflect the high priority that museums now place on visitor reception and interpretation of information, rather than on the process of curatorial transmission or on the object-centered content itself. Increasingly, museums are seeking to augment the visitor experience through the use of mobile media.

Current State of Mobile Tours
Museum audio guides today can be placed into four different categories: 1) museum devices with number pads with manual or automatic activation, 2) personal digital assistants (PDAs) such as the iPhone, BlackBerry and other smartphones with operating systems and Internet connectivity, visual imagery, and manual or automatic activation, 3) mobile phones that are manually activated, and 4) audio files/podcasts that are downloaded onto MP3 players and other devices such as the iPod/ Touch. While most museums rely on manual activation by the user (pushing device buttons), some of the newer tours utilize automatic activation by infrared hotspots that are triggered when visitors enter the area of the object with the device; however, the play button still needs to be activated manually. Both the PDAs and the mobile phones are generally brought into the museum by the visitor; however, museums often have some for short-term loan.

SJMA (Chris Alexander)

One of the newest developments in handheld devices is the iPhone by Apple, featuring a telephone, iPod and iTunes, text messaging, a hybrid map, and Internet connectivity. Two museums in the US are currently experimenting with specific iPhone audio tours, the San Jose Museum of Art (SJMA) in California and the Denver Art Museum in Colorado. The SJMA has been working on this new tour (they call it a “gallery experience/tour”) since September 2007, which can be accessed at http://www.sjmusart.org/iphone. The iPhone and/or iPod Touch make it easy for the museum to update content and allow the museum more options for features, interactivity, and accessibility, according to producer Chris Alexander. The museum introduced the tour in conjunction with its exhibition, Robots: Evolution of a Cultural Icon (April 12 – October 19, 2008). The Denver Art Museum converted their existing audio tours to “an iPhone-based experience,” says project director Bruce Wyman. “This will let us push the idea of developing web-based audio content to gallery devices, see how our wireless coverage is working, and also see what sort of traffic we experience over the existing infrastructure so we can think about scalability” (message posted by Wyman at Muse Tech Central: Museum Computer Network Project Registry. One advantage to the iPhone (and other devices with Internet connectivity) is it’s ability to provide a mobile access point to the museum’s collection management system that controls the entire permanent collection, rather than just a few highlights or a temporary exhibition. A disadvantage, however, is that downloading podcasts and other information on these devices (including MP3 players) requires visitors to plan ahead before visiting the museum, which can be unreliable with the younger visitors that favor these devices.

There are both advantages and disadvantages in using mobile phones for museum audio tours in the US. The advantages include visitors’ familiarity with their own personal device as opposed to learning a new device that they would need to borrow from the museum while leaving a form of identification. The use of mobile phones saves money for museums as they don’t have to purchase and maintain the audio devices or staff their distribution points, and it is easier for museums to update content. Various mobile phone features today support pictures, text, and video, and provide an opportunity for visitors to leave comments on a centralized message center. Mobile phones also offer greater flexibility of movement with exhibitions that continue outside the gallery spaces onto the exterior spaces of the museum and beyond, and they can be used anytime (Proctor & Tellis, 2003; Tellis, 2004; Proctor, 2007).

Disadvantages, however, are just as notable. The first obstacle to visitors using their mobile phones is a general discomfort and uncertainty at using these devices in museums, as Lee (2008) found in a recent study. Though these finding pertain to use in a science center, it is safe to assume that the same holds true for art museums as well, as many museums still prohibit mobile phone use within gallery spaces. There is a danger to museums that encouraging visitors to use their mobile phones for tours inside the gallery may encourage them to use the phones for other functions as well, such as making telephone calls or taking photos of works in violation of museum photography policies, both of which could be undetected by security guards. It is also tiring for visitors to physically hold the phone to their ear unless they have an earpiece, and reception may not be adequate in all spaces, particularly in basement galleries that would not offer a high quality audio experience. If visitors don’t have mobile phones, the museum would have to accommodate by providing them for loan, and for objects outside the galleries, visitors would need to carry around a paper guide listing the phone numbers to call. As large exhibitions travel around the country, the phone numbers to call may be long-distance, requiring extra charges that visitors might not want to pay, particularly with foreign visitors who pay higher charges.

Tate Modern (Nancy Proctor, 2007)

One example of a successful mobile phone audio tour is at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, Art on Call. Upon dialing a central number (612-374-8200), multiple voices can be heard interpreting artwork in the museum’s collection and temporary exhibitions, including the curator, artist, visitors that leave comments, and even the voice of history from interviews in museum archives. As the Walker manages not only indoor gallery spaces but also an outdoor sculpture garden and public cultural programming within the city, the audio tour offers updated information related to all of these diverse activities with interviews from film directors and performing artists, as well as dining tips in the city and jobs and volunteer opportunities at the museum. Two important features of the program are TalkBack, which allows visitors to record comments or “audio notes” on their mobile phone, and Breadcrumbing, which keeps track of artwork that visitors access on their mobile phone tour inside the museum, and then makes this personalized playlist available on the museum’s website that offers further information on the works. The museum has a few iPods on loan for free at the Visitors Services desk. Some museums also offer interactive games as part of their mobile phone tours, both inside the galleries and online, such as Ear for Art: Chihuly Glass CellPhone Walking Tour at the Tacoma Art Museum in Washington (888-411-4220).

With the handheld multimedia tours using device owned by the museum, visitors can bookmark objects of interest during their physical visit, similar to breadcrumbing. After giving their emails to a museum staff, content in the devices is transferred electronically to visitors via an email with a link to the museum website, where they can then create what is now commonly referred to as “my collection” or “my gallery.” The attractive feature for museums is that not only do they acquire visitors’ emails, but they are also able to track if visitors go to their website, how often, and what are the more popular objects being bookmarked.

Walker Art Center (Robin Dowden, 2007)

SFMOMA commissioned a study (conducted by Randi Korn & Associates, Inc.) during its 2006 exhibition of Matthew Barney: Drawing Restraint. The study determined that visitors under 40 rated the podcast and cell phone tour higher than the traditional audio tour with the same content because of “the ability to access information on demand, familiarity and comfort with the device and low or free cost” (Samis, 2007, p. 23). Using a 7-point scale to chart visitor satisfaction from “Did not help me appreciate Barney’s art” to “Helped me appreciate Barney’s art,” the highest mean ratings for visitors was the podcast tour (6.2) and the cell phone tour (6.0), followed by the headset audio tour with a mean rating of 5.6.

In 2008 (Samis & Pau, 2009), SFMOMA conducted a study by Corporate Intelligence Group at Discovery Communications, Inc. (the parent company of AntennaAudio that created the audio guide), contradicting these previous results. The study covered three distinct exhibitions at the museum, showing a diminishing interest on the part of viewers to use their mobile phones as museum tours in favor of MP3 devices and handheld museum devices, for many of the disadvantageous reasons cited above. Surveying visitors about their preferred sources of information when visiting a museum, visitors were divided into two categories; audio guide user and non-audio guide user. The choices of sources were both analog and digital: audio guide, wall text, exhibition brochure, multimedia tour, tour guide (docent), catalogue, in-gallery video, tour downloaded to personal iPod/MP3 player, mobile phone tour. The results showed that the last option for both sets of viewers was the mobile phone tour. Audio guide users preferred the audio guide first, followed by the wall text and the exhibition brochure. Non-audio guide users preferred the wall text first, followed by the exhibition brochure. The study also determined that 62% of guide users (41% of non-guide users) strongly prefer to use a museum device rather than their personal mobile phone, and there was a strong preference to use personal iPod/MP3 player devices over personal mobile phones (49% guide users, 36% non-guide users).

The Future of Mobile Devices in Art Museums
The future of museum mobile tours is based on the promise of increased multimedia features, greater bandwidth capabilities, and a global network, all offering more choices and flexibility for visitors and greater opportunities for interactivity and user-generated content. For example, one trend that Peter Samis has discussed is the “Universal Access Policy” for museums. The Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Whitney Museum of American Art, and the Guggenheim Museum have all started offering audio tours free of charge to every visitor, resulting in increased usage from 3-4% to 20-61%. However, it must be noted that this change corresponds with an increase in admission fees of up to $20 a person (Museums and the Web, 2009).

In discussing ”The Future of Mobile Interpretation,” Kovin J. Smith, Senior Analyst for Enterprise Content at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, proposes the importance for museums to know their audience to best create interpretive platforms. Smith also suggests that inside the museum, visitors expect many of the same experiences and tools as on the website, particularly with the ability to access the museum’s entire collection at the touch of a button. Smith states, “With the ability to search, group, and filter every object, the device becomes a digital surrogate, an assistant, rather than a tour guide” (Museums and the Web, 2009).

In addition to tours, the mobile future also promises museums more opportunities to track visitors and their actions and to offer visitors a more participatory experience. For example, geospatial technology already exists but has not been widely applied to museums. It incorporates GPS (global positioning systems) or cell tower triangulation and is based on geotagging, which places coordinates onto works of art or locations on the earth. The coordinates can then be accessed from Flickr, which offers free links to geotagged “things” on a world map. New mobile phone technology allows users to put location tabs on video or still images, or to declare a specific location on a map and pull up images related to where one is physically located. Museums could geotag objects for visitors to access at locations external to the physical space of the museum, especially useful at archaeological sites, parks, and public art installations. These technologies represent a development of the current infrared technology applied to handheld devices that uses visitor location to trigger data from the tours.

QR codes (discussed in the in the previous post “Digital Media in Community Libraries, Part 1”) are also being explored for use in museums to encourage a more participatory visitor experience. While QR codes could have a variety of uses, in one pilot application called artsonomy, museum visitors use their camera phones to take a picture of a QR code accompanying a piece of art. They then type words that express their attitude toward the artwork and send these tags to a database that forms a visible tag cloud around the piece, which they can also view (Perrone, 2009). Thus far, artsonomy has been installed at the Norsk Telemuseum in Oslo, Norway, at the Museo dei Mercati di Traiano in Rome, and will soon be installed at Ara Pacis Museum, also in Rome (Perrone, personal correspondence). In the US, the use of QR codes in museums has not taken off (yet). As of May 2009, the Mattress Factory in Pittsburg was the first American museum to incorporate QR codes in the exhibition experience. In order to reduce the amount of printed material and engage visitors, the gallery has put QR codes on exhibition title cards, with each code containing different data, such as video, still images, and background information. QR codes obviously take a lot of planning and technical support. They are also not without their challenges, including inconsistent size (depending on how much data is encoded) and the necessity of designing content that is mobile friendly (Chan, 2009). It is interesting that the Museum of Modern Art in New York included the newer Microsoft Tags using HCCB (high capacity color barcodes) in their 2008 exhibition Design and the Elastic Mind, but as an aesthetic physical object in the physical museum, not yet as a participatory tool. Microsoft released its new tag in January 2009, offering higher density storage for easier mobile phone camera use. Many believe both of these technologies hold much promise for user interactivity and engagement in museums.

Gavin Jancke, director of engineering for Microsoft Research Redmond

Other mobile applications in museums include content tailored for mobile devices, text alerts, RSS feeds, and Twitter feeds. The Museum of Fine Arts (MFA) in Boston has designed a program that (for a cost) lets users wirelessly download objects from the museum’s collection to be used as mobile wallpaper. Such personalization of mobile phones is more commonly achieved through photos of family or celebrities, but the MFA clearly hopes that such a service will not only enhance its own revenue stream but also expand the visitor experience beyond the doors of the museum. Museum on the Go started in April 2007 as the first mobile phone museum portal, currently hosting downloadable images, Realtunes, and videos from 10 international museums, including the Victoria and Albert in London. They charge a comparable fee. The MFA, as well as other museums, also sends text alerts (for free) so subscribers can receive current information on events and discounts. Most museums today have RSS feeds with updated information on calendar events, staff blogs, podcasts, and news. Visitors can subscribe by going to the museum’s website or social media sites (such as Facebook) and can receive these on a mobile phone with Internet connectivity. Several museums are also sending Twitter “tweets” via subscribers’ mobile phones, but with mixed reactions as to their purpose. Museum consultant and blogger Nina Simon has suggested a range of Twitter uses for museums that go beyond one-way spam-like communication, such as providing “behind-the-scenes insight” and sharing visitor photos and comments. See the Brooklyn Museum of Art for an example of using Twitter and other RSS feeds.
Boston Museum of Fine Arts

When contemplating all of these possibilities, it is important to recall Peter Samis’ words of advice, “If the institution is going to delegate significant aspects of the interpretative load to new technology devices, then it becomes imperative that those devices be made as effortlessly available to users as the wall texts and artworks” (Museums and the Web, 2009). A recent study on mobile phone tours and audio guides at the Centre Pompidou (Traces du sacré, May 7 – August 11, 2008) in Paris by Vincent Puig et al. (Museums and the Web, 2009) also reveals lessons learned not only about audio tours but also the use of mobile media in general. Aside from suggesting the introduction of GPS to alleviate visitor difficulty with entering stop numbers, the article proposed the need for “innovative multimedia search and navigation tools” to cross-reference objects, information, and keywords.

Conferences
There are two very important conferences regarding handheld devices in museums that need to be mentioned. The first is the Tate Handheld Conference (September 4 and 5, 2008), co-organized by Jane Burton from the Tate Museum in London, and Nancy Proctor from the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington DC. The full audio from the conference is available to download from the Tate Events podcast. The Conference wiki is a wealth of information on the subject, listing conference topics, case studies, resources, an online course, people, and general conference information. The MuseumMobile wiki mentioned in Anne’s last blog grew out of the Tate Handheld Conference wiki, and is an important resource as well.

The second conference is the Handheld Online Conference “from audio tours to iPhones” organized by Learning Times, held online on June 3, 2009. The website presents recordings and discussion forums from conference sessions and biographical information on the speakers. A description of the conference from the website aptly describes the current and future state of mobile tours in museums, and is a fitting end to this post:

So are the new technologies doomed simply to replace the traditional audio tour with an even more sophisticated and bewildering, but no less marginal, array of solutions for providing museum interpretation? There is no specific technology or platform that will revolutionize our visitors’ museum experiences, but rather our visitors are transforming the museum visit themselves through new informational practices that they are importing to the museum from their Web 2.0 lives. WWW has come to mean ‘whatever, whenever, wherever’ and the question of the future of museum interpretation has become not one of what technology our visitors will prefer, but rather of where, when, and how they want to engage with the museum, both on-site and beyond http://www.handheldconference.org/about/.

Mobile tour creators:
Antenna Audio - http://www.antennaaudio.com
Learning Times - http://www.learningtimes.com
NousGuide - http://www.NousGuide.com
Heritage 365 - http://www.heritage365.com
Guide By Cell - http://www.guidebycell.com
Spatial Adventures, Inc. - http://www.spatialadventures.com
Museum 411 - http://www.museum411.com

References
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Chan, S. (2009, March 5). QR codes in the museum – problems and opportunities with extended object labels. Blog posting to fresh + new(er). http://www.powerhousemuseum.com/dmsblog/index.php/2009/03/05/qr-codes-in-the-museum-problems-and-opportunities-with-extended-object-labels/

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THIS POSTING WAS WRITTEN BY SUSANA BAUTISTA AND CARA WALLIS