Here is a blatant quote from Mike Ellis‘ electronicmuseum.org.uk, but since he has such a simple and straightforward conclusion of MW2008 I wanted to copy it entirely.

Ellis just spent 7 years working as Head of Web for the National Museum of Science and Industry, UK, which comprises the Science Museum in London, Media Museum in Bradford and Railway Museum in York. He now calls himself a «Solutions Architect», working for the Professional Services Group at Eduserv.

Please visit his site, he is an authority on many things, and might even come from the future.

This is Mike’s «direction of travel gut feel for what actually went on during the week:

• We’re doing some very cool stuff using some great new approaches and technologies.
• We’re starting to see the benefits of open access to our content, both in terms of Creative Commons and programmatic access via API’s or syndication.
• We’re - at last - worrying less and doing more.
• We’re beginning to see the benefits of community, not just the coolness.
• Finally: we’re up for collaborating and sharing in more open and positive ways than ever before.»

The keynote speaker of last week’s Museums and the Web in Montreal Michael Geist is looking back at the conference with a critical article in the Toronto Star. In short, Geist summons Canada’s museums to remove fees and contractual barriers to Canadian heritage.

«The dozens of presentations at the conference highlighted the remarkable transformation in how museums display their collections and interact with the public.»

He goes on to say that «(m)any museums are using online video, social networks and interactive multimedia to pull content from diverse places to create «virtual museums.» So, the museum community has emerged as a leading voice for the development of legal frameworks to facilitate digitization and avoid restrictions that could hamper cultural innovation.»

Yet, according to Geist, who holds the Canada research chair in Internet and e-commerce law at the University of Ottawa faculty of law, «some fear the advocacy and actions of museums in embracing the Internet are not consistent, particularly in their policies on works for which copyright has expired.»

According to documents obtained by Geist under the Access to Information Act, the National Gallery of Canada appears to be treating public-domain works as a profit centre.

«(T)he gallery often added hundreds of dollars to the total cost of fulfilling a request, despite the fact that the images were in the public domain. In fact, the permission costs for such works were actually higher than those for works still subject to copyright. The gallery reasoned that the copyright holder would apply additional charges.»

Read his full article (Toronto Star, April 15, 2008)
Visit Michael Geist’s homepage

The final day of the conference is on its way. This morning we had quite a rewarding demonstration of the n8 strategy, explaining our on and off line activities. It is interesting to see so many institutions working with all these interesting and intelligent tools, but not many working collectively in a city or region, like we do in Amsterdam. I would be keen to learn from other organisations that develop plans together. The collective of over 40 museums in Amsterdam have founded the n8 as an innovation platform for youth marketing, event organisation and new media development. Our annual Museum Night is by far the most known of the projects we do, but the Museum in MP3 portal is getting some good feedback, amongst others from the kind people at MoMA and ICA Boston. I would love to discuss this more in depth with attendees of MW2008.

The 12th edition of the annual Museums and the Web conference has started today. Keynote speaker Michael Geist, law professor at the University of Ottawa where he holds the Canada Research Chair of Internet and E-commerce Law, had an interesting talk at the opening plenary, stressing the need for museums to take responsibility for shaping the future Web.

Like every year, the conference is as cluttered and complex as the topics it addresses. Chairman and MW evangelist David Bearman admits it himself, advising visitors to ‘browse’ the lectures instead of fanatically trying to absorb all of its contents. This mornings’s program consists of sessions entitled ‘Personalisation’, ‘Engaging Museum Audiences’ and ‘Theoretical Frameworks’. After lunch, themes are a.o. ‘Mobile Computing’, User-Generated Content’ and ‘What to do with New Media Art?’.

MW2008

During a discussion with Vincent de Keijzer from the Gemeentemuseum Den Haag, Niels Huijbregts of XS4ALL, and Nir Nussbaum and Marijn Koolen of the Informatics Institute of the University of Amsterdam, the idea rose to create a platform of museum professionals working in the field of opening up museums through new media and technology. In the spirit of this idea the platform should be open too, accessible for anyone with an interest in this field.

A working title that was coined is The ‹Open Museum Network›. This network should bridge the information gap between audiences and museums, and will focus on pragmatic experiments with new applications, projects and otherwise simple and elegant solutions to make museums more accessible and audiences better equipped. Topics of interest are such imaginative examples of the ‹Wikimuseum› (Powerhouse Museum), the ‹Flickr-exhibition› (Tate Modern) and the ‹Open Source Activities› (n8).

A work in progress, however an acute one, looking at the many international projects on the horizon. Would anyone reading this from abroad be interested in joining the discussion?

Museums and the Web is an annual conference that deals with “the social, cultural, design, technological, economic, and organizational issues of culture, science and heritage on-line.” It is an inspiring four day event held in North America. This time it will take place in Montreal, from 9-12 April 2008.

Next year’s programme has just been published online. Amongst its participants are delegates from museums worldwide, such as the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, Tate Modern in London, and MoMA in New York. MuseumLab editor Juha van ´t Zelfde will also be present, for a second consecutive year. He is scheduled to give a presentation in the Technology - Mobile Computing session, on the findings and results of the Amsterdam Museum Night.

Museums and the Web is organized by Archimuse. See who attended the conference in 2007.