Discussion of readings for session 2: Museum data about sunoikisisdc-2021-2022

[Avieava]

A brief summary of article two:

The impact of covid 19 on digital data practices in museums and art galleries in the UK and US.

The 2020 Covid-19 pandemic demanded an urgent increase in the online platforms of galleries and museums in order to protract their economic future. With the loss of physical interaction there was no choice but to turn to digital strategies, this paper explores the impact, organisation and development of these online platforms. The pandemic sparked a re-evaluation of the purpose of digital engagement as was no longer used to simply enhance the museum experience, it became the only way to access museum resources. The creative industries were digitised to continue public ‘access’ yet these new online resources also provided activities that combated loneliness and anxiety, instead promoting public wellbeing. Did the Covid-19 pandemic provide new innovative opportunities or a monetary driven digital revolution? There have always been online platforms in the art world these are not a new phenomenon however the pandemic demanded an urgent acceleration throwing museums in to the ‘digital deep end’ and requiring the retraining of staff to ensure they were digitally skilled. The drastic shift caused by the covid-19 pandemic has caused society to question if things will ever go back to the before known ‘normal’ or if the physical space of museums and galleries are a thing of the past.

[lewis-rhiannon]

A brief summary of “Acquiring metadata to support biographies of museum artefacts.” by Zhao, Michael B. Twidale & David M. Nichols.

This 2018 paper makes the case for the restructuring of museum object metadata to facilitate new access points outside of the museum (potential expansion through linked data, the semantic web and applications). Metadata for museum artefacts is identified here as uneven; some “star’ artefacts’ having well populated metadata, while most artefacts are potentially left with limited descriptive metadata. Zhao et al. explore the theoretical concept of object biography as a tool to construct museum artefact metadata. The quantitative study identified six object biography metadata properties: Location, Time, Person, Event, Value, Meaning. The research was focused on key artefacts from local New Zealand museums. It employed semi-structured interviews, as an object biography capture method, to produce the structured metadata.

[Ghilaevansky]

The "Acquiring metadata" article by Zhao discussed the importance of metadata and how linked data also have the potential power to support interaction with objects outside museums. This paper specifically focused on museums in New Zealand. It stresses that metadata is not easily derivable "directly from the object itself." From reading this article, I learned the impact of metadata and how it can affect people's daily lives, not just when they are visiting the museum. A specific example talked about in this article was someone using a digital audio guide for one museum then once said person left, they would get notified of certain objects available in the same area.

In the paper regarding COVID by L. Noehrer, it describes how museums were affected during the pandemic. Since museums were closed, people turned to the internet and online versions of exhibitions. This allowed companies to collect metadata from many individuals. I think that the future of museums has changed forever, due to COVID. In some ways, we are almost forced to turn to technology, as some museums have unfortunately closed completely.

[molmay]

The Noehrer et al COVID paper's emphasis on how the digital preparedness of an institution made impacted its ability to continue to function through the pandemic really made me think about the relationship of primacy between physical and digital/intangible records. For so long heritage has treated the actual, physical version of something as being a more reliable way of safeguarding an item for prosperity than an intangible version, specifically thinking of institutions like the US National archives that store physical copies of music in albums/records etc in huge storage facilities not for public viewing but literally just to keep it safe. The pandemic has flipped that trend on its head to show an example of how digital/intangible data can actually provide a more reliable 'backup' for these physical objects than physical storage could

[lettychardon]

There are two statements that I found rather odd in the Noehrer et al. article. It claims that the "the physical space of the museum is no longer dominant." I think this is a gross exaggeration. Of course, it is no longer alone but we cannot forget that the objects that are all being digitised are physical and they all need to be stored and cared for somewhere. The dynamics between in person and online are definitely changing but I think the article sometimes goes too far in its dismissal of the traditional aspects of museums. It's also strange that it describes the Smithsonian's "digital first strategy" as "strategic foresight" as if the institution had somehow predicted the pandemic! Of course it turned out that they were ahead of the trend but the phrasing in the article is unclear.

The Zhao et al. article made a claim that really intrigued me: "museums are inclined to apply exhibit design approaches solely to think about the user in the life of the museum, but not to also think about the museum in the life of the user." I don't really have anything to add to this but I just thought it was very interesting as museums can play a really big role in people's lives and so it would seem to be important to consider the give and take between exhibitions and visitors.