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Peter Samis Associate Curator Interpretation Stephanie Pau Manager Interpretation San Francisco Museum of Modern Art After the heroism, collaboration : Organizational learning & the mobile space Museums & the Web 2009 • 16 April 2009

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The Interpretive Goals Process <ul><li>A cross-departmental dialogue and interpretive brainstorm process involving: </li></ul><ul><li>Educators </li></ul><ul><li>Curators </li></ul><ul><li>Publications </li></ul><ul><li>Communications/Audience Strategy </li></ul>The Interpretive Goals Process: A collaboration

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Regarding each upcoming show:

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<ul><li>What is the rationale for the project? Why here, why now? </li></ul><ul><li>List 1-3 main visitor takeaways. </li></ul><ul><li>Who is the intended audience? Why? </li></ul><ul><li>What didactic elements are planned (wall texts, extended object labels, etc.)? </li></ul><ul><li>What other modes of interpretation, including multimedia, should we consider? </li></ul>Key Questions in the Interpretive Goals Process:

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Assistant Registrar Linda Leckart on Jonathan Ive’s iPhone (communicated via a cell phone tour) Case Study 1: 246 and Counting: Recent Architecture + Design Acquisitions

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Case Study 2: The Art of Participation 1950 to Now

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John Cage, 4’33”, 1952 Case Study 2

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Case Study 3: Frida Kahlo

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Interpretive Menu: analog + digital mix <ul><li>Brochure in 2 languages </li></ul><ul><li>Wall texts in 2 languages </li></ul><ul><li>Handheld Antenna multimedia tour in 3 languages: English, Spanish & French </li></ul><ul><li>Learning Lounge: film, kiosk, books </li></ul><ul><li>Supplementary history galleries: Kahlo in SF, Kahlo’s Legacy </li></ul><ul><li>Videos in Koret Visitor Ed Center </li></ul><ul><li>Podcasts </li></ul>

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2 Evaluation Studies <ul><li>Visitor Experience & Interpretive Goals: Randi Korn & Associates </li></ul><ul><li>Visitor response to handheld multimedia guide (audio tour) Discovery Corporate Intelligence Group </li></ul>

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Randi Korn Findings: Use of Offerings

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What a visual interface brings to the party…

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A way to point at and parse out the picture…

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[3] [15]

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Visitor feedback from Antenna’s comment book…

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The stats, too, show this is a hit: 1 2 3

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What about the cell phone idea?

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Or the personal device download idea?

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But then, who can blame them? <ul><li>Cell phone reception varies </li></ul><ul><li>The audio quality is often poor </li></ul><ul><li>Foreign visitors must pay outrageous international roaming charges </li></ul><ul><li>Holding a device to one’s ear is fatiguing </li></ul><ul><li>Podcasts require pre-visit planning ( Oops , I’m already here !) </li></ul><ul><li>Wi-fi networks are temperamental , especially in crowd situations </li></ul>

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Until these obstacles are removed, pre-loaded devices —at a cost or for free— seem to correspond to the premium cultural experience museums are expected to provide .

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Corroboration: Our 2 Case Studies 28 18 Stops on cell phone tour 22 706 Art of Participation 19 585 246 and Counting Incoming calls/day Incoming calls/month Exhibition

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Was the fault in our promotion? <ul><li>No doubt in part… </li></ul>

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But then there was evidence like this :

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Meanwhile, the story online & at home was different. RSS feed: 18,613 mp3/m4a downloads or 194 downloads/day Live Flash Streaming: numbers unknown

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So what information did on-site visitors not get? Hans Haacke, News, 1969/2008

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Content allocated exclusively to cell phones via 246 Tour & AoP Tour These had been part of our “interpretive plan.” Artist invitation to participate & comment Behind the scenes insights on how a museum collects Supplementary info re: each piece & the conditions of its production Back-story on how a work was acquired Artist voices Artwork-specific interpretation

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On the other hand, the purpose-built & delivered multimedia tour for Frida Kahlo actually had a Halo Effect :

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25% increase in satsifaction

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Takeaways 1 <ul><li>They seem to desire a high fidelity, immersive experience (at least for special ticket blockbusters) </li></ul><ul><li>Parsing out audio through a touch-and-listen interface is a winner </li></ul>Visitors apparently are not as eager to use their own devices as museums might wish.

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Takeaways 2 <ul><li>Universal Access: if a museum is going to delegate significant interpretive aspects to mobile devices, then those devices need to be as effortlessly available as artworks & wall texts </li></ul>

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The Guggenheim, Whitney, and MoMA all offer (and promote) free audio tours of their Permanent Collection. <ul><li>Take-up rates range between 20-65% </li></ul><ul><li>(vs. a more typical 3%) </li></ul>“ Universal Access”

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Takeaways 3 <ul><li>If we are to free ourselves from dependence on outside providers and empower ourselves to develop our own content… </li></ul>We need a flexible authoring and publishing platform for the mobile space.

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<ul><li>Re-thinking the audio tour based on research to date </li></ul><ul><li>Touch-&-Listen </li></ul><ul><li>Concise & multi-layered </li></ul><ul><li>Artist Voices & Videos </li></ul><ul><li>1st delivery on iPod-Touch and iPhone </li></ul><ul><li>Working with NOUS-Guide to develop </li></ul>Developing a Mobile Multimedia Guide for the Permanent Collection

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<ul><li>Need to promote permanent collection tours with a museum-wide strategy </li></ul><ul><li>Same goes for special exhibitions of lesser known artists </li></ul>Next Corollary

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Content development & Production Of course, that doesn’t solve all our problems. In fact, And that’s a lot of collaboration. Staffing of Distribution Points Hardware Marketing & Promotion it’s the beginning of a whole new set !

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Thank you.