Aging Museum Websites

This week, I ran across an article (login required) by Andrew Marton in the Dallas Star-Telegram and winced. In the piece, Mr. Marton writes "a more robust online presence is an attempt to entice a potentially huge number of younger patrons." This perspective is more than a little simplistic in its understanding of the demographics of web users and websites.

Taking a step back, the polarity presented here between grey-heads and cyber-babies is just blatantly false. According to comScore, Internet usage increased by over 24 percent last year. Of particular note here is the list of fastest growing properties for web user over 55. This list of sites includes MySpace, Wikipedia, Washington Mututal and Craigslist. A rhetorical question: what then is the older audience doing online? Well, the same thing as younger audiences. They are finding ways to communicate, research, educate, transact and connect themselves through the online channel.

Though the reality is interesting, it is the misconception of whom the web serves that is essential to understand and dicuss. From my own experience, it is exactly this mode of thinking that drives many Museums to keep websites and online services on the back burner in terms of priorities and strategic thinking – especially when it comes to discussions of funding projects and returns on investment.

The results are easy to see - most museums that I have reviewed are recycling the basic HTML containers they have used for the last five years. This is a pity because, as the comScore survey makes clear, audiences are maturing, growing and moving on. While museum-goers often cherish a more traditional experience of Museums and exhibitions, website visitors do not cling to a similar sensibility. As technology raises the bar of possibility on the web, Internet users raise the bar of expectation.

No Director would permit an exhibition hall to inspire a ho-hum reaction, yet this is frequently the net impact of museum websites.

This is an incredible resource to let go to seed. For perspective, according to the annual report of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, their website enjoyed almost 20 million visitors in the 2006 fiscal year. That is almost five times as many "visitors" than the actual Museum hosted. It is impossible to imagine that all 20 million of these visitors are “younger patrons”. Clearly, how that Museum represents itself on the web impacts a substantial portion of its in-person visitorship across demographic segments.

Lesson: We (technology practitioners and managers) need to be very careful of how we frame discussions on website technologies and whom they serve.

Wiki in the Museum Workplace

Richard Florida points out in "The Rise of the Creative Class" one of the most powerful opportunities in the creative economy is the reduction of boundaries, hierarchy and the increase of diversity in the work place. This applies equally to the corporate and nonprofit world.

There is perhaps no better technical realization of Florida's creative class ideas than the Wiki. The Wiki paradigm is a prime example of broadening and diversifying the creative voice and stake of employees in the nonprofit workplace. It comes in many flavors, programming languages, implementations, and architectures. In the end, the Wiki is the same; it is a democratic platform for information sharing, editing and contributing. It is a paradigm shift (both technically and editorially) for most organizations and one that many are curious and anxious to test.

Strangely, this revolution has lent itself to the most extreme applications and thinking. When considering Wiki, organizational dialogue has trended towards placing a Wiki on outer-facing contact points such as Wiki external relations or community building. It seems that even before a robust online community has been built for organizations, a Wiki is thrown up as a marketing device and interaction tool. This does a disservice to both the community and the technology. Rushing the Wiki to production seems a tad hasty - especially given that even Wikipedia has shifted to a managed editorial review process. Perhaps it is time to pause and reconsider the Wiki just a bit...

The genesis of the Wiki was a technical implementation for sharing code and best practices amongst computer programmers. On internal, specific projects, a Wiki is a great tool for building towards common goals and sharing knowledge. For good reason, this tool has grown within the technology community and gained many proponents. However, this acceptance and distribution process took time and involved a long lifecycle of technology need, innovation, learning and acceptance amongst the community.

If you love Wiki, can't get enough of it, I would suggest starting simple and getting back to basics. It might be better to introduce the Wiki paradigm internally first to test your own political, administrative and technical waters. This makes sense and is entirely in-line with the initial applications of the Wiki principle. Perhaps implement a Wiki-style intranet page of staff comments and suggestions. If successful, other services and applications will follow; dynamic FAQ's, a collaborative customer service knowledge base for front-line service employees or even an executive Wiki to hash out strategic direction. In all these suggestions, there is a growing of the Wiki power to foster collaboration.

In the end, Wiki is more than a coding and collaboration platform and must be understood astransformationive perspective, one that can improve management, productivity, employee buy-in and ultimately service. But, the milestones for integrating and achieving this transformation should be measured. A Wiki, like any technology is neither a panacea nor a downfall; it is a tool that users must need, grow to appreciate and understand before it is, ultimately, relied upon.

The revolution may be here, but it will take time for everyone to appreciate it.