What digital technology can bring to historic houses

Two papers today, because one of them doesn’t have much of interest, I think, to my corrections – it does have one great word however, which I will come to later. The first paper is another look at the project at the Bishops’s House in Sheffield that featured in previous papers and posts. This third paper, CLAISSE, C., PETRELLI, D., DULAKE, N., MARSHALL, M. & CIOLFI, L.. 2019. Multisensory interactive storytelling to augment the visit of a historical house museum. IEEE comes with lots of quotable quotes about the sort of environment I work in (until next month at least): “Unlike traditional museums, artefacts in house museums are displayed in domestic settings, out of their protective cases and with limited written interpretation. Due to this unique layout, they need to be understood from an experiential perspective: ‘stepping back in time’ or ‘standing in someone else’s shoes […] Digital technology is conspicuously absent, apart from occasional interventions relying on mobile phones. While using mobile phones does not affect the aesthetics of the historical heritage, any other digital technology intervention needs sensitive design, careful integration and planning.” which a pretty sweeping but generally true generalisation. One thing I am less certain of though is the authors’ assertion that historic houses “are looked after according to special practice identified as house museology.” For a start, museology is the study of museums, not a conservation (looking after) practice. I have worked in and around historic house museums since, well … since 1985* if you count my volunteering, and I have never heard the term “house museology’ with reference to looking after such place. Looking at the source for that assertion, I feel the authors are misreading what “museology” actually is.

However the next thing they say is abundantly true. “Spatial and aesthetic constraints mean curators have to choose which part of the story of the house is presented to the public. Thus house museums tend to concentrate on a single period in their history where both the building and its interiors are restored or reconstructed to match a particular era or episode in time. Such exhibition practice was recently criticized for limiting interpretation strategy to one linear narrative, often focused on a leading character.” And the finish off this introduction to the challenge of historic house interpretation with “Digital ntechnology offers new opportunities to bring these places to life. However, experiments have been limited to individual installations or temporary exhibitions”

I won’t go into too much depth on what they did – my previous posts Gove more detail. But it is worth saying that actually what they did was create five “individual installations.” These were great, and I don’t want to dismiss them for their aesthetic qualities, or content, nor the process that went into creating them, but they are only a step on the way to a responsive environment. And of course they had to be activated by a tangible object with NFC tags, which I think adds an extra layer of complication to the interface which is not necessary. Having read about a number of these NFC-based tangible interactions now, and having been involved it one at Bodiam then only one where I think the object really added to the interpretation is the Votive Lantern offerings to the gods at Chesters. But these projects are indeed steps on the way to an ideal, and the ideal is described in the conclusion pot this paper: “the web of content is not embedded in a device, but distributed all around the house as objects and rooms, characters with their portraits, and the story they tell. It is the visitors moving around the House triggering content, observing and discussing that make this an interactive storytelling in place […] it gives opportunities for volunteers [people, would be a better word I think, including staff, visitors etc] to take ownership of the place and sustain participation over a longer period of time by generating new content and uploading new stories.”

There were fewer quotable quotes in the second paper: Ardito, Carmelo, Buono, Paolo, Desolda, Giuseppe & Matera, Maristella. 2018. From smart objects to smart experiences: An end-user development approach. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies 114: 51-68. doi: 10.1016/j.ijhcs.2017.12.002. Which talked about tools for non technical staff to create interactive narratives. Its useful stuff but in my corrections I think a reference to the paper will be enough. There is one useful phrase though which I feel I might need to insert – which I think is second nature to HCI people but not to Cultural Heritage staff, though I think its easily understood and that is “Event-Condition-Action (ECA) rules”

Oh and I also like to this quote introducing MeSch, which I have already written about in my thesis but light add in “Very few contributions in the literature address the possibility of enabling CH experts to shape up smart visit experiences. One prominent approach is the one proposed by the meSch project, which aims to enable CH professionals to create tangible smart exhibits enriched by digital content. The peculiarity of
the meSch approach is that it does not require IoT-related technical knowledge: the platform offers an authoring tool where physical/digital narratives can be easily created by composing digital content and physical artefact behaviors.”

*Ouch, that feels like a very long time.

Digital CHPs?

Excuse the the dreadful pun. CHP stands for Cultural Heritage Professionals, and the paper I am reading today is Maye, Laura A., Bouchard, Dominique, Avram, Gabriela & Ciolfi, Luigina. 2017. Supporting Cultural Heritage Professionals Adopting and Shaping Interactive Technologies in Museums, which starts off with the sentence “The role that cultural heritage professionals, including curators, museum directors, and education officers, are playing in creating interactive technologies in museums is evolving.”

I think it will be useful in slightly reframing my academic work as that of a Cultural Heritage Professional exploring in what ways interactive technologies can support my profession’s “goals through active experimentation in context and in depth.”

The paper looks at a partnership between the Interaction Design Centre at The University of Limerick and The Hunt Museum in Limerick, Ireland. The aper describes in more detail an I will go into here projects involving the Loupe, one of the tangible interaction ideas discussed here. Now I think I have already shared my feelings that this is a museum interface that only adds extra complication to a visit (and one that is after all only a phone disguised as a magnifying glass and so not a thing that pulls the visitors’ eyes away from a screen to the object. So I won’t spend much time on that – rather I will look at what they learned about CHPs creating content for interactive technologies.

“From the beginning of the project, it was clear that CHPs needed to know how different interactive technologies could support their intended visitor experience.”

page 9

The paper betrays a certain frustration with CHPs rushing to a conclusions about what they want Digital interventions to do “here the CHPs chose to focus on a particular kind of narrative experience: a guided tour rather than exploring what they might be capable of. ” While CHPs collectively agree that technology should serve a meaningful purpose, the findings from this project suggest that understanding the implications of adopting those tools in context requires further, hands-on experimentation and experience.” Well I am pleased to say this is what my PhD has all been about – I am a “CHP,” and I have been doing hands on experimentation. And indeed my experimentation encounter the issue that the authors move on to – having to find workarounds to bend the low cost tools I was using to the my needs. “However, these workarounds could require CHPs to build additional skills (as seen in this case) or make compromises between the narrative they intend to portray and the available behaviours provided by the functionalities of the interactive technology.”

Now what’s interesting about the case they mention is that the workaround that they mention “as seen in this case” is very much a product of the unintuitive interface enforced by the Loupe. The CHP involved explains: “Intern Deirdre: We printed it [the content] off because it’s easy to forget the screens that come and go. So the ones that say like ‘tilt right to continue’ it’s easy to forget that was there. But when you have it on the paper, you have to pretend to do that! Turn it over or something like that!” This is touted as good, lo-fi interactive experimentation, and so it might be – but the conclusion seems to be that CHPs should spend more time learning to use the technologies that they have available. Keep in mind that that heritage organisations generally spread their CHPs thin, covering a lot a projects at the same time. Indeed the paper does, eventually, admit that “due to financial costs, it may not be feasible for CHPs to experiment with the actual technologies” and talks of “bodystorming” which is a lovely word and kind of what I was doing at Chawton. Its also good that my “Untours” were one of the things that these researchers were hoping for when they say “other types of experiences: for example, games or free exploration visits.

Four Heritage Discourses

Following on from Thursday’s post on working with volunteers at Bishops House Sheffield, a second paper on the project has lots of very quotable stuff in its preamble. For those following along at home, this paper is: Claisse, Caroline, Petrelli, Daniela, Ciolfi, Luigina, Dulake, Nick, Marshall, Mark T. & Durrant, Abigail C.. 2020. Crafting Critical Heritage Discourses into Interactive Exhibition Design.

It starts off with a lovely quote about how the nature of museums changed as they became less about privately owned collections and more about public institutions: “Traditionally, museums are concerned with material cultures as their chief role is collecting and preserving artifacts for future generations, and to communicate what is known about those objects. The early museums were places where touching, holding and smelling were an integral part of the visit, a courtesy paid by the curator or the collection owner to their visitors or guests. By the mid 19th century, however, the personal, physical relation with the objects was gone, mostly because of the widening of the audience and therefore the changing mission of museums as public institutions”

But they go on to talk sing the praises of “house museums” which “offer interesting settings to explore the value of materiality in a context where a visually-driven ‘cabinets and labels’ approach exhibition design is not deemed appropriate.” They continue “Exhibition design in house museums goes beyond the curation and display of artifacts: the whole house is a historic object, meaning that content and container are one” which is a truism, but a very concise and apposite one. I do have to take issue with one thing they say however. They are wrong, or at least, conflating two things when they state “This type of house museums is described as ‘living history museums.'” The term “living history museums” often describes places that use costumed interpreters which, I would argue, the vast majority of house museums don’t – at least not on a day-to-day basis. The term is also used for the open air museums of buildings/folk/vernacular history such at The Zuiderzee Museum in Enkhuizen, and the Singleton Open Air Museum. Indeed it came be said that live costumed interpretation in museums started in places like those (though the Singleton museum resisted it for decades).

Another bit, with which I do agree, is their summary of Heritage as an aesthetic experience “Far from being perceived as boring and tiring, museums are, for many visitors, ‘restorative environments’ that, with their unique aesthetics, capture imagination and facilitate recovery from mental fatigue [26] [35]. Such aesthetic experiences are chiefly about being there. The aesthetic experience is not the experience of beauty – for it can be pleasant or unpleasant; it is characterised by intense attention, extended cognitive engagement, and affective responses.”

Of course one of the challenges to historic house storytelling is the existence of an implicit “‘authorized heritage discourse’ approach – a long-established orientation to heritage as understood and interpreted via the expert’s perspective, and tending to privilege the prestigious, universal and grand narratives” which is of course what I discovered which my Chawton experiment. What I noticed though, was not only that such a discourse is hard-wired into interpretive thinking, but that it might also be an outcome of visitor choices. It does not have to be so, but I would challenge their assertion that “The concept of heritage as a process that is actively constructed and recombined over time is particularly significant in the context of house museums where animators often dress up and enact characters to visitors: ‘It is this sensory experience of an embodied performance of a lifestyle that constitutes the process, through which heritage is both encountered and constructed.’” While excellent live interpreters can indeed challenge the “authorised heritage discourse approach” many more simply reinforce it, however in discussing that issue the authors a have a lovely turn of phrase which I am going to steal … I mean cite: “Exhibition design in a house museum can find inspiration from such an embodied storytelling that weaves the narratives with physical objects and social history, a game of performance and fiction within a specific physical space.” And again they elegantly put into words another truism that is not often expressed: “Staff and volunteers play an important role here, as they weave
stories and place by sharing with visitors a mixture of facts, speculation and anecdotes about the lives of previous residents. The meaning of the surrounding heritage emerges from the visitor-docent interaction process: visitors are expected to take part in the dialogue, to question and deepen their interests. In comparison, digital technology is easily seen as dry, a distraction from the actual place and curators of house museums are reluctant to introduce it.”

The evaluation of the project expressed in the conclusion identified four arguments “from heritage discourses that we found relevant for designing and reflecting on digitally-augmented exhibitions. We discussed the value of materiality, visiting as an aesthetic experience, challenging the authorized voice and heritage as a process.” The first two I have no problem at all with – I like especially their use of triggered scents to enhance the multisensory nature of the interpretation. I do challenge whether they really challenged the authorized voice, as I think the power of the dominant ideology and the expectations of the visitor for authenticity will have combined to confound the challenge but in one point I will say they did well – they used the power of fiction to create the narrative, they were not bound by fact. I will also argue that the visitor perception of heritage as a process might not be as great as they suggest it is – but again I will concede on point, they got visitors visiting spaces more than once to uncover the story. which is an impressive feat.

The challenges of evaluating in-visit digitally enabled heritage interpretation

I am reading a paper which will help me better present my Chawton study. The paper is brand new: Nikolakopoulou, V. & Koutsabasis, P.. 2019. Methods and Practices for Assessing the User Experience of Interactive Systems for Cultural Heritage. In: Pavlidis, G., ed. Applying Innovative Technologies in Heritage Science. IGI Global, and it is another literature review, but more a sort of meta study of evaluations, called by the authors a “fortiori.”

The methodology of this literature search is exemplary. The authors searched (via Google scholar, ACM digital library, IEEEXplore, Science direct, and Springer link) and found 350 papers, and and in a second search another 150 that looked as though they might be evaluation studies of digital in-visit heritage content. They screened out the majority, for not actually being accessible, or not actually being scientific (I think my thesis would have fallen at this hurdle), leaving just 73. These were screened a second time and a number of duplicate were found and then a number which did not actually write up the evaluation. Leaving just 29 to study in depth.

In summary these papers discussed applications to”explore a virtual or physical space or place” and/or “play a game”. The authors noted the the proportion of games had gone down since a previous survey, which likely corresponds with the time of my change of focus away from a ludic system to something more to do with narrative. They were still roughly 20% of the papers they looked at. Overall, the systems used a variety of digital technologies including 3d game engines, mobile devices, mobile AR, VR, the web, multi-touch displays, location based audio, and physical and kinaesthetic (responding to body movement) interfaces.

There were a lot of studies that looked at usability of the technologies, but the paper points out only using “user satisfaction” as a metric, which is a dangerous trap to fall into. Only a few to a thorough investigation of the User Experience in that way that modern commercial companies test their websites. “A considerable number of systems are evaluated upon learning effects on users” this despite that fact that learning is often not the primary reason for days out (though it may be a validation for the museum), but again few do that in a properly scientific way. There is an interesting paper mentioned (Falvo, P. G. (2015, September). Exhibit design with multimedia and cognitive technologies impact assessment on Luca Giordano, Raphael and the Chapel of the Magi in Palazzo Medici Riccardi, Florence. In 2015 Digital Heritage (Vol. 2, pp. 525-532). IEEE.)) that I may want to take a look at.

The paper highlights the difference between empirical evaluations “in the lab” as it were and in the field. “Field evaluations are contextual, which enhanced the validity of the process and results.” But “recruiting visitors to experience or assess CH content on purpose changes their original purpose of visit, which is
something inherently connected with the visitor experience discussed in several museum and visitor studies […] which suggests a paradox to me, either test random users, and change their reason for visiting, and potentially their responses to the visit; or invite visitors especially for the test and thus make it more like a lab experiment. The reason for visiting a cultural heritage experience is actually part of the experience.

One issue they highlight is that despite being “peer-reviewed and published in important journals and
conferences, it was possible to identify several failures in the quality of reporting on empirical evaluations” in particular reporting on the number of users that participated in the evaluations. I expect that is because, due tho the limitations of evaluation in cultural heritage sites, the time taken to observe a visit, the number of participants is statistically small – small enough to put into question wether the studies are “empirical” at all I know that after a week on site I had less than ten samples. And so I tried very hard not to present what I learned as empirical evidence. Indeed maybe even too hard. That bit need sa re-write post viva.

The conclusion is a reiteration that digital interpretation evaluation should involve more cultural heritage professionals and field studies. It point out that there is more work in newer methodologies “like physical computing and tangible user interfaces” (objects that are the interfaceIt also highlights ongoing issues of a lack of systematic approaches to evaluation, organised “in distinct identifiable catagories” which I imagine would make doing meta-studies like this more meaningful. Also, “Aspects of cultural value, awareness, and presence could only be recognized in very few empirical evaluations. Evaluation studies that consider more qualitative dimensions and more related to general purposes of CH like learning effectiveness have been increased, and they are usually accompanied by comparative evaluations. Comparative evaluations represent a small number compared to the overall number of studies reviewed.”

Russell Staiff: Re-imagining Heritage Interpretation

When I had just started my research, in 2014 this book was published, literally down the road from where I live. So why I only discovered it a few weeks ago is a mystery. despite being published in my home town, I had to arrange an inter-library loan to get it from Leeds University Library. So, now I have to whizz through it, pulling out his thesis, and some choice quotes to illustrate it, before I have to send it back.

First, its worth point out that he come from a point of view that is (was?) skeptical about the profession of interpretation as espoused by Freeman Tilden. His preface recounts his puzzled reaction when a national park manager used the term. “Isn’t everything about interpretation? What else is there?” he, an art historian, asked himself. Indeed an early chapter is a dissection (or demolition?) of Tilden’s foundation text for the heritage industry.

On Tilden

His key point is that everybody interprets everything, all the time. Using the Michelangelo’s David as an example, he argues that while the erotic and comedic use of the David’s penis or buttocks displace the “authorized” narrative of David as the slayer of Goliath, sculpted by an artistic genius, “the two stories are not mutually exclusive for many viewers despite them being somewhat incompatible. […] Heritage interpretation cannot manage this level of of complexity without radical editing of the content or unsatisfactory and ethically suspect reductionism. What heritage interpretation can attempt is a facilitation of multiple meaning-making and meaning -making as a dynamic process within systems or representation.” He obviously thinks Tilden’s work tend more towards the reductionist angle.

For example, Staiff takes issue with Tilden’s use of the term “revelation”, on one had because it implies a hidden truth worthy of conspiracy theorists and thriller writers like Dan Brown, and on the other because “it maintains a hierarchical power relationship between the ‘expert’ and the non-expert, between those with ‘the knowledge’ and those ‘without the knowledge.'” He does acknowledge that later in the book, Tilden (in his discussion of aesthetics and beauty) “opens up the possibility of (1) the power of feelings and the role of sensorial experience of heritage and (2) visitor empowerment and (3) interpretation as a social construction.” But, Staiff claims, Tilden quickly closes that door because it “potentially unravels many of his principles of interpretation.”

Overall he considers Tilden’s work dated, and so it is. Perhaps he his correct that it is past time to move beyond Tilden’s principles.

On narrative

I very much enjoy how Staiff writes about narrative, “stories do something to us that descriptions do not; we seem to enter into what I want to call ‘fictive space.'” But, “As Roland Barthes and others have cheekily but pointedly written, texts ‘read’ the reader, the reader does not read the text. Stories, thefore do not guarantee a connection to the topographical and physical setting of the narrative. This is a crucial insight often lost in heritage interpretation.” Generally a fan of the power storytelling to give form and structure to what people are looking at, he is aware that “this is an imposed or even artificial structuring of heritage places. […] Is the way a narrative organises time and events (into causal relationships) the most appropriate way to communicate with visitors about a particular site?” On that last point, I would counter that cause and effect chronologies are just one of many narrative structures.

By way of example he imagines (creates) a segment of audio-guide for an excavation in Greece, but then critiques it. There are other ways of understanding places, he says. What of the science behind the engineering of any building? What of the context for the story his segment told? In his extract he mentions Homer’s epics. Do they need any explanation? Stories need to be peopled, but who are the people in the listeners minds? can heritage interpreters offer as well “rounded” a depiction of a historical personality as a biography, or even a novel?

He worries to that the desire for narrative might assign cause and effect to even descriptive interpretation, where no narrative is intended “In heritage interpretation the desire for explanation of often paramount in both those creating narratives and those listening, reading or seeing them.”

He concludes his musing on narrative and interpetation with four “implications”. The first is that “narrative is not the only way heritage places are represented but narrative is a very potent form of giving material things meaning and making material things the touchstone of our deepest desires, feelings, imaginations and emotions. […] The role of narrative in heritage interpretation reinforces the fact that what’s often at stake is not things but, objects and landscapes, but us.” (page 113)

Secondly he points out that there are many stories associated with any place, but they fall into two categories: sanctioned narratives – “those stories that have the imprimatur of institutions […] the narratives of scholarship (or historians, archaeologists, art historians, architectural historians, ecologists and so forth) and the narratives of custodians of heritage spaces (those who work for conservation agencies, heritage agencies or are traditional owners of a site) and usually a combination of the two”; and unofficial narratives “those created by everyone else.”

“Thirdly, narrative sutures heritage places into a particular form of representation; it absorbs the physical entity into chronological time, and it provides action, character, causation, closure and narrator. Heritage interpretation that employs narrative furthers this structuring but mostly uncritically.” I take issue with this, not with his concern that narrative might indeed structure the place uncritically, but rather I take exception with the idea that heritage interpretation “provides action, character, causation and closure.” Its often really hard to get action, character or closure out of a places history, in a way that makes an engaging narrative. Although, “Causation” there is plenty of, and I agree, probably too much. I agree with his assertion that “Chronology is particularly pernicious in the way that it organizes cultural heritage into a linear sequence.”

Finally he recognizes that “stories are a powerful and seductive way of connecting people to places,” buts asks “Is there an ethics of stoytelling at heritage places?” and here he challenges Tilden’s core aim, that interpretation should change attitudes and behaviours by instilling a conservation awareness.

In my next post, I’ll get into the meaty chapter, about digital storytelling.

Heritage Jam 2017 #THJ2017

I don’t like to brag, but … who am I kidding, I LOVE to brag! Here’s my winners’ certificate from 2015. It’s not too late, you could have one too

I’m in Crete for this year’s Heritage Jam, which is a shame, because I had such fun in 2015. I thoroughly recommend participating:

The Heritage Jam (http://www.heritagejam.org/) is back for another year of creative and innovative heritage work, and we would love everyone – from anywhere in the world – to get involved!

The Jam is a free creative event centred around making new and different interpretations of the past for audiences of your choice on a specific theme. You can create these interpretations individually or in teams – in person or remotely.

The Jam will be hosted by Leeds Museums and Galleries at Leeds City Museum, on the 27th and 28th of October 2017. There is also an online Jam for those unable to travel, which runs from the 18th of September to the 26th of October.

REGISTRATION IS NOW OPEN – read more: http://www.heritagejam.org/home2

This year’s theme is ‘The Bones of our Past’, inspired by the ‘Skeletons: Our Buried Bones’ an exhibition currently hosted by Leeds Museums and Galleries at Leeds City Museum in partnership with the Wellcome Collection and the Museum of London (http://www.heritagejam.org/blog/2017/9/18/and-the-theme-is).

Do you need to be an archaeologist or heritage professional to participate? NO! The Jam is open to all, including anyone with a passion for history!

Is there a fee? NO! The Jam has no participation charge, so there’s no reason not to join!

To sign up all you have to do is follow the link on our website – http://www.heritagejam.org/signup – and fill in a registration sheet.

All of our policies, including codes of conduct for the Jam, can also be found on our website: http://www.heritagejam.org/policies/.

We hope you can join us for this one of a kind event in October!

Sara & the #THJ2017 team

A new, easy to read guide

In a pleasant surprise today, a new book dropped through my letterbox. Interpretation in a Digital Age, by Paul Palmer and Neil Rathbone, is a concise, easy to read introduction and guide for Heritage professionals starting digital projects in their places. It promises "objective and practical guidance", and lives up to that promise.

It's an easy read, and neatly sums up the history of handheld guides in heritage sites as it walks the reader through concepts like: Bring Your Own Device; native, web and hybrid apps; media creation; webcams; and locational and proximity triggering. Palmer and Rathbone conclude a useful chapter on accessibility and inclusiveness with with a section on Mindfulness, wherein they argue we "need to develop more skill in the psychology of storytelling using digital media rather than blame the media". A sentiment with which, given the subject of my study, I can only agree.

There are chapters on using technology outdoors, understanding wifi, compliance and intellectual property, and project management. An optimistic chapter near the end explores some of the possibilities that "the digital toolbox" might enable, and the book ends with a jargon busting glossary that reveals the intended audience museum and cultural heritage professionals who not digital experts but are thinking of commissioning something and don't want to be fast-talked by potential suppliers.

It's not an academic work, it doesn't have references to other texts. Rather it is based on the practical experience to the two authors. So it's very good, if not technically detailed, on the how, and also offers practical advice on project management that will last longer than some of the technologies that are now current, but it lacks the why. It's not their intention (I think) to sell the concept of digital technology to heritage sites, rather it's a response to heritage sites looking to see what what is possible. Indeed in the introduction the authors refer to the "Gartner hype cycle", the tendency to over-estimate the potential of technology, and peter to be disappointed by its limitations. Given that more and more evidence I'm seeing suggests only a maximum of five percent of heritage visitors use apps or other mobile technologies, and that I heard recently that mention of an app is currently likely to kill an HLF bid stone dead, I'm still questioning whether it's possible to build a business case for the creation of digital content, let alone the purchase of hardware etc.

CultureGeek 2017 and Digital Customer Experiences

Better late than never, its a month since I went to two events in one week, and I’ve been so busy since then that I haven’t had time to write them up. Those of you who were following my Twitter stream live may ave some idea what excited me at the time, but for anyone else who might be interested, and more importantly for my own reflection, let me ram my thoughts together into this one post on both events.

We’ll start with Culture Geek in Kensington, which follows on from the M&H show, which I didn’t attend this year. This was the expensive one, with speakers flown in from other countries. I was pleasantly surprised to meet my colleague Alex there, so we were able to reflect a little between sessions, and there’s one thing especially we came away wanting to do, but more on that later. The conference touched on everything digital, including in-visit technology, but of course also plenty of on-line stuff. The first speaker was from that side of the field, Kimberly Drew, social media manager from New York’s Met museum. She drew on her experience as a person of colour doing a history of art degree, and how her life has changed during an internship at Harlem’s Studio Museum when a whole side of black art was revealed to her which had not been covered in her white-centric education.

Keen to share her epiphany, she and a friend started a Tumblr blog on Black Contemporary Art. Now that blog has over 200,000 followers, and she has unintentionally become “a poster child for diversity.” The Met weren’t looking for a “diversity champion” when they advertised the role of Social Media Manager (I asked her afterwards), but you can see why they snapped up such a dynamic, self-motivated blogger, with experience of, and reputation for, reaching out and expanding audiences.

Her work for the Met isn’t all about black art either. She sees the social media as the Met’s fourth space, alongside the 5th Avenue building,  The Cloisters and the Breuer. Her role there is to share 5000 years of art; connect users with the collection; highlight the ways the museum serves art and art history, and to “humanise” the museum and create invitations to participate. This last is the objective that benefits, in theory, from her previous experience, but of course they all do. Reflecting on her talk what comes across most is authenticity. Its a challenge for cultural heritage organisations, to match that authenticity of enthusiasm for both the medium and the message, someone who lives and breathes social media and the cause.

Kimberly is a young woman who inspires, and shows us how to do it, and the organisation she works for is a springboard, not a water-slides forcing her in a corporate direction. She’s one to watch.

The most interesting presentation for my research was given by Joe McFadden of the Royal Opera House. they are trying a number of digital experiments as they redevelop one of their spaces, known as the Piazza, with the intention of increasing the number of daytime visitors. Currently only the tens of thousands annually, which for a central London space, is very few. Their work is in three broad areas: Transactional – things like ordering your interval drinks online, and paying with Applepay; Experiential  – things like AR with hololens and VR (check out the work of the VOID) and post-show video on demand: and, Informational – things like personalised wayfinding (which made my ears prick up, but sadly when I quizzed Joe afterwards, he said they were struggling with the contending needs of different visitors at the same decision point, so It might not happen). We also talked about their current testing of an Alexa skill, so that Amazon Echo users could quiz their “household assistant” about whats on and even, possibly, buy tickets.

Which tied in with a fascinating presentation I saw later in the week at the Academy of Marketing’s Digital Customer Experiences event. There Prof. Merlin Stone of St Mary’s University talked about work he is doing on Baby Boomers and the heath service. These are “the largest generation of older people the world has seen”, but also the healthiest and longest living, the richest, most educated, etc etc. though its early days in the voice first market – he sees signs that they are also likely to be enthusiastic users of Alexa and other home voice assistants, and may well expect services (he was talking about health, but it applies equally well to Opera and Heritage, where baby-boomers are currently core market) to be provided by voice-first platforms.

Back to CultureGeek, Tim Wood of the Ballet Rambert showed us some simple online stuff that had proven surprisingly popular – live streaming of rehearsals. Not fancy dress-rehearsals, but studio work, the repetitive practice of moves and blocking. This is what set Alex and me off on a reverie about making a “slow TV” livestream event of a voyage down the length of the river Wey. One day….
Apart from those presentations at CultureGeek, there was interest as well in Patricia Buffa’s discussion of e-Marketing the Fondation Louis Vitton to Chinese tourists. The Chinese market isn’t a big one for my market yet, they are mostly urban tourists, and ticking off the iconic sites. But if (when?) it becomes spreads into the countryside and independent travelling there’s stuff we can learn here: the importance of Weibo/WeChat; finding Chinese celebrity advocates; doing exhibitions in Chinese partner locations; and, interestingly, the ubiquity of the QR code – “in China your QR code is your business card”.

We also got insight from the Science Museum’s use of Kickstarter to fund the rebuilding of Eric, Britain’s very first robot. We were shown a really interesting content management system created by MIT, and heard about building digital systems for a City of Culture in Hull. There were also some lovely experiments in mixed reality from the National Theatre, including a VR Alice in wonderland that the viewer experienced sitting on a toilet, and Draw Me Close, a VR opera that puts the audience in the naively drawn world of five year old Jordan. I’m not sure how sustainable the business model of this experience might be, the cast outnumbers the audience (of one) so that as the virtual Mum hugs you, or tucks you up in bed, a physical cast member also does it to you, to make an fully sensory experience. Its the closest we’ve come yet to the Ractors of The Diamond Age.

The Digital Customer experiences event was more commercial (after all, it was hosted by the Academy of Marketing at the Direct Marketing Institute). I had been invited to give a presentation, the abstract for which I posted a few weeks back. Apart from Professor Stone, whom I spoke about above, Dr Julia Wolney introduced the day with an overview of all the points in the customer “life cycle” where AI has growing potential.

Ana Canhoto gave a very interesting presentation about the conflicting attitudes to tracking and personalisation. As one respondent told her, its:

… creepy. But, then, it is just also very useful.

Dr Wolny returned to talk about her research into wearables, and the quantification of the self. As a recent wearer of an Apple watch, which I am using to incentivise my own movement, I was very interested in what she had to say. However based on her findings I’m not sure I’m typical. Women are more likely than men to track their fitness, but men are more likely to share their latest achievements. (I am not.)

But perhaps the most intriguing presentation was from Dr Fatema Kawaf – she presented a research technique I had not heard of before, but one I think may be valuable to evaluating heritage experiences. Its called The Repertory Grid, and as the linked article shows it comes out of psychology, a technique as a method to help the individual unveil his or her constructs. As Kawaf demonstrated though, it enables participants to use their own words to construct their understanding of experiences too. Kawaf was thinking about the retail experience, but I wonder if its ever been applied to heritage?

Building a story in Star Wars Indentities

A Stormtrooper marching band? The exhibition attempts to illustrate different values with illustrations like this.

It was Fathers’ day last weekend, as a treat, my family took me to the Star Wars Identities exhibition at the O2 in Greenwich. I was interested for a number of reasons, not the least of which was, being ten in 1977, I was (am) a massive fan of Star Wars. But one of the other reasons was the idea that visitors build their Star Wars identity as they go around the exhibition. This seemed to me to be a large scale, upfront attempt to personalize a cultural heritage visit. (And yes, Star Wars is cultural heritage now, I’m sure I saw other movies when I was ten, but I can’t recall what they were.)

The RFID tag that visitors use for the interactives

The mechanics of this personalization were wristbands, or if you were latex intolerant, “credit” cards, with RFID (I’m guessing) chips, and nine (not ten as advertised) stations around the exhibit where you could make choices that defined your Star Wars identity. The content of the show were props, models, costumes, concept sketches and some original art, mostly from the first six movies (though BB8 and a couple of props were squeezed in to represent the latest phase of production), with two streams of interpretation. One stream interprets the design of characters in the movies, and the second is a sort of “science of Star Wars” strand, with basic interpretation of things like genetics. Some of all this is delivered with traditional text panels, and some is aural, delivered by an IR activated headset. You are given a “medallion” style unit to hang around your neck and hook an earpiece over one ear. Then, stand in the right place in front of a panel or AV, and the relevant sound is beamed to your unit in a choice of languages. All you need to do, is control the volume… and make sure you don’t turn away from the beam, or cross your arms over the receptor, or let anybody tall stand in front of you, cutting of the beam – all of which will cut out the sound.

It’s worth  pointing out that the text comes in English and French. And that may betray the exhibition’s 2012 origins at the Montreal Science Centre. That of course explains where the science interpretation strand comes from, and why objects and stories from The Force Awakens feel shoe-horned in. One can’t argue with most of the interpretation – seeing how the characters like Yoda developed over time was interesting, the science was a bit basic, and its connections with the Star Wars story questionable (the exhibition suggests Force sensitivity is a genetic trait). The stuff on personality felt just one of many different models of personality types that, despite five post-Doc academics advising on it, reads like its been cribbed from a dodgy self-help book. Interestingly, it was the personality test that was the only interactive station that wasn’t a simple choice – visitors had to answer a number of questions before it revealed their personality profile.

When I started the experience, I was looking forward to discovering what my Star Wars identity would be, but three or four interactives in, when I realized that most of the stations were offering choices rather than revelations, I decided to rush back to the start and remake those choices – because I’ve known since I was ten what my Star Wars identity actually was: the son of Grand Moff Tarkin! Given that the character described in the link was mostly made of my direct choices, I am of course very pleased with the result. I was curious to see what my personality test said about me (or rather, about my Star Wars identity). Click on each of the buttons below the biography on the page I linked to, and it highlights the bit text in the biography that was chosen by your answers. So to reveal the personality results, all I need to do is click that button. The highlighted text says:

People often tell me I’m a generally adventurous and curious person, I also tend to be energetic and social.

… which suggests I was really getting into character when I was answering those questions, because that doesn’t sound like me at all 🙂

Actually the interactive I enjoyed most was Events. Touch your RFID bracelet to the receptor and a random life event spins into view, with a choice of how you react to it. I won a city in a “game of chance”, and had to decide (if I recall correctly) whether I governed sensibly, gave up the job, or “reveled in the prestige and borrowed liberally from the city coffers” which is the option I went for (of course). But my boy was disappointed that the random events on offer were not in some way defined by choices you’d already made – he too got the city, and I might easily have been “freed from slavery” by an event. The son of a Grand Moff in slavery? I don’t think so. 🙂

Despite its limitations (which one is prepared to forgive more when one realizes the technology is five years old), the opportunity to create a story like this was very much enjoyed by my family. I wonder if the exhibition had a deeper emotional impact on me because of it?

Simulating ideology in storytelling

The Story Extension Process, from Mei Yii Lim and Ruth Aylett (2007) Narrative Construction in a Mobile Tour Guide

Another great piece from Ruth Aylett, this time from 2007. Here, she and collaborator Mei Yii Lim are getting closer to what I’m aiming for, if taking a different approach. They kick off by describing Terminal Time, a system that improvises documentaries according to the user’s ideological preference, and an intelligent guide for virtual environments which take into account the distance between locations, the already told story, and the affinity between the the story element and the guide’s profile when selecting the next story element and location combination to take users to. They note that this approach could bring mobile guides “a step nearer to the creation of an ‘intelligent guide with personality'” but that it “omits user [visitor] interests”. (I can think of many of a human tour guide that does the same). They also touch on a conversation agent that deals with the same issues they are exploring.

This being a 2007 conference paper, they are of course using a PDA as their medium. Equipped with GPS and text to speech software, a server does all the heavy lifting.

“After [an ice-breaking session where the guide extracts information about the user’s name
and interests], the guide chooses attractions that match the user’s interests, and plans the shortest possible route to the destinations. The guide navigates the user to the chosen locations via directional instructions as well as via an animated directional arrow. Upon arrival, it notifies the user and starts the storytelling process. The system links electronic data to actual physical locations so that stories are relevant to what is in sight. During the interaction, the user continuously expresses his/her interest in the guide’s stories and agreement to the guide’s argument through a rating bar on the graphical user interface. The user’s inputs affect the guide’s emotional state and determine the extensiveness of stories. The system’s outputs are in the form of speech, text and an animated talking head.”

So, in contrast to my own approach, this guide is still story lead, rather than directly user led, but it decides where to take the user based on their interests. But they are striving for an emotional connection with the visitor. So their story elements (SE) are composed of “semantic memories [-] facts, including location-related information” and “emotional memories […] generated through simulation of past experiences”. Each story element has a number of properties, sematic memories for example incude: name ( a coded identifier); type; subjects; objects; effects (this is interesting its lists the story elements that are caused by this story element, with variable weight); event; concepts (this that might need a further definition when fist mentioned); personnel (who was involved); division; attributes (relationship to interest areas in the ontology); location; and, text. Emotional story elements don’t include “effects and subjects attributes because the [emotional story element] itself is the effect of a SE and the guide itself is the subject.” These emotional memories are tagged with “arousal” and “valence” tags. The arousal tags are based on Emotional Tagging, while the valence tag “denotes how favourable or unfavourable an event was to the guide. When interacting with the user, the guide is engaged in meaningful reconstruction of its own past,” hmmmmm.

So their prototype, a guide to the Los Alamos site of the Manhatten project, the guide could be either “a scientist who is interested in topics related to Science and Politics, and a member of the military who is interested in topics related to Military and Politics. Both guides also have General knowledge about the attractions.” I’m not convinced by the artifice of layering onto the interpretation two different points of view – as both such are being authored by a team who in their creation of the two points of view will, even if striving to be objective, will make editorial decisions that reveal a third, authentic PoV.

When selecting which SE to tell next, the guide filters out the ones that are not connected to the current location. Then “three scores corresponding to: previously told stories; the guide’s interests; and the user’s interests are calculated. A SE with the highest overall
score will become the starting spot for extension.” The authors present a pleasingly simple (for a non-coder like me) algorithm for working out which SE goes next. But the semantic elements are not the only story elements that get told. The guide also measures the Emotional, Ideological story elements against the user’s initial questionnaire answers and reactions to previous story elements and decides whether or not to add the guide’s “own” ideological experience on to the interpretation, a bit like a human guide might. So you might be told:

“Estimates place the number of deaths caused by Little Boy in Hiroshima up to the end of 1945 at one hundred and forty thousands where the dying continued, five-year deaths related to the bombing reached two hundred thousands.”

Or, if the guide’s algorithms think you’ll appreciate it’s ideological perspective, you could hear:

“Estimates place the number of deaths caused by Little Boy in Hiroshima up to the end of 1945 at one hundred and forty thousands where the dying continued, five-year deaths related to the bombing reached two hundred thousands. The experience of Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombing was the opening chapter to the possible annihilation of mankind. For men to choose to kill the innocent as a means to their ends, is always murder, and murder is one of the worst of human action. In the bombing of Japanese cities it was certainly decided to kill the innocent as a means to an end.”

I guess that’s the scientist personality talking, perhaps the military personality would  instead add a different ideological interpretation of the means to an end. As I mentioned before, I’m not convinced that two (or more) faux points of view are required when the whole project and every story element that the guide gets to choose from are already authored with a true point of view. But in many other aspects this paper is really useful and will get a good deal of referencing in my thesis.