David and Len (and others),
I also found it a bit disconcerting how little the state of the art
in museum information standards and practices in the museum field was
reflected in the testimony that was forwarded. Off the top of my head:
In terms of standards ...
The CIDOC Relational Data Model was accepted by the international
museum community 10 years ago, and has since been expressed as an
Object Oriented Model.
The Canadian Heritage Information Network has published museum data
standards (implemented in their systems used by 100s of museums with
millions of records) for over 30 years.
Art Museum participation ensured that the Categories for the
Description of Works of Art - CDWA (prepared by the Art Information
Task Force, a joint NEH-funded project of the Getty and the College
Art Association, now maintained by the Getty) represented information
museums managed. Cross-over between the two committees ensured they
were compatible
CIMI built on this work, and took it experimentally into areas of
SGML and then XML, the Dublin core and Hand-held delivery (among
other projects).
AMICO has implemented a specification based on these standards and
The AMICO Library contains 100,000+ museum records from over 25
museums that HAVE BEEN interchanged among 100s of organizations and
are accommodated in dozens of information management systems.
The Museums and the Online Archive of California project has also
assembled a significant body of museum records from multiple
institutions and made it available through multiple channels.
The community is full of experience, and the problems we face are not
insurmountable: The Tate has digitized its collection. At Museums
and the Web the discussion was turning from 'how do we do it' to
'what do we do now we're almost done' ...
In terms of innovation ...
Far from being behind the curve, museums are a hot-bed of creativity.
Look at the work of the Walker Art Center (Minnesota Artists
http://mnartists.org), the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art
(http://www.sfmoma.org) and The Exploratorium
(http://www.exploratorium.org), Conservation Central (Smithsonian's
National Zoo)
http://nationalzoo.si.edu/Education/ConservationCentral, The American
Museum of Natural History including the OLogy - Projects area
http://ology.amnh.org.
... I could go on ...
In terms of participation ...
Far from coming to the table as supplicants, museums need to step
forward as equal participants with real experience in developing
significant collections of lasting scholarly value -- both digital
and PHYSICAL. Moving knowledge forward digitally should not involve a
severing of the relationship between the physical object and the
digital surrogate. (Increased knowledge about the physical artefacts
should pass into the digital realm as a matter of course, supported
by institutional policy and procedure).
Museums have a long history of developing knowledge based on these
resources and communicating it to multiple audiences in many
different modes and modalities. What we're missing is an ability to
speak as a group about these experiences. This is one case where the
heterogeneous nature of our interdisciplinary museum community works
against us.
With my best from Grindstone Island,
jennifer
--
__________
J. Trant jtr...@archimuse.com
Partner & Principal Consultant phone: +1 416 691 2516
Archives & Museum Informatics fax: +1 416 352 6025
158 Lee Ave, Toronto
Ontario M4E 2P3 Canada http://www.archimuse.com
__________
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