Slides from the fourth session of the course "The Recurated Museum" by Sytze Van Herck & Christopher Morse at the University of Luxembourg (Summer Semester, 2020). Course slides typically begin with a brief summary of the online discussions that occurred before the session.

1. The Recurated Museum:
Collections Management and
Sustainability
Sytze Van Herck & Christopher Morse

2. How can digital exhibitions be curated and set-up to encompass/include all types of
learners? Consider how the digital format can be advantageous or problematic.
Do you think virtual museums work as a complementary to real-life museums or could
they eventually even replace real-life museums altogether?
Problem for Social
/ Kinetic learner
Context of Digital
Experience
Quizzes, interactive
activities
Virtual museum is
complementary
Virtual museum can
augment, not replace
Quality of material
object is hard to
transmit
Community
Platform

3. Exhibition without objects
focus on experience and story
Immersive learning visceral experience
driven by ideas and questions instead of objects
(Jones, 2017)
How would you imagine a museum experience without any objects?
Have you experienced a museum without a collection or without any objects on display?

4. Interpretative Tools
Digital media
Immersive spaces
Interactives
Dialogues with docents
Theatre
Maker spaces and crafting stations
Wall text
Lighting and sound design
Games and simulations
(Jones, 2017)

5. 1. We need objects now more than ever.
2. We don’t need objects unless we do something
with them.
3. We may not need the ones collected
4. We don’t all need the same ones
5. We need to restore the links between objects
and places.
6. We need a different model for access.
(Tisdale, 2011)

6. Do we still need curators?
"Today's curator is a subject expert who facilitates the process of
creating a collective history by convening the conversation, asking
interesting questions, suggesting trusted sources and methods for
exploration, gently guiding the discussion, and checking for factual
errors."
(Tisdale, 2011)

7. Assessing the user experience (UX)
of online museum collections:
Perspectives from design and
museum professionals
Studies show that online museum collections are
among the least popular features of a museum
website, which many museums attribute to a lack
of interest. While it’s certainly possible that a
large segment of the population is simply
uninterested in viewing museum objects through
a computer screen, it is also possible that a large
number of people want to find and view museum
objects digitally but have been discouraged from
doing so due to the poor user experience (UX) of
existing online-collection interfaces.
(MacDonald, 2015)

8. Evaluation:
Kyoto Costume Institute
https://www.kci.or.jp/en/archives/digital_archives/

9. User Experience Design

10. User Experience Design
UX is a consequence of a user’s internal state (predispositions,
expectations, needs, motivation, mood, etc.), the characteristics of
the designed system (e.g. complexity, purpose, usability,
functionality, etc.) and the context (or the environment) within
which the interaction occurs (e.g. organisational/social setting,
meaningfulness of the activity, voluntariness of use, etc.).
(Hassenzahl & Tractinsky, 2006)

11. VISCERAL
DESIGN
Perceptible qualities of an object
BEHAVIORAL
DESIGN
Practical and functional qualities of an object
REFLECTIVE
DESIGN
Conscious rationalization or intellectualization of an
object.
Norman’s Three Levels of Emotional Design
(Norman, 2004)

13. VISCERAL
DESIGN
Perceptible qualities of an object

14. BEHAVIORAL
DESIGN
Practical and functional qualities of an object

15. REFLECTIVE
DESIGN
Conscious rationalization or intellectualization of an
object.

16. VISCERAL
DESIGN
BEHAVIORAL
DESIGN
REFLECTIVE
DESIGN
Will people want to use the collection?
Will people be able to use the collection?
Will people want to come back to use the collection?
(MacDonald, 2015)

17. VISCERAL
DESIGN
Will people want to use the collection?
Strength of
Visual Content
Visual Aesthetics
● Role of artwork in the collection
● Balance of visual and textual content
● Quality of visual content
● Harmony of color, graphics, typography
● Consistency of non-interactive elements
● Affective responses that are universally positive

18. Will people be able to use the collection?BEHAVIORAL
DESIGN
System Reliability
& Performance
Usefulness of
Metadata
Interface Usability
Support for Casual
and Expert Users
● Level of technical errors in the interface
● Ability to accomplish user goals (e.g. finding an image)
● Length of load times to view pages/images
● Breadth and depth of metadata
● Ability for metadata to support search and filter
● Use of metadata to support innovative discovery
● Intuitiveness of use and required learning curve
● Unnecessary complexity or inefficient simplicity
● Seamless interaction between user and collection
● General functionality (casual users)
● Obtrusiveness of advanced features (advanced users)
● Seamlessness of transition between browse and research

19. Will people want to come back to use the collection?REFLECTIVE
DESIGN
Uniqueness of
Virtual Experience
Openness
Integration of
Social Features
Personalization
of Experiences
● Difference between virtual and in-person experience
● Opportunity for new insights and perspectives
● Extension beyond the in-person museum experience
● Level of personal control over content
● Description of copyright
● Content shareability
● Extent of virtual community
● Integration of social tools within the collection
● Multiplicity of communication options
● Personalizability
● Robustness of personalization features
● Empowerment of co-creation

22. Strength of
Visual Content
● Role of artwork in the
collection
● Balance of visual and
textual content
● Quality of visual content
Support for
Casual and Expert Users
● General functionality
● Obtrusiveness of
advanced features
● Transition between
browsing and research
Openness
● Level of personal control
over content
● Description of copyright
● Content shareability

23. Integration of
Social Features
● Virtual community
● Social tools within the
collection
● Multiplicity of
communication options
Uniqueness of
Virtual Experience
● Virtual vs. in-person
● Opportunity for new
insights
● Extension beyond the in-
person visit

24. Recurated Museum HCI Team

25. A Collections Management System (CMS)
for a physical or born digital collection is
comprised of a database, metadata, a
general interface, a graphical user
interface, and an application
programming interface.
Purvis, 2017

26. Collection Management System
Database
Metadata
Interface
Graphical User Interface
(GUI)
Application Programming
Interface (API)
(Purvis, 2017)

27. Functions of CMS
Object Entry and
Acquisition
Cataloging
Location and Movement
Control
Object
Exit
Loans
Retrospective
Documentation
(Purvis, 2017)

28. Benefits
Challenges
Public engagement
Commercialisation
Preservation
Productivity
Copyright
Technological Change
Conservation
Cost
(Purvis, 2017)

29. Digital processes offer a means to increase the return on
resources in meaningful, measurable ways. These (...) may reduce
the overall human interaction with original objects face-to-face or
may enhance them [VR, 3D print, hologram]. Digitisation is a
balancing act between conservation, engagement, and
commercialization, … .
Purvis, 2017

30. The Museum System (TMS)

32. Digital preservation is the active
management of digital content over
time to ensure ongoing access.
Library of Congress

33. While museums only rarely deaccession their
physical collections, digital repositories do not have
the same approach. Generally speaking, digital
storage may be broken down into three lengths of
preservation: short-term, medium-term, and long-
term.

34. Short-term preservation
Continued access to digital objects is desired but does not extend into the future beyond
changes in technology.
Medium-term preservation
Continued access to digital objects is desired beyond changes in technology. Continued
access is required for a determinate length.
Long-term preservation
Continued access to digital objects is desired beyond changes in technology for an
indeterminate length of time.
(Corrado & Sandy, 2017)

35. DIGITAL
OBSOLESCENCE

36. We digitize our images and sounds and texts
in the expectation that this somehow provides
these objects with immortality. Sadly, we may,
instead, be creating a digital dark age in
which our descendants will know nothing of
our history and the products of our society.
Vint Cerf, Digital Vellum & Archives

37. Software
Software is constantly changing, old versions are routinely forgotten: abandonware.
Hardware
Like software, hardware is subject to trends. Data transfer becomes essential over time.
Physical Media
Physical media can become damaged over time. All physical media have a lifespan.
Data Integrity
Digital assets are vulnerable to corruption: viruses, sabotage, error, transfer, etc.
Data Location
Data may be spread across multiple devices, servers, companies, and countries.

38. Original 1 bit flipped 2 bits flipped 3 bits flipped
Data degradation, Wikipedia
Data Degradation

39. DESIGNING FOR
LONG-TERM
SUSTAINABILITY

40. DIGITAL VELLUM
PRESERVING CONTEXT
...a process of taking an X-ray snapshot of the
content, the application, and the operating
system together, with a description of the
machine that it runs on, and preserve that for
long periods of time.
(Kosciejew, 2015)

41. file
software
operating system
DIGITAL VELLUM
PRESERVING CONTEXT

42. Five Stars of Open Data
OL OL RE
OL RE OF OL RE OF URI OL RE OF URI LD
AVAILABLE ON THE WEB,
OPEN LICENSE
MACHINE-READABLE
STRUCTURED DATA
OPEN FORMAT RATHER
THAN PROPRIETARY
W3C-BASED UNIFORM
RESOURCE IDENTIFIER
LINKED DATA
DATA

45. Assignments
DEADLINE
12.03 Start the discussion
18.03 Read & Annotate
Approaching “Dark Heritage” Through Essential Questions: An Interactive Digital Storytelling Museum
Experience

46. Bibliography
Cerf, V. (n.d.). Digital Vellum and Archives—Dr. Vint Cerf. Retrieved March 08, 2020.
Corrado, E. M., Moulaison, H. L., & Sandy, H. M. (2014). Digital Preservation for Libraries, Archives, and Museums. Rowman & Littlefield.
Hassenzahl, M., & Tractinsky, N. (2006). User experience – a research agenda. Behaviour & Information Technology, 25(2), 91–97.
Kosciejew, M. (2015). Digital Vellum and Other Cures for Bit Rot. Information Management Journal, 49(3), 20–25.
Library of Congress. (n.d.). Digital Preservation (Library of Congress) [Webpage]. Retrieved March 08, 2020.
MacDonald, C. (2015). Assessing the user experience (UX) of online museum collections: Perspectives from design and museum
professionals. MW2015: Museums and the Web 2015.
Norman, D. A. (2004). Emotional design (Vol. 2004). Basic Books. http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?doid=985600.966013
Purvis, E. (2017). Digital Collections Management. In A. Hossaini & N. Blankenberg (Eds.), Manual of Digital Museum Planning. Rowman &
Littlefield.
Tisdale, R. (2011). Do History Museums Still Need Objects? American Association for State and Local History, 19–24.

47. https://gph.is/g/4DLrYBj