museumsandtheweb.com - audio tour

Guided Expectations: A Case Study of a Sound Collage Audio Guide

norditte — Wed, 30 Mar 2011 16:23:47 +0000

MW2011

Ditte Laursen, University of Southern Denmark, Denmark

Abstract

This paper is a user evaluation of a mobile phone audio guide developed for visitors to use at the National Gallery of Denmark. The audio guide is offered as a downloadable MP3 file to every incoming visitor who is carrying a mobile phone with an open Bluetooth connection. The guide itself is structured through association, offering an experience more comparable to an audio documentary than a traditional guided tour. Instead of directing visitors' focus of attention to selected points and objects provided by the museum as a producer, the sound collage relates indirectly to the various objects of the exhibition, emphasizing visitors' agency and authorship.

The paper reports on a number of strategies developed by visitors when experiencing an unfamiliar guide structure. These strategies reflect both a conflict between the initial expectation of guided instruction and the freedom of making choices according to personal interest, and a conflict between the expectation of a learning experience rather than an aesthetic experience. Results indicate that most visitors are able to make sense of the guide and to use it successfully, in different ways, to enrich their visit. Evaluation also shows that visitors are fond of using their own mobile phones - but they have several problems with their phones in downloading the MP3 file.

Keywords: mobile phone, audio tour, downloadable MP3 tours, sound collage, visitor studies, user expectations

More Than Tours: radical opportunities in mobile content design and social media

dbear — Wed, 10 Nov 2010 14:40:06 +0000

MW2011

Keywords:

audio tour

Keywords:

tour guides

Keywords:

non-tour

Keywords:

untour

Keywords:

mobile

Keywords:

content design

Keywords:

Experience Design

Abstract:

This workshop is now full.

New mobile and social media platforms have hugely expanded the ways in which museums can interact with their audiences – and even with each other! Nonetheless, museum mobile experiences still tend not to stray far from the traditional audio tour in experience and content design. This workshop is designed to get us thinking "outside the audio tour box" to devise radical new approaches to mobile experiences for museum audiences.

Led by innovative mobile practitioners and museum experience designers, the workshop will challenge us to transform the relationship with museum audiences by engaging them in doing meaningful, mission-focused work, and being true co-creators of our cultural institutions. We’ll ask how content creation might be shared with audiences and among museums; how new tools like augmented reality and location-based gaming and social media apps can expand the mobile experience beyond the museum’s walls; and what research exists and is still needed to help inform our next generation mobile decisions. Outcomes will include both new paradigms for museum mobile experiences, and concrete solutions for building them.

Type:

Workshop - full or half day

Mobile 'Untours' - FULL

Authors:

Nancy Proctor

Sandy Goldberg

Ed Rodley

Koven Smith

Halsey Burgund

Dave Schaller

Kate Haley Goldman