Museums and archives manage information about their collections, facilitate interdepartmental communication, and make collections available to the public using collection management software. Here’s a rundown of the collection management systems being exhibited at Museums and the Web 2011…

Open access means that readers have free access. But who pays for the operational costs of running a publication? Often it’s the authors, though there are several common business models. How much are authors paying? What do they think about it? And what are some other business models to sustain journals and other kinds of digital [...]

The following were the twenty most visited art exhibitions of 2010:

Museums are going mobile, and many companies are eager to help. At yesterday’s Museums & Mobile 2011 online conference, several vendors promoted their wares. This is a summary of products, approaches, and some alternatives…

Walking over rough sandstone blocks, between adobe houses, our $20/person tour wove through the streets and alleys of a small village atop a mesa in the Acoma Pueblo, in New Mexico. The tour culminated in the local church (at right), the San Esteban del Rey Mission, which is a source of great pride, and also a [...]

The term “strategic communications” has become popular over the last two decades. It means infusing communications efforts with an agenda and a master plan. Typically, that master plan involves promoting the brand of an organization, urging people to do specific actions, or advocating particular legislation. It can refer to both a process, and to a specific [...]

Small differences have a big effect when trying to coax thousands or millions of people. This includes urging online readers to take an action. This post looks at how IDEA used small ads on one of our projects (a small, free web-based exhibit about Daylight Saving Time) to promote another project (a 99¢ app about Daylight Saving Time sold [...]

This weekend, I was a judge at a local chapter of National History Day (NHD). I judged web sites. Amazingly, these sites were much better than those of many small history museums. The students’ sites used a mixture of text,  images, video and audio clips in a thoughtful way. This year’s theme was “Debate and Diplomacy.” I can’t show you [...]

Museums increasingly realize that if they want government funding and support, they need to make a case for it, and get their voice heard. So today and tomorrow is ’Museums Advocacy Day.’ Flocks of staff, volunteers, trustees, students, even museum enthusiasts are rallying to make a strong case to legislators for governmental support, both online and [...]

Blog networks are collaborative blogs. They give readers an interesting destination, like a newsmagazine, with more content than blogs with just one or a few authors can usually offer. For bloggers, joining a blog network provides more visibility and respect, and allows busy bloggers who can only blog occasionally to build an audience. There are [...]