v0.3, hosted by the AGO web team.
Every four months or so, the web teams from the Royal Ontario Museum, the Art Gallery of Ontario and the Ontario Science Centre, get together to talk web. This post is a summary of the third such meeting, which took place in the AGO’s beautiful new building. Seriously, if you haven’t visited yet, do yourself a favour and go. It’s a highly pleasurable experience.
The meeting marked the introduction of new format for the summit: the un-conference. So far, each organization has had their own unique take on hosting. But with the un-conference I think we’ve found a format that offers the highest value for the time spent.
The central idea to these gatherings is to give the web teams an opportunity to share ideas and get some outside perspective. We all spend a great deal of time working within the our respective organizational structures. Most of the folks that we do business with specialize in disciplines that don’t necessarily mandate web literacy. So it’s pretty great to get with a bunch of tweeps who all speak the same language. Having short, planned sessions gives just the right amount of structure to the interactions.
We saw four presentations. I’ve had a go at summarizing bellow:
Marty Spellerberg – Talking web pages
Marty took us through an interesting application for embedding video content on webpages – the talking webpage. Kind of like a talking exhibit or a virtual tour guide, the talking page includes a short 30-60 second clip of a staff member providing additional content and context for events such as tours or on-site activities.
On top of making the page content more accessible and interesting, I’m also really impressed by the thinking that has gone into the formatting of these spots. They’re essentially short, sweet vlog posts, comprised of a single shot, that introduce a character that you may encounter when you visit. Talk about leveraging some of your best assets.
If that wasn’t enough, we were also treated to a pretty hilarious idea that has all kinds of viral potential. Sorry I couldn’t find the link.
Jess Holmes – jQuery: write less, do more
I presented an idea that we’ve gotten a bit of millage out of at the OSC. The basic premise is that we can offer a whole lot of extra functionality to our clients by adopting javascript libraries. We used jQuery as an example. It’s not a new idea, but it’s a topic that causes non-web geeks to glaze over pretty quickly – so I jumped on the opportunity to yak about it to people who might listen.
Here’s the PowerPoint that I presented.
Here are the sample links from the presentation.
Cheryl Fraser – Gaming & Museums
Cheryl led an interesting discussion on Museums and gaming. Sorry Cheryl, I can’t remember the name of the individual or conference that you referenced. The major point is that gamers are a HUGE segment. What are we doing as museums and science centres to engage gamers on their turf? Currently, not that much. We’ve had a go in the past, but at the moment we seem to be focused elsewhere.
That isn’t to say that museums can’t produce excellent work. Here’s Launchball, the game that won Best of the Web at #MW2008.
Noman Siddiqui – The how and why of marketing cultural organizations in international web campaigns
Noman, a new addition to the ROM’s team, bravely took the initiative and led a conversation on the need to engage communities outside of our core audiences. He posses an interesting question: What, if anything, are we doing to invite/attract visitors who may still be outside of Canadian borders? By creating international online marketing touch-points we become clear destination choices early on in the trip planning experience. Is it simply time that cements the association of the Louvre with Paris or is there something more to it? We are still a little thin on ideas for how exactly this process might work, but there did seem to be consensus that something would be better than nothing.
CARS GO MOO
I’d be interested to hear how much everyone else liked this format. I, for one, would like to see the sessions extended a bit. Maybe I just need to do a better job of editing, but I definitely feel like I could have covered more ground with a little more time. Or maybe a gong show format where we dress up the managers in funny costumes and they cut us off when the session gets boring.
It would also be great to start to invite/include other organizations. We three are the biggest, but there must be other web teams out there that would see similar value in this type of experience.
Thanks again to all that participated and a special thanks to Ian, Kevin, Brian. It’s pretty great to have managers that are progressive and supportive enough to organize events like this.
This post can also be seen on artmatters.ca.
Leave a comment