Sorry to jump into the thread a little late but I wanted to add that the 
Renwick study with the hand-helds was part of a larger initiative that the 
Smithsonian is hoping to introduce to the entire institution.  In April of 
this year a pilot project is being launched in five of the museums 
(Udvar-Hazy, Castle, American History, National History, and I think Postal) 
  The devices are being developed by a company called WiVid and they are 
designed to provide the audio tours, contextual videos and pictures or 
interviews, and extra text if visitors want it.  There is a lot of 
interesting talk about the possibilities of these devices which would 
include interactive maps of the museums where visitors could find their way 
to different object and exhibits or track other members of their group, get 
suggestions of what they might be interested in based on their history of 
what they have seen in that museum and other museums in the SI, take quizzes 
or provide feedback, and then have a follow-up component where they would 
have their own website they could go to and see objects and information that 
they had posted to their "clipboard" on the hand-helds while they were in 
the museum.

~ Olivia



~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Olivia Kohler
Graduate Student of Art History
American University

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