Diane,
I answered these directly below the question. Follow the ">>>"

Good luck with your project,
Alyssa

--
Alyssa Rosso
Public Relations Coordinator
Tacoma Art Museum
253.272.4258 x3002
www.TacomaArtMuseum.org

We have a very popular walking tour that's only offered twice a year.  A cell 
phone tour would mean we could offer the tour on demand.
The arguments "con" are primarily:
1) financial--losing the ability to charge for the public tours
2) visibility--losing the sight of escorting groups through the neighborhood or 
of actual staff/volunteer experts

Did your institution deal with either question? 

>>>Tacoma Art Museum offers the Chihuly Glass Walking Tour as well as the 
Chihuly Glass CellPhone Tour. The Walking Tour visits most of the same places 
as the phone tour and the museum does receive income from it. There are 
many people who prefer to interact with a human rather than a narrator on 
the phone so the in-person tour has not suffered greatly.

>>>Having signs posted throughout the museum district with our logo to 
promote the audio stops has actually extended our visibility in the public. 
People can access our services 24 hours a day, despite if the museum is open 
or not.

What's the financing for your program?  You don't charge in any way for 
access to the information, do you?

>>>We do not charge callers. 

Do you just consider the setup/maintenance a cost of general operations?      
Did you get some kind of subsidy?

>>>We received an IMLS (Institute of Museum and Library Services) grant to 
spread over two years. We worked with Museum411 to create the tour and 
Plum Voice hosts it remotely.

The standard response to cell phone tours has been:  Won't people resent 
using their minutes? How has that worked out in practice?

>>>Many providers offer free minutes on evenings and weekends. Also the set-
up of the tour allows callers to listen for as long, or as brief as they’d like. 
They have the option of skipping ahead to hear only the information they’re 
interested in. The tour works best when visitors are standing in front of the 
art, but there’s no reason why callers can’t remotely access the information 
later once the evening or weekend minutes kick in. To date, we've received no 
complaints from visitors concerning their minutes.

How about user profiles? I wonder if older visitors find the technology familiar 
and comfortable.

>>>This is why we still offer the walking tour. Older visitors prefer the one-on-
one interaction. Website for walking tour: 
http://www.tacomaartmuseum.org/page.asp?view=640 

Did you consider other technologies, such as Ipod's?

>>>The audio files are available as a podcast and the individual mp3 files are 
available to download via our website. The difference with these methods is 
that the information does not skip ahead so easily. All of the information about 
that particular audio stop is on that one audio file, however, visitors do not 
use their minutes this way. Website for mp3s and podcast: 
http://www.tacomaartmuseum.org/page.asp?view=5508

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