At session at AAM this year, a staff member from the Japanese-American
National Museum dealt with this issue in a larger context.  I can't
remember the specific session or presenter's name, and apologize in
advance if I misrepresent what she said...

that said, she talked about the importance of attracting younger
audiences...and in a survey those audiences wanted an anime exhibit.
They decided to do such an exhibit and worked with a young, non-museum
professional artist in developing the exhibit.  He was insistent that
visitors be allowed to photograph in the exhibition.   They resisted a
bit, but relented.  The result:  great publicity on blogs, websites
and in other locations, resulting in incredibly high attendance.  And,
the bonus:  they designed the temporary exhibit so that visitors had
to leave the exhibition through their core exhibition, and found out,
through evaluation, that those visitors who had come for the temporary
exhibition spent an even longer time in the core permanent exhibition.

From that perspective, it seems only a benefit to allow people to
share their perspectives on our work.

Linda

On 6/15/08, Heather McClenahan <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
>
> The person who put the images on Flickr isn't making any money off of the
> photos and probably isn't taking money away from the mueum. In fact, it
> could be viewed as good publicity, possibly reaching an audience who
> otherwise never might have heard of your museum.
>
> This is a "jump in with both feet" introduction to the concepts of Web 2.0
> -- if we don't share our own stuff about our museums on sites like YouTube
> and Flickr, someone else will.
>
> As others have said, a "no photography in the museum" policy is the best way
> to protect yourself.
>
> Heather McClenahan, museum assistant/web master
> Los Alamos Historical Society
> http://www.losalamoshistory.org
> [log in to unmask]
> P.O. Box 43
> 1921 Juniper St.
> Los Alamos, NM 87544
> 505-662-6272 (office)
> 505-470-2912 (cell)
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Kaia Landon
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Sent: Saturday, June 14, 2008 10:54 PM
> Subject: [MUSEUM-L] Flickr abuse and copyright
>
> We've been wanting to add some photos to Flickr for awhile, and I just now
> started uploading a few.  I followed the tags to see what else was already
> there tagged with our museum's name, and I was awfully surprised to find 62
> photos -- all of one small (700 square feet) very popular exhibition.  Now,
> these aren't just photos, these are basically reproductions of ALL of the
> label text, along with everything in the exhibition.  As it is Saturday
> evening and I just discovered it, I haven't had a chance to discuss with the
> exhibition's curator, or our graphic designer who spent countless hours on
> the labels, or my director, but I cannot imagine that they would be
> pleased.
>
> Has anyone dealt with this sort of problem?  Can anyone point me to relevant
> copyright regulations as applied to photos of labels, and photos of
> photos?
>
> While we do allow photographs, and we should be fine with people posting
> photographs, this is basically a complete copy of the exhibition.  It is an
> exhibition on a long-time popular local television program, and I believe we
> have several possible layers of difficulty, as some of the photos (in the
> exhibition, which are reproduced on Flickr) are undoubtedly originally from
> the television station, or private collectors, etc., along with all sorts of
> quotes.  These do not seem to be "Hey, look at my trip to the Museum"
> photos, but rather "Hey, I'm reproducing the entire exhibition for you all
> here!" photos.
>
> I'm just speechless.
> Thanks,
> Kaia Landon
> Curator of Education (and tech guru)
> Mesa Historical Museum
>
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-- 
Read my blog:
uncatalogedmuseum.blogspot.com

Linda Norris
Riverhill
PO Box 232
Treadwell, NY  13846
607-829-3501
[log in to unmask]
www.riverhillpartners.com

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