I agree with those that point out that we have not yet figured out the
best marriage of exhibits and technology.
        Virtual museums, access to the museum's database is something that
does not necessarily have to happen at the museum. It is a one-on-one
encounter, and may be more effective at 6am on a Saturday as I am writing.
        The exhibit is fundamentally different; a broad band experience
taken in conjunction with other people, not a focused one-on-one. Any use
of technology in it has to allow multiple simultaneous users: if no more
than repeater screens so that lots of people can see what you are doing.
        When thinking of technological enhancements, you need to think
about what the technology can do better in the museum setting than in the
home. A majority of the current computer use in museums would be better as
a sampler and then sold in the gift shop! I think of things like bicycle
buiding in the information age exhibit at the Smithsonian. At the same
institution, media is used well e.g. to show a complex piece of machinery
in motion, something that cannot be done by other media (one necessary
criteria for media use).
        Interactivity in a thought provoking setting is another: the old
1776 Where's Boston exhibit pioneered this: exhibits presented issues,
visitors recorded how they would vote, and then found out who they most
resembled as they left the show. Interactivity with the exhibit is one
reason live interpreters succeed.
        A second reason that they succeed is that they can provide
information conversationally to a depth controlled only by the
interpreters knowledge and by the visitors curiosity, again to a number
of people at the same time. The best interpreters can explain process  (in
a history/technology museum) and can get the vistor to "see" the object
through other eyes, providing additional contyext.
        How can this be replicated technologically? Envision a future
exhibit where the objects are ordered the way we now do them, but the
"copy" visible is high level, area titles, case titles. Case and items
"lables" disappear, so that there is even less "copy" than we saw in the
old cabinets of curiosities. But there are electronic access points,
"screens" that allow the visitor to go into as much depth as s/he desires
about the object, drawing on ultimately everything that is known. It
differs from the "virtual museum" as we can now deliever it because the
exhibit provides the sense of scale, that current technology can not
deliver. The designer orders the objects, controls the experience, but the
visitor controls the depth.
        Along these lines, could we here from someone from the Strong or
from the Met who have data on visitor response to visible storage,
interpreted only by electronic data bases?
        Only when technology can provide the virtual reality of a Gibson
("Neuromancer" et al) or a "Snow Crash" will the electronic museum be
able to replace the physical exhibit.
 
Benj. A.G.Fuller
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(One of those who pays out of pocket to cybersurf!)