>I am interrested in "personal digital assistants" and their educational use in
>exhibits. Does anyone
>know of museums that use the technology successfully, what different systems
>there are on the market
>and what they cost.


The University Art Museum at UC Berkeley will be installing the Eye-Q
system (from Visible Interactive) of using Personal Digital Assistants
(Apple Newton) for use in our galleries next month. We are a demonstration
site for this technology, so we'll be collecting user surveys as well, and
presenting on a panel at the next AAM conference. Session is called "Now
Hear this: Expanding Interpretive Possibilities with Digitized Audio
Guides." Perhaps when I collect enough data, I can also put the summary up
on our WWW page and announce it via museum-l for general perusal. My
understanding is that the Louvre, or more specifically the University of
Paris, Department of Hympermedia, working with the Louvre, is also
interested in testing this device in their galleries. It will, or already
is in use at the Smithsonian first lady's exhibition.

And of course there are dozens of museums using other devices, such as
CD-ROM and solid state devices for gallery tours.

Hope this helps,



Richard Rinehart              | University Art Museum / Pacific Film Archive
Systems Manager & Education   | University of California at Berkeley
Technology Specialist         | 2625 Durant, Berkeley, CA 94720-2250
[log in to unmask] | http://www.uampfa.berkeley.edu/