You are mistaken.  The degree of increased attendance because of WWW images
can't easily be estimated.  However, attendance is increased.  I receive
about a message a month from people who thank me for the information placed
on the web.  Several have commented that they didn't know of the museum
until they saw it on the web, and that they took the time to visit in
person.  One of our satellite facilites, William S. Hart Ranch is a smaller
house museum of regional interest.  People visiting our primary web site
have learned about it, and as a result of the web site, visited it.  How
one translates a few eMail messages from thankful patrons to statistics on
increased attendance is beyond me, but clearly, increased attendance does
occur.

I would think that there is a larger benefit to smaller, regional museums
than to large national museums.  People may already know a lot about the
larger museums.  People are often unaware of the smaller museums.

Jim

>         Institutional Studies
>There is no evidence that putting images on the WWW has any impact
>on attendance.  Not surprising, as the users of WWW are museum-goers
>who probably know of the museum/exhibit/program from other sources
>as well.  The notion that the WWW would increase attendance is very
>far-fetched.  I see many benefits of the WWW in the museum context,
>but audience expansion is definitely not one of them.

Jim Angus
Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County
900 Exposition Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA  90007

(213) 744-3317
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http://www.usc.edu/lacmnh