This is a delayed response to a post from January 9, in which Rob Guralnick
quoted a previous post from me (without attribution) and argued with
everything I said.  I found some of these arguments unconvincing and wish to
comment on them.

I said museums exist to preserve access to unique historic information.  He
responded "only in part.  They also provide some kind of context in which to
understand the unique historical information."  My point was that "unique
historic information" is embodied in the historical artifacts collected by,
stored, and/or exhibited in the museum because that is what distinguishes a
museum from some other entity.  I would argue that, as "hot" as "context" is
nowadays, that's not an essential part of the definition of a museum.
 Providing "context" is not unique to museums at all, and whereas basic
documentation of artifacts--description, provenance, etc. (cataloging)--is
probably essential, I remain unconvinced that interpretation or
contextualization of artifacts is essential.  It's a highly desirable
enterprise, which characterizes a "good" and effective museum, but the
"old-fashioned" type of museum which offered no interpretive commentary was
no less a museum for such omissions.  For many years users of museums--both
scholars and the general public--were expected to provide their own
interpretation or obtain it as an ancillary activity, and of course museum
scholars traditionally have offered interpretive catalogs of collections and
exhibitions as an optional adjunct--or alternative--to the museum experience.
 If a museum chooses to place explanatory or interpretive text in an
exhibition, that's all well and good, but there have always been practical
limits on how much such text you could place adjacent to objects; it's a
design problem as well as an issue relating to visitor fatigue.

Therefore, catalogs, books, brochures, and other kinds of auxiliary sources
of information (including, in recent years, explanatory videotapes and
videodiscs, which sidestep the design problem when they're incorporated into
an exhibit) have always been important, but remember that visitors tour
exhibitions, and scholars examine original artifacts in study collections
behind the scenes, primarily to get direct sensory experience of the
objects--not to stand and read lengthy texts.  This is why I am lumping
information contained in museum Web sites with the traditional catalogs and
other publications which a museum might provide as adjuncts to their exhibits
and collections.  This seems awfully obvious and fundamental to me, and I am
truly puzzled that people want to argue about it.

Rob, I think all your talk about the meanings of bones beyond the bare bones
is beside the point--at least it's beside MY point.  Certainly, there are
"many avenues for presenting deep contextual information," such as the
Web--and, as I said, books, catalogs, videos, etc., etc.  No one, including
myself, disagrees with that: it's obvious.

Perhaps you were thrown by my claim that the Web provides access to only a
PART of the historic information embodied in the bones or other artifacts.
 I'm speaking in very much a forensic, evidential sense.  Until you can put
the actual bones themselves on the Web--which at this juncture seems somewhat
problematic to me--you don't have ALL the information about an object on the
Web.  When I say that the Web is being used by museums as a substitute
(perhaps I should have said alternative) for other methods of publishing
information about the bones or about the museum, I don't see how you can
fairly criticize that position as "absolutely wrong."  When you say "many
museums are using their web sites as ways to present information in new
formats," how does that contradict my statement?  In my unit we are beginning
our Web site with the contents of our existing brochures, which have already
been edited.  I know for a fact that other offices of my museum and other
museums are doing the same thing.  Therefore the Web site will serve, in
part, as a substitute for these brochures, meaning people will not need to
request a free brochure after they've seen its contents on the Web.
 Ultimately we'll save on printing costs.  So my statement is absolutely
RIGHT, not "absolutely wrong."

You say that "with a Web site, you can navigate down to a detailed level of
information about a particular object...or learn a lot more about context
than you could in a museum."  Well, I can "navigate" in a traditional
collection catalog, "navigate" from one place to another in a book,
"navigate" from one book to another in a library, or "navigate" from one
brochure to another.  How is the intellectual process of going from one
information "site" to another in a book or library any different from the way
you navigate the Web?  It all depends on what information has been provided
in either a traditional library environment or the Web environment.  You
can't navigate to information which hasn't been included.

I have checked out the UCMP Web site, and it is impressive--although I found
it somewhat cumbersome to locate information about specific collection
objects.  And yes, I "honestly believe" what I saw was a "substitute for
brochures, catalogs, phonebooks, and phone calls."  All of that information,
including the highly informative and vital stuff about your personal
interests and preferences in tea, could easily be made available in some more
traditional format.  (Most museums do not put data about staff tea-drinking
habits in their brochures, but hey, I guess they could if they wanted to.
 I'll grant you that WE definitely won't issue a brochure on it.)

When I discussed the potential positive or negative impact of Web sites on
museum visitorship, you said "Who cares?"  Well, I was addressing opinions
expressed by Museum-L members in other posts, and I got the impression that
some DID care or they wouldn't have discussed it.  Some thought it would
increase visitorship, others thought it would tend to decrease it.  Who
cares?  Well, usually curators and museum boards care about attendance
figures.  I said I thought it might have no effect--perhaps the number of
"Web museum" visitors who decide they don't need to visit a museum in person
after they've seen their stuff on the Web will be cancelled out by those who
say, "Wow, that's interesting!  Gotta see those dinosaur bones up close and
in my face.  I'm going to Berkeley tomorrow."  No one SAID "the ultimate end
of the web museum [is] to increase attendance," but they wondered if it
would.  Okay?

Yes, "supplement" a museum exhibit IS a better term than "substitute for."
 We agree!
And I contend that traditional museum publications such as books, catalogs,
and brochures SUPPLEMENT museum exhibits.  So DOESN'T that logically make a
museum Web site analogous or homologous to a (museum) book or other
traditional presentation?  Supplementary information can take many different
forms and formats.  I don't understand why you think there's any disagreement
here.  Not for nothing do we talk about Web "pages."  If that's not an
implied analogy to a book, I don't know what is.

Indeed, when I analyze your message, Rob, you seem essentially to agree with
me on all my points.  I can't fathom your argumentative tone.  Perhaps I
didn't express myself clearly?

I am troubled, however, by your response to my hope that "some of the hype
and hysteria about the WWW will subside before museum people get their
perspectives too warped out of shape"; you said "It won't."  If museum people
WILL get their perspectives warped out of shape, I think that will be a
shame.  You agreed with me that the Web "is nothing more than a fancy tool
for providing and accessing information," but then said that that's "not
nothing."  Well, of course it's something.  I could also say "nothing less."
 The Web is nifty, neat, and maybe it won't disappear like the hula hoop.
 For all I know, it will prove to be as fundamental a tool for civilization
as the wheel.  But I'm no longer any more excited about the Web than my
wheels or my hammers or my other tools.  I just use 'em.  If I were more
interested in the Web than in my museum collections I'd become a Web jockey,
not a museum person.

--David Haberstich



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