Dear Andrew,

 I have been meaning to reply to your idea for a mobile museum label for a while now. As a regular museum visitor, I have a few comments and questions.

 Something where visitors can read labels in any (or at least a selection larger than the local) language is a fantastic idea (especially in the U.S. where it seems that foreigners are particularly shunned language-wise). Do you expect the museum to do the text translation, your program to do it, or plan to contract an outside service do it? (I haven't seen a very good translation program yet (most are too literal), so I would recommend an outside service being part of your set-up, unless the museum staff has bilingual people).
 How close do you have to be to the artifact to be able to read the label? Having people all crowded around a label has both amused and annoyed me. Do you plan to have something mounted near the object telling the device where it is? Will there be confusion between objects then? Depending upon the size of the objects, some are packed very closely and I could imagine a lot of confusion there. (Perhaps bar codes can be scanned or some such thing). Please arrange it so that the visitor need not stand smack in front of the object as well as close to it for 10 min reading the device. Making it such that the visitor must stand slightly to the side of the object while reading about it might be best - they can glance over at it if needed and the look full on when done - those of us not reading our wrists would like to be able to appreciate the object and if someone is standing smack in front of the object while not even looking at the object then that is a waste (and annoying as hell !
to the rest of us).
 DO NOT MAKE THEM AUDIO WITHOUT EARPHONES! Some of the responsed I have read made it sound like it would be great if everyone could hear the description. Imagine a room with two or twenty of those things speaking. No one could hear a thing.

 My two cents worth. Good luck!

       -angela



Angela Putney, Ph.D.
Physics Management Fellow
American Institute of Physics
One Physics Ellipse
College Park, MD 20740

Phone: 301-209-3135
Fax:      301-209-3133
E-mail: [log in to unmask]

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