Th Exploratorium in San Francisco published some results concerning visitor use of handheld devices.A long report is available on the web site of the museum.

http://www.exploratorium.edu/guidebook/userinterface.html

Aoki et al. wrote some articles on pocket pc's and  visitors attention. So did Chris Tellis from Antenna Audio.

The canadian CHIN has also dedicated some space on this matter.
http://www.chin.gc.ca/English/Digital_Content/Tip_Sheets/Pda/tip_sheet13.html

The Tate Modern has published reports on the pilot programs of the Multimedia Tour.

However, there is no synthetic work so far treating the matters.
I hope to be able to gather all relevant material in my PhD which started earlier this year.

Allow me finally to say that the portable of the platform proposed is a unique challenge to personalize the content, and consitutes one of the main differenes with fixed work stations. Furthermore it seems that it enhances the social interaction between groups visiting together a monument or a museum.

My studies so far have shown that we tend to compare this new media either as an e-docent, as an audio guide or as a text book. I think that the truth lies somewhere in between...

Best regards
Areti DAMALA


Areti DAMALA
BA in History of Art and Archeology
Msc in Cultural Informatics
PhD Candidate in Computer Science

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-----Original Message-----
From: Museum discussion list [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Eric Siegel
Sent: mercredi 9 février 2005 16:45
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: FW: Hand-held interpretive devices and developers

Hello, on a more fundamental level, has anyone done any evaluation about the use of handheld guides?  There is clearly a trend in museums to use handheld players to add a layer of interpretation to their exhibitions and activities.  I have a gut skepticism that visitors are looking for more text to add to their engagement with exhibitions, or that the kind of images/multiimedia that are available on handhelds are preferable to what you might be able to do with location-specific kiosks.

Audio tours have been pretty well studied in different contexts, and seem to have some benefit for some visitors in some settings, but I have not seen any similar studies for handhelds.

It has the feel of a solution looking for an answer, but I would be glad to hear otherwise.

Eric Siegel
Executive VP
Programs and Planning
New York Hall of Science

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