At 05:08 PM 7/1/98 -0500, Janice Klein wrote:

>Actually, The Field Museum Anthropology Department (over 300,000 individual
>records representing approximately 1.5 million objects) is happily using
>FileMaker Pro (even less "bells and whistles" than Access).  I cannot echo
>Steve strongly enough: it isn't just what your software CAN do, it's what
>you really are going to use it to do.

I believe that there are more complex issues here than are being reported.
It is true that for most administrative functions only basic features of a
full-featured collections management system are going to be used.  And if
the automated system is going to be used for management of objects
pure-and-simple, that perhaps that's okay.

But what happens as the automated system begins to replace the written
record, which it will as the generation of curators who are shy of
computerization are replaced by those who have used it their entire lives.
The kind of information contained in old accession files, in loan files,
etc. is complex and the relationships between objects, perhaps easy to note
on paper, require complexly fashioned database architectures.

I foresee a tragedy in the making when the simple databases become the
foundation for more complex structures as they become needed.  It is the
same tragedy that librarians have suffered as card catalogues, often with
handwritten annotations, are tossed out and replaced by databases that
cannot accommodate the rich details and patina encoded by history.

Today, when museum glamor and public awareness programs seem to get all the
money, this is the time when serious thought ought to be put into
information management strategies.  This or that trendy exhibit will soon
pass into oblivion, the plexi boxes will become so much clutter; but, the
information, if it is good information, properly recorded, will last for ever.

I think it is time for information management systems and information
managers be asked to record with integrity the depths of a museum's
cultural knowledge. I know, museums are here to serve Today, but they also
owe a debt to Yesterday, and they can only do that by serving Tomorrow.

Robert Baron
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