Lori and I are having a bit of a backchannel discussion. In the course of responding to her, I have just come up with an idea and thought I'd throw it out to the group. Let me predicate this idea by saying I spent TONS of time working with young people as my children were growing up. I will never forget the time we Girl Scout Leaders took our Troop to the now defunct Marineland. We were so excited about giving the girls the opportunity to see the marine life. So what did the girls want to do, and what did they remember about the day? Well, besides the memory of watching all four leaders "bombed" by the seagulls (ewww), their biggest memory was of all the really cool video games they got to play with. We take them to see whales, sharks, and such; they're more excited about Ms. Pac Man and Donkey Kong (ok, so it's been a while). My son, his girlfriend, and my nephew are all 23--oops, my neff turned 24 today--and you know what they love to do? You got it. Play video games. The aforementioned grandkids are even into it. A coworker gave me his son's hand-me-down Sega system for the 5-year old, and he and his parents often can be found playing with it. Me, on the other hand, I've refused to do the hands on thing with video games because I know, for a fact, I'd get addicted. So, with that as the predicate, and given our concern about adding to the customer base (as a way of increasing salaries) and teaching others to love what we love . . . HAS ANYBODY HERE THOUGHT about putting together a video game that is interactive, fast-paced, multiplayer, participatory, that involves a child or other lead character getting through multiple museums? The way I see this, it would be a collaborative effort. Pictures of what can be found at the museums could be included in the video game (could be for one of the big brands and/or it could be for PC/Mac whatever). The lead character--and they should be able to pick between a male or female icon depending upon their own gender--would have some sort of a mission that involves rescuing treasures from different types of musuems (natural history, art, science, archaeological, you name it). They should have to visit at least three types and earn bonus points for the items they preserve (maybe even a little information about what that takes). They could create their own archive so that their score is saved (enter their first name). Each time they retrieve an artifact, it is added to their collection. You would need to have many different museums (different cities, countries, etc.) to keep it going and fresh for the kids, and, with the archiving process, they could trade items for what they need in their collection. Some sort of a goal. Copies of the game could be distributed free to schools, with coupons available for printing for kids who wanted to purchase it for home use. If my grandbrats and their parents are playing video games together, what's to stop other parent/child teams from getting involved? I'm thinking of something almost like a Laura Croft, Tomb Raider, adventure could be employed for parts of this. Once the children are given exposure to these museums in something that is fun, it is liable to spur familial curiousity. Families looking for a place to vacation MAY be willing to include Museums in the itineraries--and these should not be just the majors, though clearly some of them should be included as options. I'm thinking a resourceful collaborative effort could pull this off with the help of some sort of a Museums whiz kid--like uh, let's just hypothetically say ROY HEMMAT of http://www.museumstuff.com I'm guessing you could get a grant or grants to fund this because of the educational involvement. Example: If you included museums that are integral for school curricula (like fourth graders in CA study California Missions, so throw one of those in there, and fifth graders study US History, so an historical museum that recreates America's story would work. For science, maybe a planetarium or Cape Kennedy/Canaveral or whatever). Now, what are YOUR thoughts about this idea? Anybody want to run with it? What are the motives here? Increase awareness, bring museums back into or at least into the lives of a lot of Americans, and possibly increase funding, which could equate to salaries. Are there any potential losses? ===== Indigo Nights [log in to unmask] __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Get personalized email addresses from Yahoo! Mail http://personal.mail.yahoo.com/ ========================================================= Important Subscriber Information: The Museum-L FAQ file is located at http://www.finalchapter.com/museum-l-faq/ . 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