Long Road

I’m just finishing writing an NEH grant that seeks to leverage the Mukurtu system to produce a more adaptable open source software package and use that to link up Plateau Native American communities that work through WSU’s Plateau Center and with the WSU Museum of Anthropology. As I was working on the grant I came across this article in yesterday’s NYT suggeting that:

Many museums are discovering that the Web 2.0 world lets them advance their mission online to bring in new and often younger visitors and to educate a wider audience.

The article specifically looks at the use of social networking sites like Facebook by museums as a way to get people engaged. It also mentions the Flickr + Library of commons collaboration I blogged about before. These types of efforts are pushing the field to grapple with issues of access and curation in new ways. The article is a bit light, but still good to see that the issues is circulating.