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Session title: "2010 Conference Review Roundtable"

Session chair: Douglas Hegley (General Manager of Digital Strategy, The Metropolitan Museum of Art)

Panelists/Presenters: Rob Lancefield (Manager of Museum Information Services / Registrar of Collections, Davison Art Center, Wesleyan University); Richard Urban (Doctoral Student, Graduate School of Library and Information Science, University of Illinois)

Presenters: Erin Coburn (The Metropolitan Museum of Art); Ted Forbes (Dallas Museum of Art); Paco Link (The J. Paul Getty Museum); Nancy Proctor, Head of Mobile Strategy & Initiatives, Smithsonian Institution; Ruth Ann Rugg (Texas Association of Museums); Beck Tench, Director for Innovation and Digital Engagement, NC Museum of Life and Science; Rachel Varon (New Media Consortium); Bruce Wyman (Second Story Interactive Studios); and possibly one or more surprise guest presenters!

Abstract:

An array of knowledgeable presenters will summarize their experiences and knowledge gained at other events relevant to our professional community during the past year. These include meetings of organizations including the American Association of Museums (AAM), International Committee for Documentation (CIDOC), International Council of Museums (ICOM), New Media Consortium (NMC), and Texas Association of Museums (TAM), and such conferences as Museums & the Web (MW2010), the Tate Handheld conference, WebWise, Design for Mobile, and more. The panelists will then analyze and synthesize this information, helping to illuminate trends and challenges for all of us. This session is ideal for MCN attendees whose travel budgets have been trimmed but who still wish to learn from across our active community, and for those who are seeking an analytic overview of technology trends that are creating a significant impact on our cultural heritage sector.

Session Info

• Type: Roundtable
• Keywords: conference, roundtable, Museums and the Web, AAM, WebWise, trends, challenges
• Relevance: All MCN attendees, but especially those unable to attend the array of related conferences and/or lacking the time to keep up with all of the information coming out of those events.

Presenter Bios

Douglas Hegley (chair)

Douglas Hegley joined the staff of The Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1997, finding a niche after a rather peripatetic career path, including stints within higher education and pediatric intervention. With a background in Fine Arts and Psychology, he probably should have understood where he belonged at an earlier date, but better late than never. His current responsibilities are shifting with a move into the Museum’s newly-created Department of Digital Media, but continue to include oversight of new technology initiatives, public-facing technologies (web, mobile, kiosk), and content-related projects. In addition, he is responsible for the strategies surrounding the management and production workflows of digital multimedia assets. Throughout his career, he has worked hard to demystify technology and to integrate it into the overall strategy and mission of the institution. At the 2010 MCN Conference in Austin, Texas he will assume the position of MCN Board President.

Rob Lancefield 

Rob Lancefield is Manager of Museum Information Services and Registrar of Collections at the Davison Art Center, Wesleyan University. Currently MCN Past President, he has been an MCN director and/or officer since 2002. As MCN President (2008-2009), Rob led the board's team efforts with a focus on community, transparency, and sustainability. He represents MCN on the AAM Council of Affiliates, serves on MCN's Electronic Services Committee, and is founding manager of the MCN Group on LinkedIn. His interests include technology strategy, standards, social media, digital identity, imaging, and collections information sharing. Rob's PhD dissertation in ethnomusicology addressed music, race, and intercultural aesthetic experience. He curated the exhibition "Performing Images, Embodying Race" on related aspects of U.S. visual culture. Lancefield also has written on how the repatriation of recorded sound can connect archives and heritage communities. In a parallel life, Rob is producing the digital reissue of a 1987 LP record by Talking Drums, an ensemble of Ghanaian and American musicians (including him), and is playing guitar more now than he had been for a while.

Richard Urban

Richard is currently a doctoral student at the Graduate School of Library and Information Science at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.   As a Graduate Research Assistant for the IMLS Digital Collections and Content Project, Richard participates in research on metadata, knowledge representation, and human-computer interaction for cultural heritage collections. His research interests in online library, archive and museum collections is informed by experience at the Collaborative Digitization Program, Historical Society of Pennsylvania and Historical Society of Delaware.