Critics of crowd-sourcing assert that the process of co-creating digital knowledge necessarily entails the dumbing down of content, the stripping away of its historical context and the obliteration of authorial (or curatorial) perspective. I say, bah humbug! The outcomes of co-creation (as for any product) depend as much on the production process as the quality of any individual contributor. And this process can and should be designed into the product.
Wikipedia, arguably the most successful experiment in co-creation to date, has very clear and transparent principles and protocols for contribution. If you wonder what is behind any particular assertion, you can see the sources and visit the behinds the scenes discussions. Contrary to appearances, Click! -- a powerful and successful exhibit at the Brooklyn Museum -- was made possible by the careful and thorough structure created by its curatorial team. To say it emerged like a Dada creation would be to misunderstand the vision and prowess of these museum professionals.
Like Click! and Wikipedia, Open Museum was designed with an eye toward creating the optimal conditions for collaboration. One of those conditions is clarity of ownership. No one performs at their best if there is even the slightest possibility that someone else could mar or claim credit for their work. In Open Museum, curators own their museums through a variety of ways that are programmed into the site, including the layout and features. For instance, everyone's text -- the curators' and the visitors' -- appears near the object or discussion it refers to. Everyone's text, however, is not treated equally. The curator's text appears in larger font at the top of the screen and visitor comments appear in separate boxes, each one credited to its author.
Wikipedia, arguably the most successful experiment in co-creation to date, has very clear and transparent principles and protocols for contribution. If you wonder what is behind any particular assertion, you can see the sources and visit the behinds the scenes discussions. Contrary to appearances, Click! -- a powerful and successful exhibit at the Brooklyn Museum -- was made possible by the careful and thorough structure created by its curatorial team. To say it emerged like a Dada creation would be to misunderstand the vision and prowess of these museum professionals.
Like Click! and Wikipedia, Open Museum was designed with an eye toward creating the optimal conditions for collaboration. One of those conditions is clarity of ownership. No one performs at their best if there is even the slightest possibility that someone else could mar or claim credit for their work. In Open Museum, curators own their museums through a variety of ways that are programmed into the site, including the layout and features. For instance, everyone's text -- the curators' and the visitors' -- appears near the object or discussion it refers to. Everyone's text, however, is not treated equally. The curator's text appears in larger font at the top of the screen and visitor comments appear in separate boxes, each one credited to its author.
We believe that exhibits are stories that curators tell, and like all stories, they have an implicit point of view. In Open Museum, we permit curators to share their point of view, unfettered by others (within limits set by our terms of service). In turn, visitors are free -- in fact encouraged -- to express alternative and additional points of view which stand below the curated text and cannot be edited by the curator. Yet again in turn, the curator retains the power to promote or delete visitor comments. In this way, varying points of view can be accommodated and the various participants can maintain control over their contributions.
Since we believe fences, especially virtual ones, make good neighbors, at Open Museum we program in rules that make co-creation not only possible but satisfying. We hope collaboration between museum curators and visitors will lead to greater knowledge, creativity, and mutual appreciation. And that the world will become a better place because of this co-creation, by pooling our knowledge, exposing us to various points of view, and allowing us to talk to more and different people.
Many thanks to the AAM's Center on the Future of Museums, whose excellent post inspired this post.
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