How to Handle Hot Stuff? Part 2

So fears about Open Museum allayed -- even the fears of the nervous museum pro -- "How can you participate in Open Museum?"

I'll keep this brief and to point. Giving myself 10 minutes to make 10 points, I'd say that you can...

1. Be a visitor. Take in the fascinating content of the pilot museums and keep an eye out for the release of charter partner museums in the coming months. Register so that you receive the Object of the Week, an automatic email notification of a selected object.

2. Test the features. Register and try out the full range of Open Museum's nifty participatory features -- ranging from rating, tagging, and friending museums to commenting with texts and images.

3. Test the overall site. Give any and every aspect of the site a work out; look at its flow, design and performance; and let us know what you think.

4. Contribute content to a selected museum. As an amateur or expert, help enrich a particular museum's content and online community, by posting comments and questions, participating in discussions on the wall, or contacting the curator directly with pertinent information, in the form of text, audio, image, video, links.

5. Friend a museum. With a simple click on the heart icon, you can friend a museum, thereby showing them support and signing up to receive periodic notifications of updates to the collection. Of course, notifications can be turned off if you prefer!

6. Follow this blog, Museums without Borders. It features general museum issues, like photo policy and copyright, as well as specific information about Open Museum.

7. Follow us on twitter: @OM_o. Let us know what you're thinking and re-tweet the stuff you like.

8. Curate or co-curate a museum. Open Museum will eventually accommodate the full range of museum types, from institutional, bricks and mortar and fine arts to individual, born digital and natural history. For starters, we're working with selected bricks and mortar institutions to launch the public release. Contact us to inquire.

9. Spread the word. Invite your friends, family and colleagues to check it out, by sharing the link: www.openmuseum.org or using the Share this widget inside the site. Soon you'll be able to share from your cell phone, too.

10. Talk about Open Museum. In your digital communications and in person. At your staff, board and professional meetings. The talk doesn't even have to be good! (Though I hope that most of it is). Talking will help get the Open Museum ball rolling and in the right direction.