Museums and Mobile Media (Kostas Arvanitis)
Building on findings of his previous research that looked at the use of mobile media outdoors to capture everyday meanings of archaeological monuments, Kostas is currently researching the use of mobile media inside museums for purposes of interpretation and learning. This study aims to explore the various issues and potentials in using common mobile phones as information and communication media in museums. It relates the use of mobile phones to the process of an extended visitor experience that takes place both inside and outside the museum walls. Drawing on projects and initiatives that have seen mobile phones as mediators of visitor experiences, it explores ways of taking advantage of this everyday, popular and familiar technology to disseminate museum knowledge and engage users with museum content. Issues of context, motivation and content, as well as personalisation and user-generated content are also investigated. Finally, technical and other limitations and operational concerns are considered.