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Turning cultural websites inside out: changes in online
user behaviour, Web 2.0
and the issues for the culture sector
Jane Finnis
Do you own an iPod? Maybe you share your photos on Flickr or watch videos on
YouTube? Well, if you do, you are part of the Web 2.0 revolution. Not a revolution in
what you are doing, but a revolution in the way you are doing it. The web is changing
the way we work and learn. In fact, I’m so interested in this idea that it is reflected in
the title of my blog: “Thoughts about the web and how it creates new ways of
working” (http://janefinnis.wordpress.com).
Has this online revolution hit the cultural sector yet? The answer is yes and no.
Some get it, some don’t. But the bottom line is that the impact of the online world is
growing and places like museums, galleries, archives and libraries have a
responsibility to make sure that they are part of it. Let’s be clear: we’re not talking
about some sort of real versus virtual debate. It is about the opportunities the online
world offers that coexist alongside those of the physical.
One of the key differences between the cultural sector and a lot of the biggest Web
2.0 sites or services is that the web services were born digital – their structure,
functionality, premise, purpose, delivery – everything was conceived to be online,
and the nature of the technology defines what they are and how they work. Those
businesses and services not born digital – i.e. everything else (including practically
all the websites from cultural organizations) – are mostly going through some process
of evolution, from the real to the virtual, and with varying degrees of success.
The same evolution is happening with people as well, as those of us who grew up in
schools without computers grapple with the “digital natives” 1 that most of our
children were born as.
1 http://www.digitalnative.org
Turning cultural websites inside out
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