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Elissa Frankle is the Social Media 
Strategist and Community Manager

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at United States Holocaust Memorial 
Museum here in Washington DC.

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The title of her talk today is 
"Making History with the Masses:

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Citizen History and Radical Trust in Museums.
So please join me in welcoming Elissa.

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(Elissa) Before I start I just wanted 
to thank you, the fine people

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here at MITH for inviting me in.

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As a Social Media Manager
I don't usually spend a lot of time

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talking in front of the audiences anymore.
As I am thinking of the community

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behind the computer. This is a really
treat for me to actually be able

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to come out and talk with my voice about
things that are important to me, one of those

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things being citizen history
in a world of our users, and the work

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we do, as museums and cultural organizations.

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One of the things that is really important
in all of this is just to look at

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the words that we use when we're
talking about the way we interact

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with our users. So, in a sense
what we're going to talk about today

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is really what is citizen history?
Not just "what is citizen history"

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as a concept, but what is citizen,
what is history? And what's a museum?

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Really big concepts, really interesting
things and I don't promise to have

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all the answers today, because 
most of these cases, there aren't

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real answers. That is the best part.

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But we're going to try and get a little bit
of the why to explore some of these questions.

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And see where we could get it
unlocking what would be the critical question,

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of what is citizen history,
and what can it be in the future.

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So Citizen History kind of came into being,
from it's early origins in Citizen Science

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and Crowdsourcing. Two other ways that
other fields have looked at using their

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public, to get down and dirty with their data.
We'll look at each of these in turn,

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first of all, starting with crowdsourcing.
Now, when you go to look at crowdsourcing

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on the internet, one of the first sites 
you'll run into is crowdsource.com

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Not surprisingly. And they promise 
500, 000 workers on demand.

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And what they promise for those workers
is that your data will be dealt with -- with results.

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In a speedy manner. So really using the crowd,
using the number of people you can just get

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cranking away on some amount of data,
some amount of rote tasks,

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to produce whatever the desired result is.
So the question here with crowdsourcing

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isn't so much about big answers
and big interaction, but it's more about

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a lot of people doing a lot of little things.
Museums and local organizations apply

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this crowdsourcing principle in a lot of
different ways. One of the projects we're

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talking about at lunch actually is
New York Public Library


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What's On the Menu Project, 
and it's companion project

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recently released, or about-to-be released,
the Ensemble Project.

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But in this case, transcribing menus,
and the other case, in transcribing playbills.

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Taking what's on the menu, what is on the playbill,
written it down into it's component parts,

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just saying, what do you see here,
what is the food that you see on this menu,

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and have someone transcribe that,
by some user. As a result, again, small task,

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just transcription where you look at it,
what is it that you see, you write down

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whatever it is that you see.
No real depth of thought

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going into to it, but again, a lot of
people working on a very small task

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for a long time, creating big results.
The other form of crowdsourcing

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that we see quite frequently
in cultural heritage organizations

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is the idea of, not necessarily putting
lots of small tasks into play,

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but working more from a 
knowledge base, that the person has --

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the user have some kind of knowledge
that is personal to that person,

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that they then share with the Cultural
Heritage Organization.

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So again, not a lot of deep thought,
deep interaction with content,

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but a lot of sharing up, personally.
So rather than citizen history,

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the topic of what we're going
to talk about next, we have the history

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of citizens, growing on this kind of
crowdsourced environment.

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So if you are going to talk about crowdsourcing
we're going to talk about all these things,

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with framework in Bloom's Taxonomy,
this is an educational philosophy

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framework developed by Benjamin Bloom.
They talk about the different ways that

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students can engage with learning. 
Everything from just remembering,

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kind of that rote level of "I see what it is, 
I think about it, I write it back down"

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So the regurgitation model of looking
at that knowledge, they're understanding it,

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being able to classifying things, 
up to application, they are able

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to choose to interpret, to draw
some kind of conclusion.

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And all the way at the top, to creation.
Starting from scratch, creating a product

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all by one's self. Crowdsourcing,
we tend to think it comes down,

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about this remembering, understanding,
basic level of proposition.

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This is not to say there's not value in it,
but it is just, it is very much on a rote level.

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I see what I have in front of me, 
I take it, I transcribe it, I translate it,

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and I spit it back out in a usable format.
I have the knowledge in my head,

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I have some stories that I want to share
that I've been asked to share.

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And I take it out of my head, 
and I write it down, and then to you.

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So crowdsourcing, microtasks,
on a macro scale.

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So lots of small things, lots of people together,
sharing their personal knowledge, or basic skills,

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really relying on that wisdom of the crowd.
So by having a lot of people working on

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something together, eventually something
will be completed, and answers will be given.

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Citizen science goes a little bit higher up, 
[inaudible]

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We're going to look now at two projects
From the Citizen Science Alliance,

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or the 'zooniverse' family of
citizen science projects.

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Here we see Galaxy Zoo, where
the Citizen Science Alliance

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and its partner organizations 
have pictures of galaxies.

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And they walk through a four step process,
where they ask questions about what

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the users see in these galaxies. 
Are they round? Are they spiral?

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What kinds of bulges do you see?
Just being able to classify what it is they're

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looking at by sight. Similarly we have 
Planet Hunters, this is a, well,

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from their tutorial, where they walk through
premises on how you can identify a transit.

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Ways in which these levels that we see here,
dip down, when a planet transit is identified.

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So we have again the small idea of looking, classifying, 
making a note, but in both these cases

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we also have this very exciting thing
that is a "free text box", where someone says

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"Do you see anything that is of interest,
is there anything that you want to discuss,

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from what you've seen?" So more than just
seeing, repeating, replicating, we have

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the ability to discuss, to take things 
to a higher level, to really reflect on

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what it is that we're seeing. 
So crowdsourcing, again, down

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at that lower level of Bloom's Taxonomy,
citizen science is the ability to go

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a little bit higher. Thinking about applying 
the knowledge that you have,

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what you gained from doing the project,
thinking about science on a larger scale.

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So our basic principles of 
Citizen Science say these these are

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volunteers, non-specialists,
people who are not trained in science

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Governed by and under the leadership 
of people who know what they're doing in science,

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and have that training, or that title
of scientist, to answer real-world questions.

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Because scientists don't want people 
to just look at galaxies for their help,

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though they are pretty just to look at anyway,
they want people to look at those galaxies

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so they can classify them and
know more about what's going on

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out there. In one article that I read 
about galaxies, they mentioned that

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they first know what's successful when
they classify the amount of time,

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the amount of results found by these
citizen scientists, and the number of

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person hours that would have taken
for the original researcher who was going through

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by hand, on his own, looking at all these
galaxies on his own, to go through,

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and make these same distinctions.
They can do about fifty thousand a week,

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seventy thousand done in the first two days,
so it's a lot of things that you can do.

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Again, small tasks, macro scale, 
lots of people, find the answers.

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So it seems to be a win-win proposition
for everybody. Professionals get data,

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volunteers build skills. They learn how to
look at a galaxy, what is it that they are

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looking at when they look at a galaxy.
How you identify it, the transit of a planet.

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So the real skills that a scientist use to
try and answer some of their questions,

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these citizen scientists actually get to use
on their own. So everybody wins, alright.

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In 2006, the United States Holocaust Memorial
Museum opened an exhibition called

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"Give me your children: Voices 
from the Lodz Ghetto" This was an exhibition

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built around a student diarist,
child diarist, who then lived in the Lodz Ghetto,

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after 1940. One of the artifacts that
was part of this exhibition was an album.

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An album of 14,000 names, signed by the students
of the Lodz Ghetto, presented to

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(Mordechai) Chaim Rumkowski, who was the 
administrator, on Rosh Hashanah,

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the Jewish newyear, 1941.
So we have this incredible artifact,

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this album full of signatures, and
we knew nothing about it.

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We knew that these were students
who had signed their names.

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We knew that they were about 
thirty or so different schools

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who had students sign their names.
And we had another document that

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gave us some framework as to how old
these students were in each school.

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But, the question that we asked
as we brought this album forth

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was could you have
today's students, look through

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our data for the things that
we would normally be used

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as researchers at the museum,
and try to figure out who these students were,

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as well as what happened to them.
This was really an experimental project,

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the question wasn't just "What happened
to those children?" but would it actually work

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to put today's students
at work, trying to figure out who these

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students of [yesteryear] were.
Seven years into the project

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we still call this an experimental
citizen history project.

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We're still very much in beta, 
we're still trying to figure out

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where all the lessons are.
But we do at least have a platform.

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Here I'll show you the URL for this
on the next slide.

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This is the Children of the Lodz Ghetto
Memorial Research Project,

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we have, at this point, about
8500 names available for research.

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We have them up, transcribed 
in the database, and our student users

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and volunteer users go through, 
select a name they want to research,

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and then go into our databases and see
if they could figure out who the person was,

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who most likely sign their name in the album.
Then figuring that out, figuring out who

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their most likely candidate is, going through
outlets even further, to see if they can

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figure out what happened to that person,
after the Ghetto. Were they able to

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survive the war, did they perish, where,
if so. So we have, as we seen in other

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crowdsourcing and citizen science projects
up here, we have a framework

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where we ask you to put into our research.
What was the name that you found?

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What was the date of birth if there was one?
What street addresses did you find,

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associated with this person?
And we also have this all important

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free textbox, where we ask, not only,
how was it that you're able to come

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across who this person was, but talk
to us about the process.

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What was it that made you realize 
that this was the right person,

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as opposed to some other [inaudible name].
How did you know? What was it

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about the document, what can you
determine about the document?

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So having done again, the higher order
thinking of "What do we do, when

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we look at documents?" and 
"What can we know from the document?"

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and "What do we simply not know?" We've seen from the document that a lot of students like to jump to conclusions

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that "Oh couldn't find anything else 
beyond stage 1, this person clearly

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must have perished in [inaudible]
there's nothing else to be found."

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Quite frankly the answer to that is,
well, no, the only thing that we know

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we can't find the document is that,
we don't know yet.

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The document just isn't there.
Doesn't tell us anything, just tell us

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there are big gaps. I want to talk
about these big gaps momentarily.

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They themselves are actually a big part
of citizen history museums.

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So, going back to our friendly 
framework of Bloom's Taxonomy,

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keeping crowdsourcing down here 
at the lower level, citizen history tries

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to go even higher. Getting people not only
to analyze a text but also to analyze

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their thinking, to reflect on what it is that 
they are doing. And really recognize

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they are building skills. In addition,
they are still going through, helping us

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researchers try and answer these
big questions in history.

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So we put a lot of our trust in their hands,
put a lot of documents out there,

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and then ask them to reflect
on their process, and on the process

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of doing history in general.

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So, knowing that much, knowing 
our framework with this project that

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we have, let's return to our title
and talk about some words.

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Because we present today only one
possible framework, one possible

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working nature of citizen history. 
There are a lot of best practices

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that we could draw from this,
we all have to go back to the words

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that we use. For instance, what is
a citizen? Citizens, we usually talk

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about them as citizens of nation,
citizens of a group of people,

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who are members of a certain group.
And these citizen have two things.

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They have rights and they have responsibilities.
Well, we museums, we're really good at

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responsibilities. We're really good at saying
"Please, come in to our museum space,

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But here's all the things that you can't do:
don't eat, don't drink, don't smoke,

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don't take pictures, don't poke
the priceless raw files."

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But, what is it that we can give our 
visitors, our users, the people who

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come in our space, as far as
the rights go. We're not particular

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good at saying "here's what you can do,
with our stuff." So if we actually

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set out to create a citizen project,
what we need to be able to do,

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is to give people both responsibilities 
as well as rights in that space

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that we create. Furthermore, 
going on to history.

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History, in this case, we have to 
take within the framework

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of history in a museum.
Since history is really messy.

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There's a lot of different theories
on what history is, as far as I can tell.

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History itself really has
no big answers, no big truth.

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History, as it stands right now,
is just based on the documents.

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The interpretations that we had 
at our disposal in this moment.

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So that they change tomorrow,
when a new archive is open,

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a new interpretation comes along,
something that makes us rethink

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everything that we've ever thought
to be true, about a certain part of the field.

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History takes interpretation, and history
is a constant asymptotic approach.

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To the truth, without really any expectations
that it will ever achieve the truth itself.

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That one big knowledge about
what history is, or may be.

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Museums don't really like messy.
We like to be able to put things

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up on our walls, put the text up and
leave it there for a long time.

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Now whatever the interpretation is, 
that we have to take from this original data,

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from our understanding of history,
we pick one frame, and that's

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what we put up. Hanging on the walls
and say, "Here you go visitors,

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this is truth, this is what happened in this
historical period." And because we are really good at

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broadcast model, we're not particularly
good at listening back.

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And hearing all the questions people
might have, say look at this one interpretation,

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that we have put forward, about history.
So when you're talking about the opposite

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of the broadcast model, the idea that 
history is messy, there are

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no answers, we want to be able to have 
citizens in our space. Really get down

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to questions of trust. 
Museums often say that we are

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instruments of public trust. The public
places a lot of their trust in us,

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to be able to say, this is fact, this is truth.
You're coming to my museum,

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to learn something, and you'd expect
that the knowledge being just

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passed down to you, given to you
and you'll osmose it, from looking

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at our wall text, and seeing our artifacts.
And that what you'll know.

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But of course, we now know that
history is messier than that.

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And simply heading down one 
interpretation, one framework,

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is not sufficient. It's just one way
of looking at things.

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But if museums were actually 
going to open up all these interpretations

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of history, all these different frameworks
and ways of going about it,

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would that then, hurt their ability
to be instruments of public trust?

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By trusting the public, it then help
correct our image as organizations

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that can be trusted in society.
We kind of have this Circle of Trust,

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that we keep on down low,
and inside our own frameworks,

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among our own staff in museums.
And in the Circle of Trust we have

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often the really scary things that
we don't really want to talk about.

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Like the fact that we don't know 
everything. We like to pretend that we do,

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but we really don't. And there's a lot
of information or questions in our

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collections where there's answers
might be, we just, maybe, haven't

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gone through our collections
as deeply as we might like,

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00:15:41,933 --> 00:15:45,242
because there's a lot of them. There's 
a lot of stuff out there, there's

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00:15:45,242 --> 00:15:48,262
a lot of data. It takes a long time to
get through it. There might be answers

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out there that will completely change
the way we present this information.

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<i>Whispers</i> [inaudible]

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00:15:53,580 --> 00:15:56,668
And the fact of the matter is,
that as we answer these questions

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we're not going to find any big truth,
any big answers, again, this constant

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00:16:00,935 --> 00:16:04,378
asymptotic approach to what the truth
might be, we're just going to find

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00:16:04,378 --> 00:16:08,319
more questions. We're just going to have
an even further path ahead of us.

248
00:16:08,319 --> 00:16:11,532
But we really don't like to talk about that,
so you should know it well enough.

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We place ours -- it's kind of hard to 
see here,-- but there's a big red brick wall

250
00:16:15,254 --> 00:16:18,647
around this circle of trust, because 
we don't like to talk about it, or to share

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00:16:18,647 --> 00:16:23,497
it with the public. But what if we do?
What if we actually accept that there are

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people out there, who wanted to know
that we have questions. Who want

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00:16:26,885 --> 00:16:31,714
to know what's still out there to be seen
and to be discovered, who realize that

254
00:16:31,714 --> 00:16:35,495
museums maybe don't really know everything.
And they're really curious about what's

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sitting inside that Circle of Trust.
What haven't we explored yet.

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00:16:40,083 --> 00:16:43,776
So, what if the museum said,
"well yeah, there's a lot of really messy

257
00:16:43,776 --> 00:16:48,250
stuff in there, things that we haven't 
explore, a lot of questions, that we still

258
00:16:48,250 --> 00:16:52,720
have to go through? And then we 
actually take the curiosity of our visitors

259
00:16:52,720 --> 00:16:56,142
into play, they actually say "Well yeah,
we've got questions too.

260
00:16:56,142 --> 00:17:00,280
And we've been trying to ask them, 
you just haven't been listening to us."

261
00:17:00,280 --> 00:17:03,091
Well we have to warn them first,
it's kind of messy in there, it's really

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kind of scary. And as we help them to enter
the Circle of Trust where we keep

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00:17:09,926 --> 00:17:12,835
all of our questions and our data,
and our unknown unknowns,

264
00:17:12,835 --> 00:17:16,469
those questions that lead to further questions.
There's places where we have no data,

265
00:17:16,469 --> 00:17:19,689
those things that we're really curious
about, and we wish that this one more archive

266
00:17:19,689 --> 00:17:24,440
would open up, that we'd be able to get to their stuff.
That might have some of those answers.

267
00:17:24,440 --> 00:17:27,795
There's places where there are gaps
in the record.

268
00:17:28,437 --> 00:17:31,324
We wouldn't just sign our visitors
into there, completely unequipped.

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00:17:31,324 --> 00:17:35,370
We'd give them a tool kit,
we'd give them some binoculars,

270
00:17:35,370 --> 00:17:38,031
so they'd be able to look closer at things.
We'd give them a wrench,

271
00:17:38,031 --> 00:17:40,155
that they can actually go through
and tweak the data, see what

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00:17:40,155 --> 00:17:42,773
they are playing with, messing around,
in the stuff that we have,

273
00:17:42,773 --> 00:17:46,820
as well as a hardhat, because, well,
who knows what will fall out

274
00:17:46,820 --> 00:17:50,091
when we actually shake the history
and what's in there.

275
00:17:50,091 --> 00:17:55,038
So this toolkit are the things that allow
citizens, our visitors, our volunteers, our users,

276
00:17:55,038 --> 00:17:59,020
to enter this space, this Circle of Trust,
the things that we're really curious about.

277
00:17:59,020 --> 00:18:02,997
To enter into our questions and into
our data. Working in partnership with us.

278
00:18:02,997 --> 00:18:04,727
To answer these questions.

279
00:18:04,988 --> 00:18:08,962
Some of these when we look at citizen
history, are the questions historians have

280
00:18:08,962 --> 00:18:13,327
for themselves. The ways that historians
do history, history as a process.

281
00:18:13,327 --> 00:18:16,533
So how does historians look at a source?
What's available to us in the source

282
00:18:16,533 --> 00:18:19,010
and what's the context for it.
What questions are we trying

283
00:18:19,010 --> 00:18:23,361
to answer by looking at the source.
What's new? What might we be unlocking

284
00:18:23,361 --> 00:18:26,320
with this source, what are we looking at
that might not have been considered before?

285
00:18:26,320 --> 00:18:29,283
What's in your interpretation, a new 
piece of data, it's pointing us

286
00:18:29,283 --> 00:18:34,411
in a new place. In the case of the
Children of the Lodz Ghetto project,

287
00:18:34,411 --> 00:18:37,515
we've been able to identify a couple of
these pointers. Then our citizens

288
00:18:37,515 --> 00:18:41,076
as they go through try to identify these
children, have an easier time in

289
00:18:41,076 --> 00:18:45,629
going through our stuff, because we know that 
naming conventions in 1920s and 1930s

290
00:18:45,629 --> 00:18:49,789
were a little different than you might expect
here in the States, because your

291
00:18:49,789 --> 00:18:52,886
average student would have a Polish name,
and an Yiddish name, and probably

292
00:18:52,886 --> 00:18:55,730
an nickname, maybe even a middle
name. All of which could be used in

293
00:18:55,730 --> 00:18:58,476
any number of documents. So then
you'll be able to accept there are

294
00:18:58,476 --> 00:19:02,030
a lot of names for the same person, 
helps people to be able to read sources

295
00:19:02,030 --> 00:19:04,739
and jump to fewer conclusions.
Be able to be more open,

296
00:19:04,739 --> 00:19:07,834
to different interpretations and
different names that maybe out there.

297
00:19:07,834 --> 00:19:11,373
In addition, we're working with a mostly
American audience. So being able to tell

298
00:19:11,373 --> 00:19:15,459
our users that in these documents
you'll going to see the day first,

299
00:19:15,459 --> 00:19:19,522
and then the month, helps them better
to unlock what it is they're seeing.

300
00:19:19,522 --> 00:19:23,845
And instead of putting their American lens
onto it, have a better understanding

301
00:19:23,845 --> 00:19:29,109
of what it is they are actually seeing.
So, thus hardhatted, and wrenched,

302
00:19:29,109 --> 00:19:33,024
and binoculared, we send our users
into the Circle of Trust, and while

303
00:19:33,024 --> 00:19:35,525
we're at it we might as well jump into
that Circle of Trust.

304
00:19:35,525 --> 00:19:39,469
We might as well bring the museum
into that Circle of Trust, accept that

305
00:19:39,469 --> 00:19:41,157
we have questions and more data
and unknown unknowns.

306
00:19:41,157 --> 00:19:45,251
And we're all in this together.
And a funny thing happens.

307
00:19:45,251 --> 00:19:48,159
Because rather than being our usual
broadcaster model museums

308
00:19:48,159 --> 00:19:52,855
just going out and say, "Here's truth,
take it in." We actually have conversation.

309
00:19:52,855 --> 00:19:55,964
We have users talking to the museum
and the museum talking back.

310
00:19:55,964 --> 00:19:58,615
We have users talking to one another,
helping each other to grow through

311
00:19:58,615 --> 00:20:02,657
their research, and as these questions
and conversations iterate back and forth,

312
00:20:02,657 --> 00:20:05,862
back and forth, we actually have 
more growth than we would've had

313
00:20:05,862 --> 00:20:09,401
when we're just a museum talking
to itself. Or just users speaking to one another.

314
00:20:09,401 --> 00:20:12,496
Because the museum still have
a really important role to play.

315
00:20:12,496 --> 00:20:15,566
We are the scaffolders. In addition
to giving people our questions,

316
00:20:15,647 --> 00:20:19,167
our honest research, our data, 
we're the ones who can help our users

317
00:20:19,167 --> 00:20:24,550
to go from just coming in out of curiosity
to actually going out with a skill set.

318
00:20:24,550 --> 00:20:29,738
Things they can use and apply in their
own lives beyond just the Circle of Trust.

319
00:20:29,738 --> 00:20:32,138
So what do we get out of this?
When we open up our users

320
00:20:32,138 --> 00:20:37,066
and the museum itself to accepting
we have questions, data, and unknown unknowns,

321
00:20:37,066 --> 00:20:40,397
the museum gets connections. Connections
among their [inaudible], again,

322
00:20:40,397 --> 00:20:44,471
kind of a crowdsourcing model of lots of people
looking at our stuff, at the same time,

323
00:20:44,471 --> 00:20:48,464
drawing, from the wisdom of the crowd,
some of these answers.

324
00:20:48,464 --> 00:20:51,096
We do get some of these answers to
some of these questions that we have

325
00:20:51,096 --> 00:20:54,760
and we get more questions, of course.
Everytime we try to answer a question

326
00:20:54,760 --> 00:20:57,397
we just end up with more questions 
and more directions that we could

327
00:20:57,397 --> 00:20:59,601
take our research in.
And perhaps these are questions

328
00:20:59,601 --> 00:21:03,469
we haven't considered before. Because
we've got people coming in with fresh eyes.

329
00:21:03,570 --> 00:21:06,948
Looking at our stuff in ways we might not 
have considered before. And thus

330
00:21:06,948 --> 00:21:10,450
where we would already have more questions,
we have more and more questions.

331
00:21:10,450 --> 00:21:15,847
It's great! So what do our users get out of it?
Now that the museum's gotten all this

332
00:21:15,847 --> 00:21:20,017
good stuff from the people who work 
in their data. Well, the user discover.

333
00:21:20,017 --> 00:21:23,345
What we know, truth about history.
That there are no simple answers, that

334
00:21:23,345 --> 00:21:27,793
history is messy. In a lot of cases they
also get a very personal connection

335
00:21:27,793 --> 00:21:30,933
to the history. We've discovered that
from our users at least.

336
00:21:30,933 --> 00:21:34,361
We have students working on research
about students, they get very personally

337
00:21:34,361 --> 00:21:38,899
invested in looking at these individuals,
their lives, their families, and what happened

338
00:21:38,899 --> 00:21:43,109
to them. So having a personal connection
to this one aspect of history often helps them

339
00:21:43,109 --> 00:21:46,010
being a greater personal connection
to the rest of history as well.

340
00:21:46,010 --> 00:21:49,995
And frankly, we don't ask them
to give back their hardhats, their wrenches,

341
00:21:49,995 --> 00:21:53,591
their binoculars when they leave.
We let them keep it.

342
00:21:53,591 --> 00:21:56,267
So they take all of these great skills
they have developed, within

343
00:21:56,267 --> 00:22:01,317
the Circle of Trust, within the museum's
setting, and take them out into the world.

344
00:22:01,317 --> 00:22:06,147
Because really what's at stake here
isn't just citizens being citizens of our sphere

345
00:22:06,147 --> 00:22:08,841
having rights and responsibilities
where we are, but it's about their

346
00:22:08,841 --> 00:22:12,781
citizenship. One of the great things about
the study of history, the process

347
00:22:12,781 --> 00:22:15,680
that we go through as we look at 
history, is that a lot of the skills

348
00:22:15,680 --> 00:22:20,362
that we use looking at a document,
making an argument, talking to one another,

349
00:22:20,362 --> 00:22:24,640
are also skills for the public sphere.
And on the internet today, it's kind of

350
00:22:24,640 --> 00:22:30,134
a murky monkey place, where there's 
a lot of debate and dialogue going on,

351
00:22:30,134 --> 00:22:34,474
without a lot of people talking to 
or listening to one another.

352
00:22:34,474 --> 00:22:37,542
So what if we're actually be able to
go into this digital area where our

353
00:22:37,542 --> 00:22:41,925
citizen history lives, dig people out, you know,
have this skill set of being able to

354
00:22:41,925 --> 00:22:46,207
look critically at a source, think critically
about what they're hearing, and being able

355
00:22:46,207 --> 00:22:50,095
to form a cogent argument,
having send them back out to the murk

356
00:22:50,095 --> 00:22:53,858
of the internet, and see what happens.
See if we could actually improve

357
00:22:53,858 --> 00:22:58,277
civil discourse, by having this new 
generation not of trained historians

358
00:22:58,277 --> 00:23:03,647
but of people trying to think historically.
Take their skill set back out into the world.

359
00:23:03,647 --> 00:23:08,169
So let's go back to our words. 
Citizen history and radical trust in museums.

360
00:23:08,169 --> 00:23:11,867
What does this mean for best practices
for citizen history? Well, museums,

361
00:23:11,867 --> 00:23:16,533
we have to remember that we're more
than just our four walls. That we are also

362
00:23:16,533 --> 00:23:19,346
the additional space for the people
who come in to our walls.

363
00:23:19,346 --> 00:23:22,600
They need to be able to think beyond
just what we want to present.

364
00:23:22,600 --> 00:23:26,111
In this very closed box. They are
to think about the larger conversations

365
00:23:26,111 --> 00:23:31,903
going on around us, in the world at large.
History is living, breathing, growing --

366
00:23:31,935 --> 00:23:34,565
something that is constantly evolves.
In an early version of this talk

367
00:23:34,644 --> 00:23:38,423
I didn't have history made history,
history is shared. History is noise,

368
00:23:38,423 --> 00:23:42,083
and that was more active than just 
the static noun, of history.

369
00:23:42,083 --> 00:23:46,467
Because history should never be static.
So the knowledge that history is constantly

370
00:23:46,467 --> 00:23:50,696
growing and evolving and changing,
and what is true for history today

371
00:23:50,696 --> 00:23:53,932
might not be true tomorrow.
Also means that when we have our projects

372
00:23:53,932 --> 00:23:56,841
going on we need to be able to take
whatever it is that we're learning,

373
00:23:56,841 --> 00:23:59,810
and reiterated back into the project.
To be able to have the assumptions

374
00:23:59,810 --> 00:24:03,204
that we make for our citizen users 
grow and change, something learn

375
00:24:03,204 --> 00:24:05,790
more and more from.

376
00:24:05,790 --> 00:24:09,394
Citizens have rights and responsibilities
in your online space, you've gotta be able to

377
00:24:09,394 --> 00:24:13,426
let them in. Because it's not just enough
to say "Come in and look at our stuff

378
00:24:13,426 --> 00:24:16,409
precisely the way that we want you to."
We have to be able to give them the right

379
00:24:16,605 --> 00:24:20,239
to go into our data, muff around and see
what they are curious about within that

380
00:24:20,239 --> 00:24:25,604
framework, and send us their questions 
for whatever it is that they've uncovered.

381
00:24:25,604 --> 00:24:28,092
Trust is hugely public, as we just talked
about, it's really the Circle of Trust,

382
00:24:28,092 --> 00:24:32,658
the idea of the public trust, and the fact
that opening our trust to the public

383
00:24:32,658 --> 00:24:35,740
doesn't break down our trust.
It's as if it's becoming a partnership,

384
00:24:35,740 --> 00:24:38,420
the way that we can all grow from working 
together. So we have to be able to

385
00:24:38,420 --> 00:24:44,000
welcome our community into our questions,
and be able to, willing, to take our authority

386
00:24:44,000 --> 00:24:47,338
out just enough to be able to say,
"Alright, what answers do you have?

387
00:24:47,338 --> 00:24:51,951
What questions do you have for us,
what can you do to bring in to our sphere,

388
00:24:51,951 --> 00:24:58,144
to help us all grow together."
And frankly the all important word, and.

389
00:24:59,225 --> 00:25:05,097
It's really bridging here, not just citizen history,
and radical trust of museums, or just

390
00:25:05,177 --> 00:25:09,337
citizens, and museums. It's really about 
partnership and dialogue.

391
00:25:09,337 --> 00:25:13,306
Whenever we look at this, it's not just about
two things working across purposes,

392
00:25:13,306 --> 00:25:16,740
it's people who think they'll be working
together. In a partnership.

393
00:25:16,740 --> 00:25:20,332
So not only it's this about our citizens,
it's also about what the museum must do

394
00:25:20,332 --> 00:25:23,380
within the space, so we have to be able to
scaffold the skills we want to build,

395
00:25:23,380 --> 00:25:26,904
we have to be able to engage our users.
This community takes a lot of caring

396
00:25:26,904 --> 00:25:30,257
and feeding, a lot of time. To be able to
make sure people are getting the skills,

397
00:25:30,257 --> 00:25:34,021
building the skills, learning the things
that we'll hope they'd take away from this.

398
00:25:34,021 --> 00:25:38,101
And be able to say "We may not have the
historical authority in this space,

399
00:25:38,101 --> 00:25:41,939
we have the understanding. How you go 
about, thinking historically, let's help you

400
00:25:41,939 --> 00:25:48,334
grow, let's all move along this continuum 
together. So, finally, instead of best practices

401
00:25:48,334 --> 00:25:53,388
I think about from these different ideas about
citizens, history, and museums, you need to

402
00:25:53,388 --> 00:25:56,318
be able to start with a question that
begs answers. Something that is actually

403
00:25:56,318 --> 00:25:59,811
a legit question in history. It's not enough
just to give people busy work

404
00:25:59,811 --> 00:26:03,948
and say "Go." This is gotta be something
that museums are actually curious about.

405
00:26:03,948 --> 00:26:06,689
Furthermore, we'll have to be able to
welcome these fresh eyes into our stuff.

406
00:26:06,907 --> 00:26:10,809
We don't need everyone to be trained 
historians right off the bat, but that

407
00:26:10,809 --> 00:26:14,978
there's actually value in having people
not necessarily worked with this data,

408
00:26:14,978 --> 00:26:18,701
with this period of history, or with these
historical skills before, coming in

409
00:26:18,701 --> 00:26:21,975
and looking at our stuff. We need 
to be able to iterate and dialogue.

410
00:26:21,975 --> 00:26:25,240
Again, keeping in mind that this is
never static, this should never stay

411
00:26:25,240 --> 00:26:28,838
in one place for very long, that our 
projects need to constantly be

412
00:26:28,838 --> 00:26:31,772
evaluated and reevaluated, taking
knowledge that we've learned,

413
00:26:31,772 --> 00:26:35,118
putting it back into the project,
and remembering it's always about

414
00:26:35,118 --> 00:26:39,183
the dialogue between the museum
and it's users. Between users and users.

415
00:26:39,183 --> 00:26:42,627
The conversation that goes on in that space
is just as important what we find out

416
00:26:42,627 --> 00:26:46,781
from it. We need to make sure that
there is that space, for debate and discussion.

417
00:26:46,781 --> 00:26:50,041
We've got some place for these people to go,
to be able to talk comfortably

418
00:26:50,041 --> 00:26:53,373
to one another. We have to be able to
create opportunities for growth,

419
00:26:53,679 --> 00:26:56,219
as people find that they are getting 
more and more into these skills,

420
00:26:56,219 --> 00:26:58,563
learning more and more about
what they are doing. We need to

421
00:26:58,563 --> 00:27:01,167
make sure that there's some place 
for them to go, beyond just the basic

422
00:27:01,167 --> 00:27:05,513
level of citizen history. In the Lodz Project,
for instance, we have a level called

423
00:27:05,513 --> 00:27:09,711
expert reviewer, when users have gotten
really good at doing the basic research

424
00:27:09,727 --> 00:27:13,837
that we ask them to do, we can then elevate
them to the expert reviewer, and then

425
00:27:13,837 --> 00:27:16,742
as a result, they are then asked
to go through and review the research

426
00:27:16,742 --> 00:27:21,217
that their colleagues, their peers have done.
We elevate peers to a higher level,

427
00:27:21,217 --> 00:27:24,732
they then go talk to their peers
as greater authority figures,

428
00:27:24,732 --> 00:27:27,416
thus giving them a little bit more
empowerment and also give them

429
00:27:27,416 --> 00:27:32,814
their peers an opportunity to realize
that there's opportunity for growth.

430
00:27:32,814 --> 00:27:35,378
(Student) And what's after that?
(Elissa) What's after that?

431
00:27:35,378 --> 00:27:39,716
That's a great question. Once we've worked
out the expert reviewer a little bit more,

432
00:27:39,716 --> 00:27:43,544
I'm hoping we'll find out.
That's part of our next iteration

433
00:27:43,544 --> 00:27:47,409
as we learn more. And finally this 
community need a lot of caring

434
00:27:47,409 --> 00:27:49,630
and feeding. You gotta make sure 
you've got a community manager

435
00:27:49,630 --> 00:27:51,995
that is really, willing to be boots
on the ground, constantly working

436
00:27:51,995 --> 00:27:57,456
with your people, with your users,
with your citizens. And being there

437
00:27:57,456 --> 00:28:01,128
to answer their questions, to help them
get through the murk of the unknown

438
00:28:01,128 --> 00:28:04,896
unknowns, you know, there's still
value in there. Citizen history has

439
00:28:04,896 --> 00:28:09,001
truly been one of the great lapse 
of my professional life, and the more

440
00:28:09,001 --> 00:28:13,330
that I talk to users, learn from users,
understanding this that we do,

441
00:28:13,330 --> 00:28:17,304
the more I like our users, the more that 
I love having them in our space,

442
00:28:17,304 --> 00:28:22,472
to be able to learn from them.
And because you today are my citizens here,

443
00:28:22,472 --> 00:28:25,283
love to hear if you have any questions?

444
00:28:25,283 --> 00:28:27,927
<i>Clapping</i>

445
00:28:30,410 --> 00:28:35,173
(Host) Sure I got lots. Thank you for giving us
an idea of what you do, and [inaudible]

446
00:28:35,173 --> 00:28:40,107
you are at it for seven years. You talked about
museums as if there is this, sort of,

447
00:28:40,107 --> 00:28:44,346
global museum - of course there are different museums -
but even within the Holocaust museum,

448
00:28:44,346 --> 00:28:49,659
could you talk about how, what kind of
responses, support, and sponsorship

449
00:28:49,659 --> 00:28:59,853
you've gotten from curators, staff, directors,
boards of trustees, sponsors, members, donors?

450
00:28:59,853 --> 00:29:02,889
(Elissa) Well this is little bit of where that
radical part comes in, those words in the title

451
00:29:02,889 --> 00:29:07,518
that we didn't talk about. I kinda dispense
the word radical pretty early on

452
00:29:07,518 --> 00:29:11,355
in the preparation process because this is
really what museums are all about.

453
00:29:11,355 --> 00:29:15,077
(Audience Member) It's hardly radical anymore.
(Elissa) Right, but within the framework

454
00:29:15,077 --> 00:29:19,140
of the Holocaust museum it kind of is.
We're still very much nervous about

455
00:29:19,140 --> 00:29:22,824
having anybody who isn't us working
on our data, one of the reason why it's been

456
00:29:22,824 --> 00:29:26,158
in beta for seven years, because we're
worried about saying "The museum

457
00:29:26,158 --> 00:29:29,747
is doing this project where we're putting
our data our there, come be part of us,

458
00:29:29,747 --> 00:29:34,384
and look at whatever you want."
Because some elements in the museum

459
00:29:34,384 --> 00:29:37,776
are worried that they are going to ask
for more data to be out there,

460
00:29:37,776 --> 00:29:42,610
Things that we aren't necessarily ready
to have, out there there aren't very -- yea.

461
00:29:42,610 --> 00:29:46,792
We often got a lot of support from
the educational community.

462
00:29:46,792 --> 00:29:52,306
Because the project again has been
on the DL [down low] again, for seven years.

463
00:29:52,306 --> 00:29:55,138
Then when do the people find out
about it, it's been a lot of fun

464
00:29:55,138 --> 00:29:58,405
in the last two and half years after
we've mentioned it, the more people seemed

465
00:29:58,405 --> 00:30:02,770
to like it and really appreciate the fact that
we give people empowerment within our space.

466
00:30:02,770 --> 00:30:08,307
We see a lot of opportunities for it, within
educational, formal educational setting.

467
00:30:08,307 --> 00:30:15,209
As far as donors go we haven't really pushed
to them that much. And now that I sit in

468
00:30:15,209 --> 00:30:18,135
the marketing department, there's definitely
more opportunities for us to do that.

469
00:30:18,459 --> 00:30:22,067
About a year ago we went through
and completely revamped the site,

470
00:30:22,067 --> 00:30:25,314
the screenshots that I showed earlier
are from the new version.

471
00:30:25,314 --> 00:30:27,793
And the plan was always going to be
that once we got it to that point,

472
00:30:27,793 --> 00:30:32,149
we're going to release it out of beta,
and that it would go live, marketing

473
00:30:32,149 --> 00:30:34,960
would do this big push around it
and we will get lots and lots of users,

474
00:30:34,960 --> 00:30:38,074
that would be wonderful, and we
just never got there.

475
00:30:38,074 --> 00:30:41,333
Part of the reasons is an accident 
of timing. This is our 20th anniversary year

476
00:30:41,420 --> 00:30:46,395
and probably 90% of my time has been
spent on working on the 20th, working

477
00:30:46,395 --> 00:30:50,832
our outreach around that.
My other kind of [inaudible] been

478
00:30:50,832 --> 00:30:55,625
for that. So maybe if we done this
the year before, we'd actually be able to

479
00:30:55,625 --> 00:30:57,891
run it through the marketing cycle 
and see what happened.

480
00:30:57,891 --> 00:31:00,730
(Audience Member) Here's some few more numbers --
(Elissa) Sure

481
00:31:00,730 --> 00:31:04,716
(Audience Member) How many people have contributed
to that Lodz project?

482
00:31:04,716 --> 00:31:08,287
(Elissa) So we have about 1500 people
working on the project, in some capacity

483
00:31:08,287 --> 00:31:10,538
or another.
(Audience Member) Is that number increasing or decreasing?

484
00:31:10,538 --> 00:31:13,720
(Elissa) That number is increasing.
We've been doing a lot of work, again,

485
00:31:13,720 --> 00:31:17,374
with classes. We tell teachers about the project,
they work with their students.

486
00:31:17,374 --> 00:31:22,405
I do a webinar showing them how to use
the project, and the teacher does the support.

487
00:31:22,405 --> 00:31:26,377
in the classroom then I give support at the
back end as they turn research in.

488
00:31:26,377 --> 00:31:30,466
So that number is going to increase. Again,
next week when I got another forty students

489
00:31:30,466 --> 00:31:35,508
from GW on this site. We do have the occasional
user who comes across it and then

490
00:31:35,508 --> 00:31:40,294
goes hogwild on it. That, as people find this
on their own, they would usually spend a lot more

491
00:31:40,294 --> 00:31:42,877
time on it.
(Audience Member) And how many followers do you have

492
00:31:42,877 --> 00:31:46,195
on your Twitter feed?
(Elissa) You mean personally or the museum?

493
00:31:46,195 --> 00:31:50,520
(Audience Member) Well @museums365 is that it?
(Elissa) That's - I forgot - about 1400.

494
00:31:50,520 --> 00:31:54,661
The museum itself has 150,700 something.
(Audience Member) So you do have an audience

495
00:31:54,752 --> 00:32:00,062
that you can reach by that twitter feed.
So you use it to advertise events,

496
00:32:00,062 --> 00:32:04,848
do you promote these citizen history projects?
(Elissa) We do, and particularly now, the way

497
00:32:04,848 --> 00:32:09,212
that our social media team is set up,
I came over last October, and then

498
00:32:09,281 --> 00:32:12,856
by a month behind me, we have analyst 
person come over from collections.

499
00:32:12,856 --> 00:32:17,151
I've been in education for -- and so the two of us
I ran the Lodz Ghetto project,

500
00:32:17,151 --> 00:32:20,843
he ran Remember Me, which is
a crowdsourcing project in the vein

501
00:32:20,843 --> 00:32:23,943
of the American History Project
where we had people sharing their

502
00:32:23,943 --> 00:32:29,912
personal knowledge, where the memories
of, children in displaced children's camps.

503
00:32:29,912 --> 00:32:34,528
We have photographs that we show, these children,
and ask "Does anybody remember this person?

504
00:32:34,528 --> 00:32:38,611
Do you know who this person is?"
And people do and they share their story.

505
00:32:38,611 --> 00:32:42,453
It's really been remarkable to see how successful
that's been. So we have two people working

506
00:32:42,453 --> 00:32:46,889
within this crowdsourcing field, now sitting in 
the social media. And I'm very excited to see

507
00:32:46,889 --> 00:32:53,951
what we can actually do with that, 
once we get out of the 20th muck.

508
00:32:53,951 --> 00:32:58,436
(Audience Member) I have many more questions but I should
let others, pursue.

509
00:32:58,436 --> 00:33:05,869
(Fraistat) So, um, looking at the Children
of the Lodz Ghetto site, and right at the top

510
00:33:05,869 --> 00:33:13,962
there's project status, so, twenty students
known to have survived, so is this what's been known

511
00:33:13,962 --> 00:33:21,277
or verified through people working on this site?
(Elissa) That's right, yeah.

512
00:33:21,370 --> 00:33:25,537
This is one of the additions that we put in
with the new iteration of the site.

513
00:33:25,537 --> 00:33:32,494
We had done a bit evaluation with some 
of our users, and a little bit work from

514
00:33:32,642 --> 00:33:36,490
the Center for New Media and History, and they 
gave us some of their feedback.

515
00:33:36,490 --> 00:33:40,300
Among that was, people want to see the scope
of what they are doing. How far along

516
00:33:40,300 --> 00:33:44,109
we're actually getting with this project.
(Fraistat) I think that's really important,

517
00:33:44,109 --> 00:33:50,511
even including the number of 
citizen historians who have contributed

518
00:33:50,511 --> 00:33:57,943
to the project. I think that's a good thing 
to show too. They do this at NYPL, show

519
00:33:57,943 --> 00:34:04,340
the number of people, number of records
that have been curated or transcribed.

520
00:34:04,340 --> 00:34:07,482
(Elissa) It's one of the things that they mentioned
in that same article about galaxy zoo,

521
00:34:07,482 --> 00:34:11,016
was that, here at the three in the morning
with my galaxies, you know, there are

522
00:34:11,016 --> 00:34:13,928
a couple thousand other people also
up at three in the morning with their galaxies.

523
00:34:13,928 --> 00:34:17,518
So when their best [ribow] in the end,
where we're so often on our own,

524
00:34:17,518 --> 00:34:21,499
we're actually very much with other people
at the same time.

525
00:34:27,309 --> 00:34:33,302
I am an educator, I love questions, 
and I love wait time, so I'm willing to wait as long as it takes.

526
00:34:36,812 --> 00:34:40,718
(Audience) Yeah I didn't mention that I went
to the museum last week, and now that you're saying

527
00:34:41,002 --> 00:34:47,689
saying about this, I don't remember that 
there was anything, lets say, in the area

528
00:34:47,689 --> 00:34:54,491
that talks about it. And I thought that, you know,
that might be a good thing,

529
00:34:54,491 --> 00:34:59,557
to have something, where they're from
or something, where they go to talk about

530
00:34:59,557 --> 00:35:05,349
this project, because, you know, 
looking around there are maybe,

531
00:35:05,349 --> 00:35:14,104
I think, you know, elderly people who have
person of interest as they go to that museum.

532
00:35:14,104 --> 00:35:21,408
That might open up more --
(Host) So it's like how does

533
00:35:21,408 --> 00:35:26,657
the brick and mortar interact more tightly
with the virtual here.

534
00:35:26,657 --> 00:35:29,739
(Elissa) And what we've been more willing
to do in the brick-and-mortar space is then to say

535
00:35:29,739 --> 00:35:34,801
connect with us online. We've also been
missing a lot of our community museums

536
00:35:34,872 --> 00:35:39,031
around the the symposium near some of our mall.
Where we'd get to the end of the exhibition

537
00:35:39,031 --> 00:35:44,355
and say "What did you think? Tell us on twitter at
Am-History Museum." So we are more willing

538
00:35:44,355 --> 00:35:50,069
to let people tell us, share their thoughts
in the social space. So putting things

539
00:35:50,069 --> 00:35:53,906
in our Facebook wall, talking to them
on Twitter, putting videos on Youtube,

540
00:35:53,906 --> 00:35:58,765
pinning stuff on Pinterest boards.
But as far as interaction with our

541
00:35:58,765 --> 00:36:04,204
digital space, the things that are connected to us
in visual and outside of social,

542
00:36:04,204 --> 00:36:08,537
we definitely have less of a push, 
to those into the museum itself.

543
00:36:08,537 --> 00:36:11,385
There is a space on the second floor
of the museum, where our third

544
00:36:11,385 --> 00:36:14,806
crowdsourcing project, we have three 
going on right now, to a very much end.

545
00:36:14,806 --> 00:36:18,068
The World Memory Project,
we're in partnership with Ancestry.com

546
00:36:18,068 --> 00:36:22,260
we have a bunch of names list, that we're
trying to get transcribed, and we open

547
00:36:22,260 --> 00:36:26,999
those up to the Ancestry community to help
us key in some of those names and dates

548
00:36:26,999 --> 00:36:32,474
and things from these giant databases.
And there are two stations that are set up

549
00:36:32,474 --> 00:36:36,258
there. Where you are getting to help 
key in -- but again we don't talk about

550
00:36:36,258 --> 00:36:41,235
it very much. And I often do wonder
if there is some kind of force separation

551
00:36:41,235 --> 00:36:44,406
between our brick-and-mortar self,
and our digital space self.

552
00:36:44,406 --> 00:36:47,721
Because the brick and mortar, we can 
control, pretty much. We can control

553
00:36:47,721 --> 00:36:52,962
what conversations going in that space,
we have information comes down from

554
00:36:52,962 --> 00:36:57,287
the museum at large. And the digital space
was a little bit scarier. Right? We're not

555
00:36:57,287 --> 00:37:00,551
be able to control the conversations there
as much. We are worried that people

556
00:37:00,551 --> 00:37:04,903
would just take our stuff and run away with it.
And if we are not ready for that many people

557
00:37:04,903 --> 00:37:10,988
to look at our data and actually poke our stuff,
poke our precious raw files, then having

558
00:37:10,988 --> 00:37:16,837
information leading to those things in
the brick and mortar space can be

559
00:37:16,921 --> 00:37:20,670
a little bit scary sometimes.
(Fraistat) And it's like on the other side of your ticket

560
00:37:20,670 --> 00:37:23,597
it could say "Work with us online."
(Elissa) Totally.

561
00:37:23,597 --> 00:37:27,551
I would love that.
(Fraistat) So the museum's greatest fear

562
00:37:27,551 --> 00:37:32,138
might be something like success where
people demanded more and more.

563
00:37:32,138 --> 00:37:39,232
What's your biggest fear about citizen
historian projects in the Holocaust museum?

564
00:37:39,232 --> 00:37:45,613
(Elissa) I think my fear is that it'll fail.
And I believe in failing big and failing best.

565
00:37:46,485 --> 00:37:49,981
But I am worried that when we build it
nobody will come, where we build it,

566
00:37:49,981 --> 00:37:54,507
people come, and then we can't share
that with our internal community.

567
00:37:54,507 --> 00:37:57,480
We say "Look at all these great success 
we had." And they say "So what.

568
00:37:57,480 --> 00:37:59,881
What's the point?" That discrete
experiment we were running

569
00:37:59,881 --> 00:38:03,701
where we have the trust of our users,
we have a wonderful community

570
00:38:03,701 --> 00:38:07,688
that well iterates and talks to each other
and learn skills, and goes out into the world

571
00:38:07,688 --> 00:38:13,837
that nobody on our side will listen enough.
And that if this experiment fails,

572
00:38:13,837 --> 00:38:16,920
then how are we every going to
convince them again?

573
00:38:16,920 --> 00:38:23,389
(Fraistat) It makes me think of -- there's
all this talk about blended online education,

574
00:38:23,389 --> 00:38:31,432
and moves and the counter-discourse 
from people in pedagogy is about, well,

575
00:38:31,432 --> 00:38:38,818
we need learning outcomes that
can be assessed. How do you measure

576
00:38:38,818 --> 00:38:42,776
the education that you are giving?
But it seems to me that's the other

577
00:38:42,776 --> 00:38:50,886
part of the circuit that we don't have
closed here yet. It's -- how do we document

578
00:38:50,886 --> 00:38:56,697
that we have taught citizens 
how to do history in a way that meets

579
00:38:56,697 --> 00:39:01,004
our own sense of what it means
to do history. When we show how

580
00:39:01,004 --> 00:39:04,203
many people -- we could show
how many people might have transcribed

581
00:39:04,203 --> 00:39:08,852
something, how do we document
what they learned, and, make the

582
00:39:08,852 --> 00:39:13,165
the counter-argument to people
who say "So what? So you've got some people

583
00:39:13,165 --> 00:39:16,739
who type some stuff in, big deal."
(Elissa) It's really hard, it's where I think

584
00:39:16,739 --> 00:39:19,833
having the notes field so prominent 
really comes in. That we've given

585
00:39:19,833 --> 00:39:23,747
people the space, we ask them
to share with us what their reflections are.

586
00:39:23,747 --> 00:39:26,607
And anecdotally I can tell you that
people as they spend more and more time

587
00:39:26,607 --> 00:39:29,840
on the project get better and better
at filling their skill, and they'd able to

588
00:39:29,840 --> 00:39:33,268
reflect more critically what is it
that they are thinking. But in terms

589
00:39:33,268 --> 00:39:38,167
of being able to measure, to give it
a name, I don't know if we can.

590
00:39:38,167 --> 00:39:39,907
I don't have to figure that out yet.
We also have a lot of supporting

591
00:39:39,907 --> 00:39:43,754
teachers, who haven't quite grasp
the idea either, I have one teacher

592
00:39:43,754 --> 00:39:47,707
who wanted to use the project such
that the students would go on

593
00:39:47,707 --> 00:39:51,010
and research one student, and they
would present the powerpoint

594
00:39:51,010 --> 00:39:54,772
of that student's life, in class.
Then I had to tell him that

595
00:39:54,772 --> 00:39:58,767
you can't do that, because you are
going to have kids who would go and

596
00:39:58,767 --> 00:40:02,718
look for a student, and find nothing there.
That's the nature of the project,

597
00:40:02,718 --> 00:40:07,079
that's the nature of doing research.
We don't know what we don't have.

598
00:40:07,079 --> 00:40:09,446
And in finding that out, that's part of
the goal for us is to figure out

599
00:40:09,446 --> 00:40:12,146
we don't have what those gaps are.
And so trying to put up a critical

600
00:40:12,146 --> 00:40:17,794
narrative on it, you can't always do that.
The expectations just aren't the same.

601
00:40:17,794 --> 00:40:23,274
(Fraistat) Now thinking about you using
the Bloom's model, you were saying that

602
00:40:23,274 --> 00:40:27,592
as we think through what we want
to give people who interact with us,

603
00:40:27,592 --> 00:40:32,502
we want to climb up the scale.
So, a kind of outcomes assessment

604
00:40:32,502 --> 00:40:36,919
would be to somehow to map back
to that. And say, "We've brought people

605
00:40:36,919 --> 00:40:42,494
from here to here to here.
But how you make that assessment is

606
00:40:42,494 --> 00:40:47,737
I mean, I'm thinking of it strictly 
from our own projects that are

607
00:40:47,737 --> 00:40:53,682
trying to do this, so, I'm self-interested
in an answer to this problem it seems.

608
00:40:53,682 --> 00:40:56,636
Really hard stuff.
(Elissa) I imagine you have, like an

609
00:40:56,636 --> 00:41:01,677
another crowdsourced group of people
who would then go through those

610
00:41:01,677 --> 00:41:04,624
free text responses and code those.
So you would have something like a

611
00:41:04,624 --> 00:41:08,638
separate project going on at the same time
where they'll be able to have certain words

612
00:41:08,638 --> 00:41:12,687
or outcomes we'd be looking for.
In those notes.

613
00:41:12,687 --> 00:41:15,994
(Audience) I know that there's been
some discussion about this in the archives

614
00:41:15,994 --> 00:41:21,947
field in particular the question of instruction
and how much when you bring in a group

615
00:41:21,947 --> 00:41:24,897
of students into the archives and you
teach them how to do research,

616
00:41:24,897 --> 00:41:28,327
teaching them actually handling the skills,
and what they've been doing

617
00:41:28,327 --> 00:41:32,735
is a pre- and post-test. And trying 
to compare the results to see

618
00:41:32,735 --> 00:41:36,956
what they've actually learned.
But there's a whole new set of research

619
00:41:36,956 --> 00:41:41,575
that is going into this because no one 
is really quite sure that actually works.

620
00:41:41,575 --> 00:41:47,572
But, I think this is a critical issue
for a lot of disciplines right now,

621
00:41:47,572 --> 00:41:51,117
is trying to figure out what it is
you are trying to evaluate

622
00:41:51,117 --> 00:41:55,474
and how you going to do that evaluation.

623
00:41:55,474 --> 00:41:58,885
(Host) I'm wondering off, also it gets
to the top of the Bloom's pyramid ,

624
00:41:58,885 --> 00:42:03,276
when you get to that true creative level,
but when you start seeing your users

625
00:42:03,276 --> 00:42:10,390
able to take the skills that they acquired
in the course of the interaction with

626
00:42:10,390 --> 00:42:16,611
the institution and create truly new
and different things, and the institution

627
00:42:16,611 --> 00:42:20,695
has to be willing to accept that,
as almost like, well here's one of our

628
00:42:20,695 --> 00:42:26,420
user's exhibit. You might even call it
an exhibit on this topic. It's their

629
00:42:26,420 --> 00:42:30,039
interpretation, we don't necessarily
endorse it, but maybe when we give them

630
00:42:30,039 --> 00:42:34,897
the space, the digital space in order
to demonstrate that creativity.

631
00:42:34,909 --> 00:42:38,759
So they kind of move up from being
worker bees to, you know,

632
00:42:38,928 --> 00:42:43,507
making something.
(Elissa) Should they take it even further

633
00:42:43,507 --> 00:42:49,361
trusting now apart, to be able to --
(Host) Right, you know, way out there

634
00:42:49,361 --> 00:42:55,262
interpretations, or people do stuff
with your data that you don't even like.

635
00:42:55,262 --> 00:43:00,262
(Audience) And with the Holocaust Museum
you could imagine how that could go.

636
00:43:00,262 --> 00:43:04,993
(Audience) One of the best ways to,
at least to being to get a sense of what

637
00:43:04,993 --> 00:43:08,210
people are getting out of this 
is simply to ask them "What did

638
00:43:08,210 --> 00:43:10,706
you get out of it?"
And if they are able to express that

639
00:43:10,706 --> 00:43:14,656
in a way that is convincing, then you know
that it worked.

640
00:43:14,656 --> 00:43:17,727
(Elissa) That's a good point. We have
one teacher, so that the teacher that's

641
00:43:17,727 --> 00:43:21,626
going to be working with us starting
next week, again, who's been our

642
00:43:21,626 --> 00:43:24,591
biggest fan for most of the time
the project's been up.

643
00:43:24,591 --> 00:43:27,568
Who assigns students at the end of class
due two reflection papers.

644
00:43:27,568 --> 00:43:31,628
One just the real basics of what did you find
on this day, how much time did you spend

645
00:43:31,628 --> 00:43:35,179
on that project, what did you write,
what did the museum write back.

646
00:43:35,179 --> 00:43:39,109
And reflect on that encounter.
And then a new page on just,

647
00:43:39,109 --> 00:43:43,946
their experience of the site.
What it is that they, were thinking

648
00:43:43,946 --> 00:43:46,637
about getting out of it,
what we could do better,

649
00:43:46,637 --> 00:43:50,608
what they could do better.
Next topic. And I think,

650
00:43:50,608 --> 00:43:55,026
in aggregate, that is the best we've been
able to do so far, being able to see what it is

651
00:43:55,026 --> 00:43:57,950
that people are taking away from the project.
I think that if there is some way

652
00:43:57,950 --> 00:44:03,663
to make that more of the part of the project,
to ask people as they leave this thing,

653
00:44:03,663 --> 00:44:08,974
share something. Answers, questions
someone open with it, with us.

654
00:44:08,974 --> 00:44:10,608
That we're kind of unsure.

655
00:44:10,608 --> 00:44:13,830
(Fraistat) I don't know that much about
the -- really, a merging discipline

656
00:44:13,830 --> 00:44:18,181
of learning outcome assessment,
knowing we have our own specialist

657
00:44:18,181 --> 00:44:23,565
scattered through campus, but it's a lot
more complex than just asking people

658
00:44:23,732 --> 00:44:29,767
what they think they've gotten out of it.
That's a part of it. And I really think

659
00:44:29,767 --> 00:44:35,754
that we need to know and we need to
figure out ways to know what we are doing.

660
00:44:35,754 --> 00:44:42,635
Because how can we know if, you know,
we're doing a good job of teaching

661
00:44:42,635 --> 00:44:46,697
the things we want to teach through
these sites and through these participation.

662
00:44:46,697 --> 00:44:52,347
How can we know how to change?
To better realize our goals.

663
00:44:52,347 --> 00:44:56,934
Those are really complex issues 
and I am actually thinking out of,

664
00:44:56,934 --> 00:45:00,893
trying to reach out to some learning
outcome assessment people just,

665
00:45:00,893 --> 00:45:06,812
to help think through that part of the equation.
(Audience) So I want to return to encourage you

666
00:45:06,812 --> 00:45:10,874
to go much further with this, you know,
Neil's idea of printing it on the tickets

667
00:45:10,874 --> 00:45:14,866
or making visible in the museum, 
and lots of other ways if you have

668
00:45:14,866 --> 00:45:18,424
150,000 Twitter followers, you should 
be generating a lot more than 1500

669
00:45:18,424 --> 00:45:23,990
participants. I mean, we work here
at the Smithsonian's Encyclopedia of Life project,

670
00:45:23,990 --> 00:45:30,277
to make a webpage for every species,
and they have some of the same concerns

671
00:45:30,277 --> 00:45:33,844
that you have, but I think you have a grand
opportunity to go to your wards and

672
00:45:33,844 --> 00:45:37,590
your sponsors and ramp this up 
as the central way. This is the future

673
00:45:37,590 --> 00:45:42,987
of this museum. It's a matter of creating
out. That's one thing about educating

674
00:45:42,987 --> 00:45:46,895
the users but, creating outreach and 
engagement in getting people to

675
00:45:46,895 --> 00:45:51,184
participate remotely, that may generate
more traffic with people who

676
00:45:51,184 --> 00:45:54,566
come and visit, there's just a lot of ways
this should grow bigger, and I'm,

677
00:45:54,566 --> 00:45:59,112
you know, you should be shy of
that growing this much larger.

678
00:45:59,112 --> 00:46:03,188
The fears are prevalent everywhere
and maybe the Holocaust museum

679
00:46:03,188 --> 00:46:08,429
deservedly, as I said, I worked for them
on their early design-- their fears are prevalent

680
00:46:08,429 --> 00:46:14,243
about Holocaust deniers taking over these,
or polluting results. Even one small error

681
00:46:14,243 --> 00:46:20,207
in the data set will then trigger a national
news story that undermines the validity of it all,

682
00:46:20,207 --> 00:46:25,202
so you do have more concerns than usual,
but all of the more reasons to go at it,

683
00:46:25,202 --> 00:46:29,752
in a substantive way, and deal with
the credibility of, you know, ensuring

684
00:46:29,752 --> 00:46:34,212
the credibility so, it's good that you've got
the, sort of, senior reviewer status,

685
00:46:34,212 --> 00:46:38,422
but various forms of badges and recognition
having annual conference for those

686
00:46:38,422 --> 00:46:42,528
who participating, bringing them in,
bringing them together, raising their stature,

687
00:46:42,528 --> 00:46:45,877
making them leaders of the project,
giving them decision making power

688
00:46:45,877 --> 00:46:51,279
and supervision to control any problems.
There's lots of ways you can go much further

689
00:46:51,279 --> 00:46:56,557
and demanding more of your users 
will actually causing them to engage more.

690
00:46:56,557 --> 00:46:59,500
So don't be afraid about that. 
I have one particular question about

691
00:46:59,500 --> 00:47:03,054
the 1500. You have some distribution
of the demographics, I mean there's

692
00:47:03,054 --> 00:47:06,320
two theories. One says that, well,
the museum patrons and interests

693
00:47:06,320 --> 00:47:10,217
are of an older demographic, and 
the other says, well, it's the kids who

694
00:47:10,217 --> 00:47:14,283
are doing online citizen science,
so help me with that one.

695
00:47:14,283 --> 00:47:16,388
(Elissa) Well it's a little bit skewed,
but there's again, a lot of our outreach's

696
00:47:16,388 --> 00:47:19,970
been through teachers, so, most
users here are school-aged,

697
00:47:19,970 --> 00:47:23,468
so my best users have been in middle school.
Which is for our middle-school educators

698
00:47:23,468 --> 00:47:27,828
has been incredibly gratifying. 
But as far as our power users,

699
00:47:27,828 --> 00:47:34,695
people who find us not through a school,
just on their own, and then, crank out

700
00:47:34,695 --> 00:47:40,794
at the data, they for the most part
been in college or just out of college.

701
00:47:40,794 --> 00:47:46,239
(Audience) I mean you could do a lot more,
I am a supporter, I am a contributor

702
00:47:46,472 --> 00:47:50,074
and a member at -- I have no idea 
about the Lodz Ghetto project.

703
00:47:50,074 --> 00:47:54,281
It's just not advertised, doesn't reach
me, in either the email traffic I get from

704
00:47:54,281 --> 00:47:59,287
USAHMM or the printed materials,
or the annual reports or anything

705
00:47:59,287 --> 00:48:03,784
that I get, so I mean I think there's a way
that you should be less shy, you should be

706
00:48:03,784 --> 00:48:09,682
more bold in making these projects 
are more visible. That will raise the issue

707
00:48:09,682 --> 00:48:13,614
of credibility but also the value 
to the museum and you need the

708
00:48:13,614 --> 00:48:18,689
buy-in of the people upstairs.
Your directors and your boards.

709
00:48:18,689 --> 00:48:21,525
To be able to be into this.
I mean, a memorable day was --

710
00:48:21,525 --> 00:48:26,082
I was working and writing plan
for computers in this museum

711
00:48:26,082 --> 00:48:31,097
where the 70 members of the Holocaust
memorial board, many spoke up against it

712
00:48:31,097 --> 00:48:37,137
saying things like, "If the Nazis had computers,
you know, etc." So it was [Shanky Wineburg]

713
00:48:37,137 --> 00:48:40,951
who was, sort of, the lead designer
of this, who said, I mean, settled it all

714
00:48:40,951 --> 00:48:45,335
with a very sharp quote, he said
"Computers are the best way for

715
00:48:45,335 --> 00:48:50,700
the next generation to learn about the Holocaust."
And it was over. You know, making that

716
00:48:50,700 --> 00:48:56,364
forcible statement, that this is important, and
I'm glad to help you, if that would be useful.

717
00:48:56,364 --> 00:49:00,467
I'm writing you an email, so
you'd be on with that, you know,

718
00:49:00,467 --> 00:49:06,282
I think there's a lot that you can
and should be doing and revving up

719
00:49:06,282 --> 00:49:12,116
internally as well as externally,
absolutely the way to go.

720
00:49:12,116 --> 00:49:16,677
(Fraistat) I think what's interesting
is that if you trust your users enough,

721
00:49:16,677 --> 00:49:23,285
say Holocaust deniers did get a hold of
some material, I mean, how do you

722
00:49:23,285 --> 00:49:28,738
teach people to do history well?
History is all about refuting arguments

723
00:49:28,738 --> 00:49:33,567
that don't hold up and learning
how to do that, and understanding

724
00:49:33,567 --> 00:49:39,430
that those arguments will inevitably
crop up all the time, and as you raise

725
00:49:39,430 --> 00:49:44,314
your profile you will get more of that.
So be prepared, but go there.

726
00:49:44,314 --> 00:49:48,430
(Audience) Maybe the analogy to look at
with the cranks and so forth is,

727
00:49:48,430 --> 00:49:54,878
is open source software community.
They're, by opening up the software,

728
00:49:54,878 --> 00:49:57,881
you have a better chance of creating
something that is robust, and

729
00:49:57,881 --> 00:50:04,797
it's going to be protected then if you
try to keep it to yourself, control it.

730
00:50:04,797 --> 00:50:07,910
(Audience) I was thinking, while we're 
planning follow-up projects where you

731
00:50:07,910 --> 00:50:10,364
<i>Laughter</i>

732
00:50:10,364 --> 00:50:16,714
(Muñoz) You mentioned that the audience
for this is still predominantly American.

733
00:50:16,714 --> 00:50:20,499
Partly imagine that's because of working
with classes, but I wonder whether

734
00:50:20,499 --> 00:50:25,076
there isn't a kind of pen-pal-esque kind of
angle to this, right - the internet,

735
00:50:25,076 --> 00:50:28,798
is everywhere and you know,
the descendants of many of the people,

736
00:50:28,798 --> 00:50:32,098
or people who might know about this,
or have other sources of information

737
00:50:32,098 --> 00:50:37,848
are obviously probably still in, might still
be in Europe, or in Israel or wherever.

738
00:50:37,848 --> 00:50:41,528
And I wonder about, sort of, a global
outreach, sort of, piece, and how that

739
00:50:41,528 --> 00:50:47,741
fits in with the museum's position,
vis a vis the other Holocaust and remembrance

740
00:50:47,741 --> 00:50:50,493
institutions.
(Elissa) My interns actually are working on

741
00:50:50,493 --> 00:50:56,062
German language arts program,
she's coming to us from Berlin this year.

742
00:50:56,062 --> 00:50:59,536
She was totally jazzed about the Lodz
Ghetto project, and probably are

743
00:50:59,536 --> 00:51:05,687
our heaviest moderator at the moment.
And I should send my boss a review,

744
00:51:05,687 --> 00:51:10,620
as a German language outreach program,
to German schools, based on the things

745
00:51:10,620 --> 00:51:15,007
in their curriculum, and be able to --
We had a group of teachers

746
00:51:15,007 --> 00:51:18,476
from Poland who came in last year.
And I was asked to come and present

747
00:51:18,476 --> 00:51:22,381
the project to them. And there's actually
a lot of hesitancy about it, that

748
00:51:22,381 --> 00:51:27,994
they didn't like the concept or the framework.
Except one woman who actually was

749
00:51:27,994 --> 00:51:32,708
from Lodz, and she said it was a brilliant
idea and that her students would love

750
00:51:32,708 --> 00:51:37,529
to work on it. Part of the problem is
that our resources are in English,

751
00:51:37,529 --> 00:51:42,357
and all the data is in German. 
So we have to go through and say that

752
00:51:42,357 --> 00:51:49,098
yes, 'name' means name and 'vorname' is
first name. And do that explication

753
00:51:49,098 --> 00:51:53,653
for our English speaking audience, so there's 
a German language cheatsheet.

754
00:51:53,653 --> 00:51:57,513
And for our German speakers they've already
got the data at their disposal

755
00:51:57,513 --> 00:52:02,142
and a lot of them are taught English
in schools. I'm not as familiar with how other --

756
00:52:02,142 --> 00:52:07,560
I guess we could view it as just English
class project, for schools. But I think

757
00:52:07,560 --> 00:52:12,453
it's an excellent idea that we've paired
this with our global outreach since part

758
00:52:12,453 --> 00:52:15,745
of this project still sits in a division
called the global classroom

759
00:52:15,745 --> 00:52:19,008
where we do talk about outreach
to the world.

760
00:52:19,008 --> 00:52:22,308
(Audience) I'm curious about the Polish 
teachers' hesitancy.

761
00:52:22,308 --> 00:52:31,945
(Elissa) Um, it was bad. Yeah, they didn't 
like the way we were posing our questions.

762
00:52:31,945 --> 00:52:37,018
The fact that we just open these students
up for anybody to come and look at them.

763
00:52:37,018 --> 00:52:43,765
And I think there's also some hesitancy about
the way that we are reading history.

764
00:52:43,765 --> 00:52:46,957
Again the idea that history is, being
something that is open. They weren't

765
00:52:46,957 --> 00:52:51,442
as comfortable with just having that be our framework,
that there could be new questions

766
00:52:51,442 --> 00:52:55,153
coming out of them. And I'm not sure if that was,
I'm sure it's not just

767
00:52:55,153 --> 00:52:58,732
the polish teacher mindset
that it was a particular group

768
00:52:58,732 --> 00:53:02,642
with particular questions they were posing.
And I definitely imagine that

769
00:53:02,642 --> 00:53:09,110
when we are working with different
group of teachers and have different outcome.

770
00:53:09,852 --> 00:53:14,084
(Fraistat) If there are no other questions
or comments, let's have a round of applause

771
00:53:14,084 --> 00:53:16,455
for a really great presentation.

772
00:53:16,455 --> 00:53:20,628
<i>Applause</i>

773
00:53:25,830 --> 00:53:31,512
Does not count as genuine.
The allographic work, by contrast,

774
00:53:31,512 --> 00:53:37,220
such as a musical score or poem
has no one acceptable instance.

775
00:53:37,220 --> 00:53:42,759
Or as Goodman puts it, all correct
performances or renditions of the work

776
00:53:42,759 --> 00:53:48,698
are equally genuine instances o f it.
Allographic art, therefore we may

777
00:53:48,698 --> 00:53:54,694
thereby define as a rule-bound.
Pondering the question, Goodman asks,

778
00:53:54,694 --> 00:54:00,503
"Could institution of a notational system
transform painting or acting from

779
00:54:00,503 --> 00:54:06,286
an autographic, into an allographic art."
Well Goodman answers the question

780
00:54:06,482 --> 00:54:09,940
in the negative. "The development of
time-based media suggest that

781
00:54:09,940 --> 00:54:15,555
we reconsider the issue. Past the work
of art in the digital era, become akin

782
00:54:15,555 --> 00:54:21,606
to a symphony or a publication."
Does the aim of curators, conservators,

783
00:54:21,606 --> 00:54:27,275
technical specialist and artists to sort out
the implications of such questions going forward.

784
00:54:27,275 --> 00:54:33,249
As we consider the ramifications of time-based
art, which can be reproduced and decimated

785
00:54:33,249 --> 00:54:38,607
outside the realm of traditional museum
environments, what is the significance.

786
00:54:38,607 --> 00:54:44,175
of showing such work in museums, 
in a laminar institutions to become repositories

787
00:54:44,175 --> 00:54:49,954
for such work. When might it be appropriate
to recognize that a work of art is essentially

788
00:54:49,954 --> 00:54:57,281
ephemeral. And when and why might we want
to take steps to preserve it and perhaps

789
00:54:57,281 --> 00:55:03,114
to transform it in order to preserve it.
To do so, ultimately, is to privilege

790
00:55:03,114 --> 00:55:08,770
the idea over matter, recognizing that
we must inevitably allow the medium

791
00:55:08,770 --> 00:55:15,211
in which the work was originally executed
to evolve, in the service of its presentation.

792
00:55:15,211 --> 00:55:19,876
The opportunity to collect exhibit and
preserve time-based art, thus provides

793
00:55:19,876 --> 00:55:25,286
an exceptional opportunity to consider
the philosophical locations of new media

794
00:55:25,286 --> 00:55:29,862
for understanding our world and our selves.
As well as to explore the technical

795
00:55:29,862 --> 00:55:34,650
and intellectual challenges of preserving 
these works for future audiences,

796
00:55:34,650 --> 00:55:41,723
and for providing access to them,
for audiences now and tomorrow.

797
00:55:41,723 --> 00:55:45,609
The new technological environment
produced by digital media further

798
00:55:45,609 --> 00:55:50,911
privileges the value of interdisciplinary
and interinstitutional collaboration,

799
00:55:50,911 --> 00:55:55,701
as we explore the tools and strategies
necessarily to share time-based and

800
00:55:55,701 --> 00:56:00,959
digital works with future generations.
And on that note, I thank you so much

801
00:56:00,959 --> 00:56:06,026
for your attention. And I very much looking
forward to hearing your thoughts, observations

802
00:56:06,026 --> 00:56:08,615
and questions. Thank you.

803
00:56:08,615 --> 00:56:11,769
<i>Applause</i>

804
00:56:17,678 --> 00:56:21,023
(Anne) Yes
(Audience) First of all, I have a critical

805
00:56:21,023 --> 00:56:24,832
question to ask, first of all let me give a --
thanking you for that extraordinary

806
00:56:24,832 --> 00:56:28,942
presentation. I don't get to introduce myself
as I was away. I'm sorry about that,

807
00:56:28,942 --> 00:56:33,117
but I'm coming to mid presentations
for years now as a fellow here.

808
00:56:33,117 --> 00:56:38,553
This is one of the most remarkable
that I've seen. There's a lot of deeper

809
00:56:38,553 --> 00:56:44,029
respect behind these questions.
My question is this: on the note of

810
00:56:44,029 --> 00:56:47,875
[Benjamin] and he's sort of,
who was a figure that I distrust,

811
00:56:47,875 --> 00:56:51,140
as someone was, as far as this type
goes as well, and he's mentoring

812
00:56:51,140 --> 00:56:55,641
notions of the subject rendering
management of flux. I wanted to

813
00:56:55,641 --> 00:57:00,489
get you to reflect on the fact --
there's a brave fascination in your idea

814
00:57:00,489 --> 00:57:04,658
of the time series, and the various
flooring that go on with it.

815
00:57:04,658 --> 00:57:08,223
You can get the point about how 
conventional ways of formulating

816
00:57:08,223 --> 00:57:12,992
subjectivity are under attack.
But it strikes me as paradoxical

817
00:57:12,992 --> 00:57:17,944
that the portrait library would be
this place where this radical project

818
00:57:17,944 --> 00:57:21,375
would be going on, and before I want
to do that, would rather -- first of all

819
00:57:21,375 --> 00:57:25,243
it seems to me that a lot of these
radical experiment that you put forward

820
00:57:25,243 --> 00:57:29,735
are actually predicated just as much
as [Benjamin]'s essays of [inaudible]

821
00:57:29,735 --> 00:57:34,223
I have a really nostalgic impulse to recover
the subject in the first place.

822
00:57:34,223 --> 00:57:39,257
When I see those three late night 
talk show hosts, I was shocked by the news.

823
00:57:39,257 --> 00:57:42,618
This is I think what the lips are supposed
to feel, that the identity of it all,

824
00:57:42,618 --> 00:57:48,024
the fact that there were, makes me
long for a world that is better than that.

825
00:57:48,024 --> 00:57:52,420
It's a reflection of my alienating world
that I want to see the individual,

826
00:57:52,420 --> 00:57:57,125
so there's the nostalgia there.
But I think the problem is even greater

827
00:57:57,125 --> 00:58:01,836
than that in my mind, that I constant
to engage in this radical project while

828
00:58:01,836 --> 00:58:09,212
presuming that the subject is going 
to be a portrait, is to presume the very

829
00:58:09,212 --> 00:58:13,341
thing that was the problem in the 
first place, you know what I mean?

830
00:58:13,341 --> 00:58:19,208
Like, if I can put it, it's like the idea
of presuming the individual subjects

831
00:58:19,208 --> 00:58:26,016
so that to attack that idea, is stacking --
is not a radical project in the first place.

832
00:58:26,016 --> 00:58:31,612
When I put Lebron James all by himself
in a cube and evacuate the entire cube

833
00:58:31,612 --> 00:58:36,269
of everything in the world except
images of himself and then conduct

834
00:58:36,269 --> 00:58:40,990
a radical decentering from that,
I pre-supposed in the first place

835
00:58:40,990 --> 00:58:46,423
in totally artificial terms, one, I'm presuming
that radically to attack.

836
00:58:46,423 --> 00:58:50,418
There's something about this project 
going on in the space of the portrait gallery

837
00:58:50,418 --> 00:58:55,018
that seems to presume the erratic enemy
in the first place, I just wanted put --

838
00:58:55,018 --> 00:58:59,596
(Anne) I think it's a fabulous -- I think
It's a really really fabulous set of observations

839
00:58:59,596 --> 00:59:03,606
that you put forward and I thank you
so much for that, and I have to say

840
00:59:03,606 --> 00:59:08,567
one of the things that I love so much about
[Benjamin] and it's like any great author,

841
00:59:08,567 --> 00:59:13,627
something that keeps me coming back
over and over is there are so many facets

842
00:59:13,627 --> 00:59:19,534
obviously to all of his essays. I have to
admit the work of art in the age of mechanical

843
00:59:19,534 --> 00:59:24,691
reproduction is this magnet for me.
And I'm just -- I put it obvious, I think you're

844
00:59:24,691 --> 00:59:33,752
right, that he seems to be in many instances
sort of battling with his own sense of nostalgia.

845
00:59:33,752 --> 00:59:40,885
And I will also say that I think I really do
consider his work extraordinarily artful.

846
00:59:40,885 --> 00:59:46,156
It's obviously very self conscious in it's 
construction, as is the case with the artworks

847
00:59:46,156 --> 00:59:50,497
I shared with you today. And so I guess
first and foremost I would say

848
00:59:50,497 --> 00:59:54,614
I don't think there's any one way to read
any of these, and that ultimately

849
00:59:54,614 --> 00:59:57,920
is the fascination. There are lots of 
different context in which these can

850
00:59:57,920 --> 01:00:04,194
function. I do think that the work of art
in the age of mechanical reproduction

851
01:00:04,194 --> 01:00:09,608
itself in terms of observations about
subjectivity is really really interesting,

852
01:00:09,608 --> 01:00:14,153
particularly [Lee] in this essay, when he's
grappling with this question of Victorial

853
01:00:14,153 --> 01:00:17,837
cliffs for example, and really dealing with
the fragmentation of the body,

854
01:00:17,837 --> 01:00:22,214
and new ways in which we could get to
literally see and understand the body of result,

855
01:00:22,214 --> 01:00:28,513
and freeze-frames it and photographic interventions
on, but that's a little bit of an aside.

856
01:00:28,513 --> 01:00:32,717
And you bring up the really important question
of, alright, if I'm working at the portrait

857
01:00:32,717 --> 01:00:37,728
gallery, how can I -- I notices it's not directed
personally, but how can one who is attached

858
01:00:37,728 --> 01:00:42,516
to this notion of a portrait gallery in the
first place presume to undermine this notion

859
01:00:42,516 --> 01:00:49,450
of an individual hand-on one of the things
that is important to understand about

860
01:00:49,450 --> 01:00:53,967
the notion of the portrait gallery itself.
I don't mean just ours, but this larger

861
01:00:53,985 --> 01:00:59,365
intellectual framework, as of course,
it too has, a history that relates to

862
01:00:59,626 --> 01:01:05,451
a specific set of political developments,
and specific set of intellectual developments.

863
01:01:05,451 --> 01:01:10,961
It is a product of mid nineteen century,
it seems to be a very British concept,

864
01:01:10,961 --> 01:01:14,467
which is interesting, [Norship Pointing]
for example, has made the point that

865
01:01:14,467 --> 01:01:18,767
portrait galleries tend to exist in the
English speaking world, which I actually

866
01:01:18,767 --> 01:01:26,106
have come to think is attached to ways
of thinking about the political significance

867
01:01:26,106 --> 01:01:30,350
of the individual unit in society
that is kind of interesting, especially

868
01:01:30,350 --> 01:01:34,274
with respect to democratic ideals
so I have to say actually, I think there's

869
01:01:34,274 --> 01:01:39,595
something really interesting about the 
perhaps hidden political assumptions

870
01:01:39,595 --> 01:01:46,088
that go along with the portrait itself.
But specifically with respect to trying

871
01:01:46,088 --> 01:01:51,431
to undermine and retask this initial
portrait gallery, that has a lot to do

872
01:01:51,431 --> 01:01:56,520
with the fact that that's where I happen
to find myself as a young curator.

873
01:01:56,520 --> 01:02:01,844
I ended up at the portrait gallery 
somewhat unexpectedly shortly after

874
01:02:01,844 --> 01:02:06,281
finishing graduate school. And I --
one other things that really intrigued

875
01:02:06,281 --> 01:02:11,331
me about it, and this is going back
twelve years, is that the museum

876
01:02:11,331 --> 01:02:18,146
underwent a very self-conscious 
reinvention between 2001 and 2006

877
01:02:18,146 --> 01:02:22,788
when it was actually under physical renovation.
And there was a desire to re-examine

878
01:02:22,788 --> 01:02:29,781
the very principles of portraiture, which
I think has tended to be a form of art making

879
01:02:29,781 --> 01:02:34,140
that has not gotten a significant amount
of credit, I think in the recent past,

880
01:02:34,140 --> 01:02:40,460
it's been seen as a somewhat tired genre,
in fact, in the sixties lots of artists refuse

881
01:02:40,460 --> 01:02:45,578
to use that term, we think of Chuck Close 
for example, who does these giant faces.

882
01:02:45,578 --> 01:02:50,990
But during the sixties he called them heads.
He would not acknowledge until relatively

883
01:02:51,192 --> 01:02:58,718
recently that they are a form of portraiture.
And so one of my pleasures, pleasures

884
01:02:58,718 --> 01:03:04,813
perhaps as a curator has been to ask
audience to reconsider what they think

885
01:03:04,813 --> 01:03:11,601
they know about portraiture by thinking
of it -- and this is a thorny term, I'm using

886
01:03:11,601 --> 01:03:18,114
that word, but I wanted to do is to undo
the notion of portraiture and to recast it

887
01:03:18,114 --> 01:03:22,933
a little bit as a way of thinking about
identity and breaking down personal identity.

888
01:03:22,933 --> 01:03:26,776
But I think you are right to bring up
the question about whether or not

889
01:03:26,776 --> 01:03:37,095
there are in fact some, you know, some 
types of paradoxes or some assumptions

890
01:03:37,095 --> 01:03:41,413
that are invented in there that are,
you know, in some sense, going against

891
01:03:41,413 --> 01:03:47,257
the grain of the deeper thinking here.
It is really interesting to me to talk with

892
01:03:47,257 --> 01:03:50,992
contemporary artists and, actually,
a project I'm working on right now

893
01:03:50,992 --> 01:03:56,836
is about portrait extraction, who really
do very actively seem to be rediscovering

894
01:03:56,836 --> 01:04:01,325
or re-examining a notion which certainly
goes back to the Renaissance and this is

895
01:04:01,325 --> 01:04:05,769
the notion that somehow in depicting 
anybody else, or anything else,

896
01:04:05,769 --> 01:04:11,296
an artist is obviously reflecting something
of who he or she is, but I think the idea

897
01:04:11,296 --> 01:04:16,461
that that entity can somehow be seen
as an envelope, that is impervious to

898
01:04:16,461 --> 01:04:22,819
outside influence is really completely 
disintegrated. And yet side by side with that

899
01:04:22,819 --> 01:04:26,746
we know that we live in this incredible 
culture of celebrity, and of course

900
01:04:26,746 --> 01:04:31,968
[Worhose] was critiquing , so there 
definitely I think it's a very very very intersting

901
01:04:31,968 --> 01:04:39,698
push-pull and I think you are right
to raise these questions on --

902
01:04:39,698 --> 01:04:41,913
So I'm not sure that's a very satisfying 
response.

903
01:04:41,913 --> 01:04:47,590
(Audience) I just wanted to underscore that
all these paradoxes that that you unintendedly

904
01:04:47,590 --> 01:04:52,895
fly by underscore the interest of these lines.
Because it seems to me to speak to the

905
01:04:52,895 --> 01:04:57,241
contradiction of the world that we live in.
So thank you very much.

906
01:04:57,241 --> 01:05:01,045
(Anne) Oh, thank you. Thank for your
wonderful question.

907
01:05:01,045 --> 01:05:04,451
(Audience) Hi, um, thank you for having us,
your talk was interesting.

908
01:05:04,451 --> 01:05:10,691
I was wondering if the distinction of [inaudible]
autographic and allographic artwork

909
01:05:10,691 --> 01:05:16,003
can really be helpful for preservation,
to artworks, because I think

910
01:05:16,130 --> 01:05:25,153
the distinction is not that evident or --
there's more of a learning space between

911
01:05:25,153 --> 01:05:29,406
the two, and I think they really applies to
all the media that is - all the work so far,

912
01:05:29,406 --> 01:05:36,677
they are not necessarily time-based.
For example, sculpture by Turner,

913
01:05:36,677 --> 01:05:43,039
and the way that it has to be reorganized
in the gallery according to certain

914
01:05:43,039 --> 01:05:48,102
instructions because it travels in pieces,
but it has to be organized. You see,

915
01:05:48,102 --> 01:05:52,413
that, in a way of performance, all the work,
because if something goes wrong,

916
01:05:52,413 --> 01:05:57,143
you don't know where the things are,
you could argue that you are creating

917
01:05:57,143 --> 01:06:01,355
a new work if you do that. So that means
if the first time that that was done

918
01:06:01,355 --> 01:06:06,935
by the artist himself, that was the autograph
and is lost or maybe preserved through

919
01:06:06,935 --> 01:06:14,773
photography. So that work is un-autographic
but it also has autographic instances.

920
01:06:14,773 --> 01:06:18,985
And then it becomes untruthful work
so that if I show you a music as well,

921
01:06:18,985 --> 01:06:24,739
in a sense you can have performances
in terms of someone performing the work

922
01:06:24,739 --> 01:06:27,853
for, someone creating a new addition, 
but there will always be someone

923
01:06:27,853 --> 01:06:33,524
that goes in before, the autographic
instances are very in, manuscript, for example.

924
01:06:33,731 --> 01:06:39,896
And if we think [inaudible]
they exist in time-based media,

925
01:06:39,896 --> 01:06:46,910
because you will look for it in each of the page,
you will look for proof of the first instance

926
01:06:46,910 --> 01:06:55,228
of these sequence of art manifestations 
that will be steadily generated by the artists.

927
01:06:55,228 --> 01:07:01,880
So, where's about that option
[inaudible] for preservation.

928
01:07:01,880 --> 01:07:05,647
(Anne) That's a really interesting point.
I guess the assumption that you make

929
01:07:05,647 --> 01:07:08,529
that there will always a desire to go
back to the original form of the

930
01:07:08,529 --> 01:07:13,194
time-based piece, I think it's not
necessarily something that you should in fact

931
01:07:13,194 --> 01:07:16,936
be taking for granted. It's actually
something, of course I have really

932
01:07:17,063 --> 01:07:21,765
great colleagues, but it is a discussion
that I had with members of our staff.

933
01:07:21,765 --> 01:07:25,968
Why do we need to hold on to this
original form, and again, this is where

934
01:07:25,968 --> 01:07:29,591
I think the paradigm of being about 
being a historian is so important.

935
01:07:29,591 --> 01:07:33,947
That my colleagues in exhibitions
department were more focused on

936
01:07:33,947 --> 01:07:37,083
the here and the now, and getting it up
on the wall, for them, it's sort of,

937
01:07:37,083 --> 01:07:41,299
excess baggage to worry about
the sixteen iterations that perceive it

938
01:07:41,299 --> 01:07:45,315
it's not meaningful in the same way
in that context as it is to me.

939
01:07:45,315 --> 01:07:49,297
I think they understand the value of 
preserving it, and ultimately I think that

940
01:07:49,297 --> 01:07:53,099
that's where the framework of the museum
maybe have something special to

941
01:07:53,099 --> 01:07:57,750
contribute to this dialogue, but this
distinction between allographic

942
01:07:57,750 --> 01:08:02,412
and autographic I agree, is not a perfect one.
And in fact I think there are ways in which

943
01:08:02,412 --> 01:08:06,461
intentions that we observe in the world of
time-based and digital media

944
01:08:06,461 --> 01:08:12,493
are in fact really simply shedding light
on old problems that have always

945
01:08:12,493 --> 01:08:16,843
been there. Our conservation, has always
been about intervention into, you know,

946
01:08:16,843 --> 01:08:22,704
so-called erratic original, and 
the conservator has to make choices

947
01:08:22,704 --> 01:08:28,818
about how to best represent the intent
of the original artist or at least what

948
01:08:28,818 --> 01:08:33,324
is understood as being the original intent.
And what I really wanted to do with that

949
01:08:33,324 --> 01:08:39,487
distinction was to, I guess, disengage from
the idea that there is some inherent,

950
01:08:39,487 --> 01:08:43,214
well, of, but I as a historian I do think
there are things to be learned from

951
01:08:43,214 --> 01:08:46,026
the original that may not even be
interesting to the artist, however,

952
01:08:46,026 --> 01:08:51,298
that aside, I wanted to make a point that
if we begin to re-conceptualize visual art,

953
01:08:51,298 --> 01:08:56,324
which is traditionally been seen as something
which is the product of an erratic genius.

954
01:08:56,324 --> 01:09:00,495
You know, [Benjamin] is obviously trying
to disengage that, but it's sort of,

955
01:09:00,495 --> 01:09:07,179
[fidelization] that continues, that we can
begin to see these works of art as things

956
01:09:07,179 --> 01:09:13,329
that can migrate and retain some resemblance
of authenticity, no matter what medium

957
01:09:13,329 --> 01:09:18,043
they are executed in, as long as they visually
represent or conceptually represent

958
01:09:18,043 --> 01:09:24,160
what the artist wanted that piece to be,
but I do think it's an imperfect metaphor.

959
01:09:24,160 --> 01:09:27,414
Things are going to change, things are
going to deteriorate and something ultimately

960
01:09:27,414 --> 01:09:31,481
maybe a representation of itself.
And that becomes, I think it's almost

961
01:09:31,481 --> 01:09:37,077
sort of interesting philosophical conundrum,
and I'll just say one more thing.

962
01:09:37,077 --> 01:09:41,944
Which is simply to observe that this notion
of authenticity also functions

963
01:09:41,944 --> 01:09:45,700
slightly differently for people who are
interested in preserving data,

964
01:09:45,845 --> 01:09:48,552
and making sure that the data itself
doesn't get corrupted. So in fact,

965
01:09:48,552 --> 01:09:53,670
I think that lots of interesting layers
get added in here, that are worth

966
01:09:53,670 --> 01:09:59,521
thinking about, but it's a great question.
Thank you.

967
01:09:59,521 --> 01:10:06,799
(Audience) I wanted to point out that
the idea of the essential self which

968
01:10:06,799 --> 01:10:13,248
would be captured in the portrait is rather
a naive notion or is at fault with the public

969
01:10:13,248 --> 01:10:17,394
presentation of a person. Everybody knows
these people have private lives.

970
01:10:17,394 --> 01:10:22,038
Everybody knows they did all sorts of things,
they were complex beings. And if you take

971
01:10:22,038 --> 01:10:30,770
something like -- well, it doesn't take
new media to bring out the complications

972
01:10:30,770 --> 01:10:34,333
in the first place. You know, the diaries 
them-self are worth one avenue,

973
01:10:34,333 --> 01:10:38,970
but the other thing is, photographic,
presentation as in for instance,

974
01:10:38,970 --> 01:10:43,282
David Duncan spoke on Picasso
the private Picasso, he has this big

975
01:10:43,282 --> 01:10:48,460
photographic record of Picasso 
in the fifties, the forties and fifties,

976
01:10:48,460 --> 01:10:53,013
and you get this much complication.
In fact, you get a whole lot more complications

977
01:10:53,013 --> 01:10:58,118
there than you can get in your average
presentation, well, you know, the one

978
01:10:58,118 --> 01:11:03,674
of [Gitzburg], for instance. You get 
as much from David Duncan as you do

979
01:11:03,674 --> 01:11:09,834
from the new media presentation.
And digitization doesn't actually change

980
01:11:09,834 --> 01:11:17,329
anything so it's not quite that our notion
of a person's identity is modified by

981
01:11:17,329 --> 01:11:22,653
the exposure of new media. The exposure
of new media is interesting if it's own right.

982
01:11:22,653 --> 01:11:27,552
But it doesn't change the basic concepts
that we have of who we are,

983
01:11:27,552 --> 01:11:32,198
what persons are, what vulnerabilities 
and complications we have.

984
01:11:32,198 --> 01:11:35,690
(Anne) I think that's such a great
observation and would be so much fun

985
01:11:35,690 --> 01:11:42,761
to dig into that question with you,
I would submit, I would like for the sake

986
01:11:42,761 --> 01:11:47,766
of argument maybe put forward the idea
that I really do think there are ways

987
01:11:47,766 --> 01:11:54,030
in which we are developing new insights
in the present day about self on which

988
01:11:54,030 --> 01:11:57,979
perhaps are giving us new tools 
to go back and look at the past.

989
01:11:57,979 --> 01:12:03,992
For example, the querying of the history
of art, for example. Not necessarily,

990
01:12:03,992 --> 01:12:08,927
which is not to say that things were not
present previously that complicates

991
01:12:08,927 --> 01:12:12,715
the picture, I think you are absolutely
right that there's always been

992
01:12:12,715 --> 01:12:15,730
complexity with the human self.
But it is interesting to go back

993
01:12:15,730 --> 01:12:19,218
and look at the language that
the artists use at least, in describing

994
01:12:19,218 --> 01:12:23,334
their projects. Even somebody like
Alfred Stieglitz who was such

995
01:12:23,463 --> 01:12:29,375
a perceptive and sophisticated photographer,
really looked for the essential moment

996
01:12:29,375 --> 01:12:34,748
to capture somebody. And it's a language
but there's somehow I think, embedded

997
01:12:34,748 --> 01:12:40,617
in that presumption of a privileged way
of understanding somebody. And yet of course

998
01:12:40,617 --> 01:12:46,002
he did lots of different portraits of O'keeffe,
you can look at that series of portrait

999
01:12:46,002 --> 01:12:48,713
presentations.
(Audience) I would not trust what an artist

1000
01:12:48,713 --> 01:12:56,124
says about his own project. It just isn't reliable.
It is self-promotional and --

1001
01:12:56,124 --> 01:13:00,327
(Anne) There's a narrative-reflective
paradigm but I loved -- I think your point

1002
01:13:00,327 --> 01:13:02,984
is an excellent one. I think you are 
pervasing it.

1003
01:13:02,984 --> 01:13:05,929
(Host) We have time for two more,
and there's a few people who have been waiting.

1004
01:13:05,929 --> 01:13:09,082
So one there and then at the back.

1005
01:13:09,082 --> 01:13:14,728
(Audience) Dealing with authenticity,
how, whenever you are deciding

1006
01:13:14,728 --> 01:13:21,690
to migrate or provide forms for
current exhibition, how do you deal

1007
01:13:21,690 --> 01:13:27,457
with deterioration versus intent.
For example, in [Globagrew]

1008
01:13:27,457 --> 01:13:33,290
the artist manipulated the signal 
to get different colors and distortion.

1009
01:13:33,290 --> 01:13:36,671
How do you know what's genuine
and how do you know what's real?

1010
01:13:36,671 --> 01:13:41,421
Especially with film, if it's a color film
and there's red shift, was that intended?

1011
01:13:41,421 --> 01:13:45,535
(Anne) Yeah, you know, the weird thing
is that you don't always know, actually.

1012
01:13:45,535 --> 01:13:51,513
There's a great piece at the [Hershorn]
by John -- no not John Jordan, um,

1013
01:13:51,513 --> 01:13:56,285
oh goodness, actually the artist's name
has just slipped my mind. But I'll get it

1014
01:13:56,285 --> 01:14:01,030
for you. There's this great film piece
by a very interesting artist who was

1015
01:14:01,030 --> 01:14:07,673
working in the seventies which is a film piece,
and there is sound that goes with it.

1016
01:14:07,673 --> 01:14:12,883
But there's a little bit of a hypothesis,
about how we think the artist wanted

1017
01:14:12,883 --> 01:14:16,903
that particular piece to be installed.
And the problem is there's an absence

1018
01:14:16,903 --> 01:14:21,588
of documentation. So actually, 
one of the things that's really interesting

1019
01:14:21,588 --> 01:14:27,313
and this goes to, really actually, any
period of artwork that we really have to

1020
01:14:27,313 --> 01:14:31,895
rely very heavily upon an interpretive
framework. And so one other thing

1021
01:14:31,895 --> 01:14:35,722
we've been doing in terms of looking
at this question about some practices

1022
01:14:35,722 --> 01:14:39,369
is to think about what it means to
document the intention of the artist,

1023
01:14:39,369 --> 01:14:43,584
at the outside. And so for example 
what we try to document now,

1024
01:14:43,584 --> 01:14:48,419
recognizing that this information can
very very quickly disappear, is, you know,

1025
01:14:48,578 --> 01:14:52,305
how does the artist want the piece to look
what it -- look when it's installed.

1026
01:14:52,305 --> 01:14:56,420
What is it supposed to sound like,
and of course inevitably even when

1027
01:14:56,420 --> 01:15:01,755
one tried to document these things
meticulously, we have to recognize that

1028
01:15:01,755 --> 01:15:07,217
there's inevitably going to be some slippage.
Even when you think you are being very

1029
01:15:07,217 --> 01:15:11,540
meticulous, things like processing
times, for computers can change.

1030
01:15:11,540 --> 01:15:20,047
And so I have to say that we do our best
to develop data that gives us as many

1031
01:15:20,047 --> 01:15:25,254
points of reference as possible, 
but I think ultimately we have to recognize

1032
01:15:25,254 --> 01:15:30,650
that it is to a certain degree,
an imperfect science. We also something

1033
01:15:30,650 --> 01:15:35,387
called a Checksum value to try to 
determine that the data moving forward

1034
01:15:35,387 --> 01:15:41,962
is kept in tack, but I think it's very
interesting that historically the --

1035
01:15:41,962 --> 01:15:46,916
in order to be sure that there are it,
problems for example, with the migration

1036
01:15:46,916 --> 01:15:51,253
of video into digital format, except
there's been curators, I mean,

1037
01:15:51,253 --> 01:15:55,616
[conservators], or probably curators too,
and certainly conservators who sit and look

1038
01:15:55,616 --> 01:16:00,157
intently at something to be sure that
there are no disruptions. We can't do that

1039
01:16:00,157 --> 01:16:04,632
with a generative work, so we've moved
beyond the point at which human perception

1040
01:16:04,632 --> 01:16:09,858
can really answer these questions for us.
And so I think on a certain level we have to

1041
01:16:09,858 --> 01:16:15,572
accept a certain degree of slippage,
and a certain degree of imperfection,

1042
01:16:15,572 --> 01:16:21,549
inability to completely nail something down,
and again, that is kind of a mind shift.

1043
01:16:21,549 --> 01:16:25,049
We've become comfortable with the fact
that we know everything will always be

1044
01:16:25,049 --> 01:16:29,426
something of an observation.
So I don't know if that --

1045
01:16:29,426 --> 01:16:33,943
(Audience) Those helped. Thank you.
(Host) So I'm afraid that we are out of time,

1046
01:16:33,943 --> 01:16:38,522
I'm sure Anne will be happy to stick around
if there are a couple of more questions,

1047
01:16:38,522 --> 01:16:41,171
but let's thank her for a really interesting clip.

1048
01:16:41,171 --> 01:16:44,987
<i>Applause</i>

1049
01:16:50,272 --> 01:16:53,212
(Anne) I can definitely stick around.
(Audience) What is a generative?

1050
01:16:53,212 --> 01:16:58,886
(Anne) Oh right, we started with this term of --
yeah, it's a relatively new term and it refers

1051
01:16:58,886 --> 01:17:05,382
to artwork that has no -- that doesn't loop.
That is continuously changing, so there is

1052
01:17:05,382 --> 01:17:10,097
code behind the image that leads to
ever-changing permutations of the way

1053
01:17:10,097 --> 01:17:16,690
in which the digital data is combined
and output. So there is no one instance

1054
01:17:16,690 --> 01:17:21,017
of the work. It's constantly changing.
One can describe the generative is --

1055
01:17:21,017 --> 01:17:25,059
(Audience) So a network piece,
is generative enough? It can

1056
01:17:25,059 --> 01:17:27,815
run on for a hundred years?
(Anne) Forever. And you'll see

1057
01:17:27,815 --> 01:17:30,502
ever-changing combinations.
(Audience) Yeah, maybe not very

1058
01:17:30,502 --> 01:17:33,496
interestingly different, but none the less.
(Anne) Yeah that's right, exactly.

1059
01:17:33,496 --> 01:17:37,399
You could just -- you did a pretty good job
describing it. Especially after fifty

1060
01:17:37,399 --> 01:17:40,715
or so minutes. Yeah.