Welcome to the first issue of Dispatches from the Future of Museums

I am happy to share with you the inaugural issue of "Dispatches from the Future of Museums" - CFM's new vehicle to bring you timely, useful information about trends and innovations that will shape museums' world in coming decades. Each week CFM staff will present you with articles and news bites to fuel your imagination and inspire a fresh look at how you do your work. "Dispatches" is your resource - give us feedback so we can shape it to meet your needs! And please send us your suggestions for news about the future that we should share.

Yours sincerely,
Elizabeth Merritt
Founding Director, Center for the Future of Museums
futureofmuseums@aam-us.orgMore

Historical value: Families look to local museums for affordable entertainment
MetroWest Daily News
The Metro Daily West News reports on a rise in attendance noted at many museums nationwide due in part to aggressive digital marketing campaigns, well designed exhibits and features, and the state of the economy and the effect that has on families trying to save money and still educate and entertain themselves and their families.More

How the real-time Web is leaving Google behind
WIRED Magazine
People increasingly turn to the Internet for up-to-the-minute information about, well, everything - blog postings about celebrity antics, status updates from friends, and pictures and videos of political events as they unfold, like the protests over the Iranian election. Pundits call it the real-time Web. It's upending the Internet as we've known it, and it's not something that Google can easily dominate.More

How much should charity resemble business?
Chronicle of Philanthropy
How much should the nonprofit world mirror big business? Are charity leaders unfairly held to a different standard than corporate ones?More

Opening up the shut-down learner
The Futurist
Four out of every 10 American students in elementary school today might give up on learning well before graduation time, according to school psychologist Richard Selznick. They will disconnect from teachers, tune out of class, and simply "shut down" as students. In The Shut-Down Learner, Selznick tells parents and teachers what they can do to re-engage them.More

A rocket for the 21st century
SEED Magazine
Former astronaut Franklin Chang-Diaz explains how his plasma rocket engine could revolutionize space travel and why we need nuclear power in space.More

What If... future form, future function?
The Science Gallery
WHAT IF...insects could diagnose illness? WHAT IF...clouds were modified to snow ice cream? WHAT IF... we lived in a society where our every thought was public? These are just some of the questions asked in the upcoming exhibition at Science Gallery which probes the space between reality and the impossible and where designers meet scientists to explore the future.More

Healing habitats
The Futurist
Facing climate change, resource depletion, peak oil, and global migration, urban designers are challenged to create sustainable environments that contribute to the overall well-being of those who inhabit them.More

Robot as connoisseur
Studio 360
Sparky is four feet tall and has a TV monitor for a head. He can see, he can talk, and he likes sculpture by Louise Bourgeois. He's the invention of the artist Marque Cornblatt. Public radio's "Studio 360" takes Sparky on a spin through the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.More

Teaching cops to see
Smithsonian Magazine
Early one morning a bunch of New York City police officers, guns concealed, trooped into the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The officers, all captains or higher in rank, were attending "The Art of Perception," a course designed to fine-tune their attention to visual details, some of which might prove critical in solving or preventing a crime.More

Starting a digitization project: Basic requirements
Dlist
Digitization of the resources of the libraries and the information centres has become very essential for preservation as well as better access of the resources. Here an overview has been given about the basic requirements needed to start a digitization project. These include the hardwares and the softwares and some of the important technical issues.More