Geni This is an excelent idea - of course if we mounted a bar code as well and they had wi fi or internet phone carrying customers then we could use Google Goggles and supply it in different languages.... I tried suggesting this at one museum and I got the impression that they were worried about "doing their job" of course they can use our text and take nearly all the credit for just doing a print. Roger On 31 January 2011 23:39, geni <geniice(a)gmail.com> wrote: I was recently in the Portsmouth natural history museum (or as the natives call it Cumberland House). When I was there I saw this: http://www.flickr.com/photos/58992329@N03/5406060116/ If you look at the text in the right column (may need to view image at full size) you will find that it is not only dated (it's treating 1982 as recent) but is treating the [[Almas (cryptozoology)]] thing seriously. The museum doesn't really have any money so this isn't something that is likely to be fixed by them any time soon. I think offering to replace it with wikipedia based text along the lines of say [[User:Geni/museum_sign]] would fall within 7-8 of: http://uk.wikimedia.org/wiki/Business_Plan#Mission_and_Objectives I don't know how much doing such a replacement would cost but I would be surprised if it passed the limit of our micro grant program. Wikimedia-UK would need to be involved to cover use of the logo and the like. ==Advantages== *Museum gets a better sign *New way to spread wikipedia content *Gives us the chance to produce a real world example of the type of signs we would like to see (QR code and the like) *Helps draw attention to gaps in Wikipedia (in this case it failed to mention how much Neanderthals weigh) *It may get us some good will with the Portsmouth museum service which since they hold one of the larger collections of ship paintings could be kinda handy *May get us some new editors who are interested in working on such signs. *It's a concrete real world activity that we can point to as an example of what we are doing. ==Disadvantages== *Might be more expensive than expected *Images are an issue in this case (need to check copyright status of http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Homo_neanderthalensis_models ) *Scale we can do this on is limited both financially and finding people to write such signs ==Neutral== *They might say no -- geni _______________________________________________ Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l(a)wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: http://uk.wikimedia.org -- Roger Bamkin (aka Victuallers) _______________________________________________ Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l(a)wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: http://uk.wikimedia.org

WRT QR codes: I brought this up when chatting with the British Library. If it were part of a temporary exhibition (the BL has a funky new-media room in the foyer area, for example) then a demo using QR codes and a free smart phone app(*) would be an easy thing to show off and less controversial than sticking new labels all over a museum. As the QR codes can point to an official website (or database record for the item) this would not need to be a Wikipedia specific initiative. If someone is into this technology, perhaps we can make such a demo part of an upcoming workshop/edit-a-thon event with a relevant GLAM (like Derby or the BL)? (*) The BL recently made a great hoo-ha about their new smart phone app, see http://www.bl.uk/app/ Fæ -- http://enwp.org/user_talk:fae _______________________________________________ Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l(a)wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: http://uk.wikimedia.org

I feel the revolutionary in me. (Mike you were talking about a new wiki project....) If we could arrange for these 2D QR Bar codes to be easily printed from GLAM pages then "enterprising" visitors might add a little sticker to GLAM labels. Its international travellors today who have access to Google Goggles.... but ? years ago it was only them who had a phone. If these labels became universal then the phone companies would fight each other to be the first to make it happen easily on their network. If we get a developer then maybe we could see if we could add a "Print GLAM sticker" to the list of options on a Wiki page? On 2 February 2011 09:49, Michael Peel <email(a)mikepeel.net> wrote: There are some museums that are already taking advantage of Wikipedia's content. Last weekend, I was at Fort Perch Rock [1], which is a small naval/RAF museum near Liverpool. The style of some of the content pinned to the wall was easily recognisable - it was straight from Wikipedia. E.g. the complete text of the article on HMS Thesis [2] was there, infobox and all. Although, there was a slight lack of attribution... I would love to see this become more widespread. QR codes linked to Wikipedia content would be fantastic. If the museum has an international audience, then using the different language editions of Wikipedia would be great, if there's space on the paper (bear in mind that most people don't have smart phones, or if they do and they're international travellers then they probably won't want to use the expensive data roaming costs). It very much depends on the museum's interest, and the level of the costs; it's worth talking to them about though. I think it would be a really interesting use of a microgrant, if the costs are sub-£100. Mike [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Perch_Rock [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Thetis_%28N25%29 On 1 Feb 2011, at 11:48, Fae wrote: _______________________________________________ Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l(a)wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: http://uk.wikimedia.org -- Roger Bamkin (aka Victuallers) _______________________________________________ Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l(a)wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: http://uk.wikimedia.org

Sorry to be a smart-pants but I just cobbled a userscript to add the QR code generation as a Wikipedia toolbox function. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Fæ/QRcode.js<http://en.wikipedia.org/w… In the usual way add: importScript('User:Fæ/QRcode.js'); //QRcode on toolbar to your vector.js or other preferred skin file. Cheers, Fæ -- http://enwp.org/user_talk:fae _______________________________________________ Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l(a)wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: http://uk.wikimedia.org

I feel the revolutionary in me. (Mike you were talking about a new wiki project....) If we could arrange for these 2D QR Bar codes to be easily printed from GLAM pages then "enterprising" visitors might add a little sticker to GLAM labels. Its international travellors today who have access to Google Goggles.... but ? years ago it was only them who had a phone. If these labels became universal then the phone companies would fight each other to be the first to make it happen easily on their network. If we get a developer then maybe we could see if we could add a "Print GLAM sticker" to the list of options on a Wiki page?

But, for fine arts galleries or major museums the process and policies of label writing is a very complex thing. Lots of people/departments involved, lots of policies and style guides (which wikipedians can relate to!) and lots of discussions about how to fit accurate content into small spaces without either dumbing down nor filling up the wall with text. I once did a multi-week internship at the [[powerhouse museum]] in order to research and write *two* labels for a temporary display! Suffice it to say that no museum is going to, at this stage, outsource their label writing to Wikipedians - it would be too much of a political decision within the organisation as you can imagine. [perhaps a small/volunteer organization might though...]

On Mon, Jan 31, 2011 at 23:39, geni &lt;geniice(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote: One thing we* could potentially do for the GLAM sector that could be quite helpful is to have a very simple service where they could log in to a website with a nice shortish URL (the sort of length that could be posted on Twitter or printed onto museum signs). They could basically then have some information on the page - a short description, a photo (which would get uploaded on to Commons) etc. They would be encouraged to put up a description that is the same as it is on the physical sign and optionally a photo. They would be strongly encouraged to make both the text CC-BY-SA and to get a photo up it would have to go on Commons. Imagine it as a sort of 'Open Museum Signs' site. Providing it as a free service would mean that smaller museums could document their stuff online, and it could do QR codes and maybe someone could build a smartphone app (so you could wander around the museum looking at objects and then sharing them with your friends or whatnot). I sketched something very crappily in Adobe Ideas: http://i.imgur.com/wo4d7.png Something like that is all there would be on the page. You scan the QR code, you see the object, and you can choose to read more on Wikipedia. The point about it is that it would be a nice simple thing the GLAM institutions could control, but the rights for the text would be assigned in such a way that it could be reused on Wikimedia projects and any photos they upload would be put onto Commons. And because there is a link from the object to the article(s) on WP, as they start doing more and more signs, they have a motivation to keep an eye on the articles. For smaller museums, it would be a way for them to start producing structured data (which publicly funded bodies are trying to do more and more) but also be a feeder for Wikipedia. Providing free tools for museums and other GLAMs might be a good way of getting initial buy-in to the whole collaborating-with-Wikimedia thing during a recession. * And by 'we', I mean 'hopefully not me'. Well, not yet anyway. I'm off to the Dev8D conference soon and some museum people go to that, so I may be able to find some people to get the ball rolling. I've also thought of a domain, which I won't share or register if there isn't any interest. -- Tom Morris <http://tommorris.org/> Please don't print this e-mail out unless you want a hard copy of it. If you do, go ahead. I won't stop you. _______________________________________________ Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l(a)wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: http://uk.wikimedia.org

I have updated the template {{QR code}} which should make it easy to include a QR link on any Wikipedia talk page and avoid installing scripts. * http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Template:QR_code Fæ -- http://enwp.org/user_talk:fae _______________________________________________ Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l(a)wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: http://uk.wikimedia.org

On Thu, Feb 3, 2011 at 21:00, Michael Peel &lt;email(a)mikepeel.net&gt; wrote: Yes, there are plenty. I was going to suggest that instead of using Google we could have one put up on Toolserver.org, but it looks like you can't hotlink images from wikipedia to toolserver. We could still put it up on Toolserver so Wikimedia projects can use it.

On Mon, Jan 31, 2011 at 23:39, geni &lt;geniice(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote: One thing we* could potentially do for the GLAM sector that could be quite helpful is to have a very simple service where they could log in to a website with a nice shortish URL (the sort of length that could be posted on Twitter or printed onto museum signs). They could basically then have some information on the page - a short description, a photo (which would get uploaded on to Commons) etc. They would be encouraged to put up a description that is the same as it is on the physical sign and optionally a photo. They would be strongly encouraged to make both the text CC-BY-SA and to get a photo up it would have to go on Commons. Imagine it as a sort of 'Open Museum Signs' site. Providing it as a free service would mean that smaller museums could document their stuff online, and it could do QR codes and maybe someone could build a smartphone app (so you could wander around the museum looking at objects and then sharing them with your friends or whatnot). I sketched something very crappily in Adobe Ideas: http://i.imgur.com/wo4d7.png Something like that is all there would be on the page. You scan the QR code, you see the object, and you can choose to read more on Wikipedia. The point about it is that it would be a nice simple thing the GLAM institutions could control, but the rights for the text would be assigned in such a way that it could be reused on Wikimedia projects and any photos they upload would be put onto Commons. And because there is a link from the object to the article(s) on WP, as they start doing more and more signs, they have a motivation to keep an eye on the articles. For smaller museums, it would be a way for them to start producing structured data (which publicly funded bodies are trying to do more and more) but also be a feeder for Wikipedia. Providing free tools for museums and other GLAMs might be a good way of getting initial buy-in to the whole collaborating-with-Wikimedia thing during a recession. * And by 'we', I mean 'hopefully not me'. Well, not yet anyway. I'm off to the Dev8D conference soon and some museum people go to that, so I may be able to find some people to get the ball rolling. I've also thought of a domain, which I won't share or register if there isn't any interest. -- Tom Morris <http://tommorris.org/>

+1! Got any pictures of the installation processes or labels in-situ? This deserves a mention in the Signpost and if you could also add it to the "this month in GLAM" report for Feb that's being compiled here http://outreach.wikimedia.org/wiki/GLAM/Newsletter Agreed with Roger too, if we could generate labels that not only show the QRcode but also the article title, and maybe something like "read about me on Wikipedia..." to give some context. Roger, would you mind giving a report of what you've achieved to the cultural-partners mailing list and requesting assistance to bring this to v.2? -Liam Wittylama.com/blog Peace, love & metadata On 05/02/2011, at 10:06, Fae &lt;faenwp(a)gmail.com&gt; wrote: _______________________________________________ Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l(a)wikimedia.org http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: http://uk.wikimedia.org

Opps the pictures are in [http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Quick_Response_Codes here] although they are mixed up with other QR stuff... Victuallers

I told a mate of mine, Terence Eden, a mobile technologist who writes frequently on his blog about how to do QR codes properly, about this thread. He's put up a post on his blog with some advice that could help Wikimedia do QR codes properly. http://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=3586