Technology

Futurist Friday: Superhuman

By Elizabeth Merritt

As you may have guessed from Wednesday’s wordless post, I’m glued to the Paralympics this week. Today I’m encouraging you to watch this trailer for the 2016 Paralympic games titled “We’re the …
What YouTube Can Do for Museums

By Winifred Kehl

This article originally appeared in the September/October 2016 issue of Museum magazine. How museums can use YouTube to engage visitors and extend their reach. “YouTube is the new TV”—or so seemingly everyone tells me at VidCon, the annual …
Futurist Friday: Curating the Hereafter

By Elizabeth Merritt

I have a special place in my heart for museums that help their audiences explore the future. The latest addition to my collection: the Hereafter Institute, a fictitious company created by Gabriel Barcia-Colombo, recipient of a 201 LACMA …
Futurist Friday: Empathetic AI

By Elizabeth Merritt

Whenever a new technology starts to take off (drones, 3D printing, Virtual Reality), the initial breathless coverage in the press is inevitably followed by articles deriding the trivial applications of these advances. We’re deluged …
Futurist Friday: Telepathic Theater

By Elizabeth Merritt

What if you could hear what characters in a play were thinking, as well as what they were saying? How would that change how playwrights create and audiences experience performance?While my main futurist focus is museums, I keep my eye on …
Futurist Friday: Cognitive Museum Buildings

By Elizabeth Merritt

Here’s a short video from Jonathan Strickland of Forward Thinking on the emergence of “cognitive buildings”: structures that use the internet of things (IoT) to analyze performance and anticipate our needs. …
A New AR Invasion: Pokemon Go!

By Elizabeth Merritt

If you haven’t heard the buzz about Pokémon Go—the new augmented reality game taking the world by storm—well, you must have been locked in collections storage, with no internet access, for the last few weeks. This new game was born from …
Futurist Friday: The Eyes Have It

By Elizabeth Merritt

I’ve been writing and thinking a lot lately about very serious topics: gender bias in the workplace; the way assistive technology can increase the “the digital divide;” the barriers to welcoming people who are not …
Futurist Friday: Deep Brain Stimulation and Memory Implants

By Elizabeth Merritt

Are you a cyborg? Before you reply with a reflexive “no,” consider this list of technologies many people welcome into their bodies: Contact lenses Pacemakers Insulin pumps Artificial heart valves Replacement joints (hip, knee) …
The Future of Museums (According to One Woman)

By Elizabeth Merritt

I was delighted to be interviewed for an issue of MISC Journal devoted to The Future According to Women. As the introduction notes, “The future we read about is made up of recycled bits of interviews curated from the minds of a few great …