Open Data – American Alliance of Museums

Why Create & Use Open Source Software? Reflections from an imaging nonprofit

By Elizabeth Merritt

Doubtless your news-feed, like mine, is flooded with stories about the “open” economy: the rise of open data, open software, open government. (For an introduction to the trend, revisit the related chapter in TrendsWatch 2015.) …
Museums as 21st Century Databases

By Elizabeth Merritt

In August, Jeff Inscho blogged for CFM about the launch of the Carnegie Museums’ new Innovation Studio at Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh. This week his colleague David Newbury, who leads development on the Art Tracks project for Carnegie …
Why are we locking our data away from the public?

By Elizabeth Merritt

When I was researching TrendWatch2015 I sent out a call for examples of how museums struggle with the trend towards “openness” when it threatens traditional ways we have shared (or not shared) our data. Chris Norris, in the Division of …
Stitching Together Open Collections Data

By Elizabeth Merritt

In TrendsWatch 2015 I cited last year’s CitStitch Hackathon as an example of natural history museums collaborating with the public to create open datasets about collections. So I was super happy to open an email from Robert Guralnick, …
The “Open” Economy: filling the data pipeline

By Elizabeth Merritt

“‘Open’ is already on track to supplant ‘participatory’ as buzzword of the year, with good reason. The proliferation of groups supporting and encouraging openness in the cultural/creative sector is impressive. Wikimedia, Creative Commons, …
Crowdsourced Resources on Open Data

By Elizabeth Merritt

A lot of great folks joined me for last Friday’s Tweet chat on open data. Here’s a compilation of the resources, recommendations and questions shared by participants, to help you Find me on Twitter@futureofmuseums with your exploration of …
Monday Musing: TrendsWatch Watch

By Elizabeth Merritt

Here’s a quick roundup of recent stories related to the themes in TrendsWatch 2015 (Haven’t got your copy yet? Download the free PDF here. Print copies will be available in the AAM Bookstore soon.) Open Data Here’s a story I featured in …
The “Open” Economy: Filling The Data Pipeline

By Elizabeth Merritt

This article originally appeared in the March/April 2015 edition of Museum magazine. A sample of TrendsWatch 2015. “‘Open’ is already on track to supplant ‘participatory’ as buzzword of the year, with good reason. The proliferation of …

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