Monday, December 24, 2007

What's Good for the Queen...

A gentle nudge to museums: Her Royal Highness, the Queen of England has introduced the official Royal Channel on YouTube with a video of her 1957 television Christmas addess to the people of England. What I love in particular about this chat from the days of yore is that what she has to say actually could pertain to museums and why they should be making videos for the public as well:

I very much hope that this new medium will make my Christmas message more personal and direct. It's inevitable that I should seem a rather remote figure to many of you...but now at least for a few minutes, I welcome you to the peace of my own home.

Sadly, as with Queen Elizabeth, many museums often still seem a bit remote to the general public, just one reason why participation in social media such as YouTube is important for museums. The Brooklyn Museum just recently took YouTube participation a step further with its Visitor Video Competition, inviting visitors to make videos about the museum within its own walls.

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