6040: Slightly better than 5050

What kind of idiot writes about the future? Well, we’ve tried to. So we must be idiots.

I haven’t written a ‘paper’ for as long as I can remember. But it was a good, disciplined (of sorts), exercise and made me think a lot about how successful we’d been with developing the Compass Lounge at the National Maritime Museum. Co-writing the paper (with Fiona) for the Museums and the Web conference has helped to formalise those thoughts. I think we are doing the right things, and we’ll be making them better over the next 12 months. What I hope is we get the chance to really understand how to make them better; working with visitors more, genuinely understanding why some things are failing, without the panic that the future has already moved on and we got it wrong.

I’ve been trying to wangle a trip to Yosemite National Park recently. This just makes me want to go more:

Yosemite HD from Project Yosemite on Vimeo.

Oldish, but love the sentiment of this and particularly how it’s shot.

So a committment then, to re-invent this space a little.

Or even to perhaps use it properly once again, with a bit more vim, vigour and verve.

It’s the only way to get through these tough times, no? Hit it head on. Have a go. Crank it up a notch.

It’s an Olympics year too, and in London, on my doorstep.

We’ll see.

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House flag, Eastern Telegraph Co Ltd, London.

Some great pics that document the development of the Compass Lounge at the NMM.

Swing high, originally uploaded by Lawrence.

Simple

Took a stroll around the national library in Paris a couple of weeks ago. It’s a stunning piece if architecture, but like so many parts of Paris it’s quite brutal and stripped back so that you feel a bit alienated, like you’re making the place a bit dirty by being there. But it’s also like being in the future, which feels good.