Following the lead of Bilboa in transforming a European city considered to be a remote outpost of civilization, the New York Times recently showcased two other cities following the same formula.
The city of Santiago de Compostela in the northern Galicia region is home of a new City of Culture, which includes a library, archives, museum (which sounds like it is primarily going to exhibit temporary exhibitions), and performance spaces, in an uber-modern building located in a centuries-old historic district. Details at
http://travel.nytimes.com/2011/08/21/travel/santiago-de-compostela-spain-aims-to-attract-new-cultural-pilgrims.html
Reporter Finn-Olaf Jones reports that the city of Perm, on the western edge of Siberia (and, apparently, considered the last stop in civilization as one enters Siberia on the TransSiberian Railway), is transforming itself from a closed city of the Soviet era into an avante-garde visual and performing arts centre, and is attracting notice worldwide. The city is doing this by dedicating some of its economic development resources for the arts. The transformation involves strengthening and expanding cultural institutions like remodeling the museums. But more importantly, the transformation involves developing and promoting local talent. In the process, Perm is also attracting emerging international talent to its burgeoning arts scene.
Check out the whole story—as well as travel suggestions—at
http://travel.nytimes.com/2011/07/24/travel/perm-russias-emerging-cultural-hotspot.html?hpw=&pagewanted=all.
Showing posts with label travel. Show all posts
Showing posts with label travel. Show all posts
Tuesday, November 22, 2011
Sunday, August 28, 2011
Sadie Katz's Is Closing
Burlington, Vermont loses its Jewish deli
From the best I can tell, Sadie Katz’s Deli in Burlington, Vermont is the closest thing to a traditional New York Deli between Boston and New York, and the North Pole. (Montreal has lots of Jews—but their interpretation of Jewish food is significantly different than their brethren in the U.S.)
But Sadie is closing her doors next Sunday (the day before Labor Day). Someone bought out her lease and, from the best I could tell while eavesdropping, the owner is focusing on a brewpub with pizza by the slice.
Although we discovered a New York-style bagel shop in Burlington the same day we heard this news, it’s a bagel shop, not a deli, and it doesn’t serve matzo ball soup.
If anyone knows of a deli in Western Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Albany, Saratoga Springs, or even Syracuse, please comment.
Otherwise, try to patronize Sadie before she closes her doors for good.
From the best I can tell, Sadie Katz’s Deli in Burlington, Vermont is the closest thing to a traditional New York Deli between Boston and New York, and the North Pole. (Montreal has lots of Jews—but their interpretation of Jewish food is significantly different than their brethren in the U.S.)
But Sadie is closing her doors next Sunday (the day before Labor Day). Someone bought out her lease and, from the best I could tell while eavesdropping, the owner is focusing on a brewpub with pizza by the slice.
Although we discovered a New York-style bagel shop in Burlington the same day we heard this news, it’s a bagel shop, not a deli, and it doesn’t serve matzo ball soup.
If anyone knows of a deli in Western Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Albany, Saratoga Springs, or even Syracuse, please comment.
Otherwise, try to patronize Sadie before she closes her doors for good.
Friday, August 06, 2010
Reflections on Museums 2: What Museums Cost Visitors—and Lessons for Information Architects and Information Designers
Although individual museums may wonder what to charge visitors, and some museum organizations consider the issue, for the vast majority of visitors, we primarily consider the issue on a case-by-case basis. That is, we decide to visit a museum and, when we learn about the admission fee, we decide whether or not to pay it.
Admittedly, I haven’t looked for it, but I can’t say that I’ve seen much widespread discussion of the cost of museum visits. Although most tour books include admission costs in their descriptions of museums, most reviews do not. Nor have my museum reviews mentioned admission costs.
But the issue of cost quickly went top of mind when I began my marathon of museum visits this winter. After visiting nearly 30 museums in as many days, museum admission costs admittedly became a daily issue. In this post, I explore these costs—then relate the implications to information designers and information architects.
Basic Admission Fees Are Competitive within Their Markets
And in the process of facing it that frequently, I quickly observed that, although admission fees would vary among specific institutions, basic admission fees in a community were remarkably similar. For example, in Paris, museum admissions typically ran between 8 and 10 euros; in Spain, admissions were slightly lower--6 and 9 euros.
That said, museum admissions in Europe seem remarkably similar to those in Canada, but significantly higher than many museums in the U.S., as many American museums do not charge admission (like the Smithsonian) or only charge admissions to special exhibitions (like the Baltimore Museum of Art and Minneapolis Institute of Arts).
Discounts Aren’t Easy to Come by
Of course, being the tightwad that I am, I’m always looking for a discount. So I paid attention to some of the discounts on offer:
To mitigate museum admission costs, my partner and I explored museum passes. These are tickets that are good for a large number of museums for a limited number of days. To be honest, consumers need to be cautious about these. In some instances, they can be a good deal but, in others, they could actually wind up increasing admissions expenses. For example, we bought passes in Berlin but did not buy them in Paris.
When deciding whether or not to purchase a pass, consumers first need to consider which museums they want to visit, then check the list covered by the pass. If the pass does not cover some of the museums on the list, then its value is reduced.
Next, consumers need to figure out how many of those museums they might visit during the time period covered by the pass. Visitors can typically visit just 1 or 2 museums per day; perhaps even fewer when trying to discover massive museums like the Louvre.
Last, consumers need to figure out the actual admission costs of the museum. In our case, at a rate of about 1.5 museum s per day, we paid less by paying individual admissions (even without discounts) rather than paying for the pass. I reached the same conclusion a year earlier with the New York Museum pass, which is promoted by the same company as the Parisian pass.
In contrast, we saved money with the Berlin Museum Pass. (Not surprisingly, the pass appears to be promoted by a different organization than the Parisian and New York passes.) Its cost was about that of three museums and we visited 5 on the pass. But the pass did not cover every museum we wanted to visit, such as the commercial DDR Museum and Story of Berlin, and one historic church. We found that, as a result of purchasing the pass, we actually selected museums based on whether or not they were included on the pass.
What Does this Mean to Information Architects and Information Designers
On the surface, museums and websites are unrelated phenomena. After all, museums are cultural institutions that exist in three dimensions; websites are informational and educational institutions that exist in two dimensions.
But, as a great speaker (whose name escapes me right now) once observed, sometimes the best ideas come from non-competitors. And as websites struggle with the challenge of generating revenue from users, information architects and information designers might learn a few lessons from museums.
The ability to charge for content seems to have some contextual basis. That is, museums in Europe and Canada, have similar admissions fees, and are able to charge across the board. In contrast, museums in many American markets do not charge admission fees, perhaps making it harder for other museums in their markets to charge anything other than nominal admission fees.
In other words, market conditions might determine whether a website can charge users a general entrance fee. In markets where most competitors do not charge fees, only a concerted action by all will change the rates. Airlines have tried this with only mixed results; when several airlines raise fares, often one will not, to skim off the rest of the business from price-conscious consumers.
When basic fees are constrained by market conditions, a la carte fees offer an alternative. For example, although many American museums do not charge a basic admission fee, they do charge fees to see special exhibitions. These fees are often as high as, if not higher than, regular admission fees to comparable museums in other markets. For example, special exhibitions at the Baltimore Museum of Art require separately purchased tickets.
But the practice is not limited to American museums that do not charge a basic admission fee. The Prado in Madrid, for example, had a general admission fee and separate fees for special exhibitions.
Information architects and designers might consider this as an alternate approach; providing access to some content either for free or for a lower general price, and providing access to other content only after purchasing a “special ticket.” Generally, most professional associations adopt this model, providing some general information about the profession for free, but providing articles, research studies, and similar intellectual property only to paying members.
Memberships offer benefits to both parties. For people who want to frequently visit a particular museum, or merely want to show their support, they can become a “member” of the museum. All levels of membership offer free admission to the general collection and special exhibitions (though they might limit visits to special exhibitions). More costly memberships provide additional privileges, such as invitations to exhibition openings. For those who have income limitations, like students, seniors, and families, special prices make membership affordable.
Information architects and designers might also consider such approaches to charging for their websites; a one-time visit fee (like a one-time admission fee to a museum) as well as memberships for frequent visitors and supporters. Similarly, information architects and information designers might consider offering different levels of membership with different levels of access to information, as well as discounted memberships for groups who have limited incomes.
In some ways, this resembles the approach to websites taken by professional associations, except theirs is an all-or-nothing approach. This approach might work better with magazines and other subscription materials, as they can charge for one issue (as some are starting to do for the iPad) and general subscriptions.
When several related websites want to reach the same groups of users, they might collaborate with passes. As the museums of Berlin, New York, and Paris collaborated to offer a single pass that provides admission to several museums, so information architects and information designers who work with several websites trying to reach the same group of users might collaborate with one another by offering a “ticket” that lets users visit all of the sites for a period of time by using a single pass. This is an idea that is being considered by the community that publishes online periodicals; news reports suggest that they are considering subscriptions that provide access to several publications at once (much like cable companies offer “packages” of specialty stations). When creating such passes involves several publishers, the challenges are admittedly daunting, as participants need to determine what to charge, how much access to provide, and how to divide the revenue—among other questions.
And how should websites deal with “donations” of content (also known as user-generated content)? On the one hand, user-generated content—that is, tips, insights, ideas, and similar information that users contribute to the website, appears to be a gift. On the other hand, whenever anyone can contribute to the site, usually anyone does—including people trying to advertise professional services (without paying for the privilege), sell reliable and dubious products (once again, without paying for the privilege) and people offering advice who, in reality, have a stronger need for it. Museums face similar challenges; people want to donate items that may or may not relate to their collections and, even if they do, might not strengthen that collection. As a result, most museums have acquisitions policies, which govern which artifacts they seek and the conditions under which they accept them. Similarly, many online press outlets as well as specialty websites—plagued by flaming or irrelevant posts—have increasingly adopted policies regarding these “gifts” of content, limiting them to registered users whose identities they can always track. In some instances, contributors may need to join the website (at a fee) to continue receiving the privilege of contributing.
What does this mean? As information architects and information designers struggle with the challenges of which content to provide for free and which for a fee, and whether to allow the general public to contribute comments or only registered users, we might look to museums for models of how to approach these challenges and adapt them to our needs: general admission fees, a la carte fees, membership, passes, and gift privileges.
Admittedly, I haven’t looked for it, but I can’t say that I’ve seen much widespread discussion of the cost of museum visits. Although most tour books include admission costs in their descriptions of museums, most reviews do not. Nor have my museum reviews mentioned admission costs.
But the issue of cost quickly went top of mind when I began my marathon of museum visits this winter. After visiting nearly 30 museums in as many days, museum admission costs admittedly became a daily issue. In this post, I explore these costs—then relate the implications to information designers and information architects.
Basic Admission Fees Are Competitive within Their Markets
And in the process of facing it that frequently, I quickly observed that, although admission fees would vary among specific institutions, basic admission fees in a community were remarkably similar. For example, in Paris, museum admissions typically ran between 8 and 10 euros; in Spain, admissions were slightly lower--6 and 9 euros.
That said, museum admissions in Europe seem remarkably similar to those in Canada, but significantly higher than many museums in the U.S., as many American museums do not charge admission (like the Smithsonian) or only charge admissions to special exhibitions (like the Baltimore Museum of Art and Minneapolis Institute of Arts).
Discounts Aren’t Easy to Come by
Of course, being the tightwad that I am, I’m always looking for a discount. So I paid attention to some of the discounts on offer:
- People who receive public assistance can, in some countries, receive reduced or free admission.
- Student discounts are really young people discounts. Most are restricted to students under the age of 30, even if the person can produce documentation verifying that he or she is a full-time student. Given the focus on mature students and the fact that many of them would benefit from museum visits but have foregone income for a year, this age limit is both arbitrary and discriminatory; it should really be named “Traditional student discount.”
Furthermore, some student discounts are limited to students studying within the country, as is the situation in France, Germany, and Turkey. Although this is discriminatory, it is a bit more understandable, as visits to state-sponsored museum s are an extension of state-sponsored educations. Students studying in other states are not sponsored. It’s not nice, but it’s a bit more understandable.
- Teacher discounts are, available on an even more limited basis. Spain is the most generous with its discounts; most Spanish museums offered me free admission when I showed my faculty identification. Otherwise, only one other museum offered complimentary admission to teachers: the Jewish Museum of Paris. All of the museums offering complimentary admission did not ask what I taught or at what level.
- Membership in a national museum association only works within the country. For example, I am a member of the Canadian Association of Museums. One of the benefits is complimentary admission to museums throughout Canada. When I was a member of the American Association of Museums, that membership card often worked in Canada, but as the Canadian association strengthened, that happened less frequently.
An International museum association exists, called ICOM. A benefit of membership in that organization is complimentary admissions throughout the world. Figuring out how to become a member, however, is another story.Museum Passes Are Often a Deal Worth Passing On
To mitigate museum admission costs, my partner and I explored museum passes. These are tickets that are good for a large number of museums for a limited number of days. To be honest, consumers need to be cautious about these. In some instances, they can be a good deal but, in others, they could actually wind up increasing admissions expenses. For example, we bought passes in Berlin but did not buy them in Paris.
When deciding whether or not to purchase a pass, consumers first need to consider which museums they want to visit, then check the list covered by the pass. If the pass does not cover some of the museums on the list, then its value is reduced.
Next, consumers need to figure out how many of those museums they might visit during the time period covered by the pass. Visitors can typically visit just 1 or 2 museums per day; perhaps even fewer when trying to discover massive museums like the Louvre.
Last, consumers need to figure out the actual admission costs of the museum. In our case, at a rate of about 1.5 museum s per day, we paid less by paying individual admissions (even without discounts) rather than paying for the pass. I reached the same conclusion a year earlier with the New York Museum pass, which is promoted by the same company as the Parisian pass.
In contrast, we saved money with the Berlin Museum Pass. (Not surprisingly, the pass appears to be promoted by a different organization than the Parisian and New York passes.) Its cost was about that of three museums and we visited 5 on the pass. But the pass did not cover every museum we wanted to visit, such as the commercial DDR Museum and Story of Berlin, and one historic church. We found that, as a result of purchasing the pass, we actually selected museums based on whether or not they were included on the pass.
What Does this Mean to Information Architects and Information Designers
On the surface, museums and websites are unrelated phenomena. After all, museums are cultural institutions that exist in three dimensions; websites are informational and educational institutions that exist in two dimensions.
But, as a great speaker (whose name escapes me right now) once observed, sometimes the best ideas come from non-competitors. And as websites struggle with the challenge of generating revenue from users, information architects and information designers might learn a few lessons from museums.
The ability to charge for content seems to have some contextual basis. That is, museums in Europe and Canada, have similar admissions fees, and are able to charge across the board. In contrast, museums in many American markets do not charge admission fees, perhaps making it harder for other museums in their markets to charge anything other than nominal admission fees.
In other words, market conditions might determine whether a website can charge users a general entrance fee. In markets where most competitors do not charge fees, only a concerted action by all will change the rates. Airlines have tried this with only mixed results; when several airlines raise fares, often one will not, to skim off the rest of the business from price-conscious consumers.
When basic fees are constrained by market conditions, a la carte fees offer an alternative. For example, although many American museums do not charge a basic admission fee, they do charge fees to see special exhibitions. These fees are often as high as, if not higher than, regular admission fees to comparable museums in other markets. For example, special exhibitions at the Baltimore Museum of Art require separately purchased tickets.
But the practice is not limited to American museums that do not charge a basic admission fee. The Prado in Madrid, for example, had a general admission fee and separate fees for special exhibitions.
Information architects and designers might consider this as an alternate approach; providing access to some content either for free or for a lower general price, and providing access to other content only after purchasing a “special ticket.” Generally, most professional associations adopt this model, providing some general information about the profession for free, but providing articles, research studies, and similar intellectual property only to paying members.
Memberships offer benefits to both parties. For people who want to frequently visit a particular museum, or merely want to show their support, they can become a “member” of the museum. All levels of membership offer free admission to the general collection and special exhibitions (though they might limit visits to special exhibitions). More costly memberships provide additional privileges, such as invitations to exhibition openings. For those who have income limitations, like students, seniors, and families, special prices make membership affordable.
Information architects and designers might also consider such approaches to charging for their websites; a one-time visit fee (like a one-time admission fee to a museum) as well as memberships for frequent visitors and supporters. Similarly, information architects and information designers might consider offering different levels of membership with different levels of access to information, as well as discounted memberships for groups who have limited incomes.
In some ways, this resembles the approach to websites taken by professional associations, except theirs is an all-or-nothing approach. This approach might work better with magazines and other subscription materials, as they can charge for one issue (as some are starting to do for the iPad) and general subscriptions.
When several related websites want to reach the same groups of users, they might collaborate with passes. As the museums of Berlin, New York, and Paris collaborated to offer a single pass that provides admission to several museums, so information architects and information designers who work with several websites trying to reach the same group of users might collaborate with one another by offering a “ticket” that lets users visit all of the sites for a period of time by using a single pass. This is an idea that is being considered by the community that publishes online periodicals; news reports suggest that they are considering subscriptions that provide access to several publications at once (much like cable companies offer “packages” of specialty stations). When creating such passes involves several publishers, the challenges are admittedly daunting, as participants need to determine what to charge, how much access to provide, and how to divide the revenue—among other questions.
And how should websites deal with “donations” of content (also known as user-generated content)? On the one hand, user-generated content—that is, tips, insights, ideas, and similar information that users contribute to the website, appears to be a gift. On the other hand, whenever anyone can contribute to the site, usually anyone does—including people trying to advertise professional services (without paying for the privilege), sell reliable and dubious products (once again, without paying for the privilege) and people offering advice who, in reality, have a stronger need for it. Museums face similar challenges; people want to donate items that may or may not relate to their collections and, even if they do, might not strengthen that collection. As a result, most museums have acquisitions policies, which govern which artifacts they seek and the conditions under which they accept them. Similarly, many online press outlets as well as specialty websites—plagued by flaming or irrelevant posts—have increasingly adopted policies regarding these “gifts” of content, limiting them to registered users whose identities they can always track. In some instances, contributors may need to join the website (at a fee) to continue receiving the privilege of contributing.
What does this mean? As information architects and information designers struggle with the challenges of which content to provide for free and which for a fee, and whether to allow the general public to contribute comments or only registered users, we might look to museums for models of how to approach these challenges and adapt them to our needs: general admission fees, a la carte fees, membership, passes, and gift privileges.
Next post: Different ways of learning from museums.
Thursday, August 05, 2010
Reflections on Museums 1: Tour Buses, Advance Organizers, and Truth in Organizational Communication
The next several posts reflect on the experience of visiting museums. The first explores tour buses, advance organizers and truth in organizational communication.
Subsequent postings explore:
One of the more interesting surprises of my recent visit to Europe was my discovery of the city tour—you know, those double-decker buses that drive around a city and point out the sites to people.
In the past, I had never seen the point to them. I always felt that the history museum for the city was the ideal launching pad for a visit. These museums describe how the city evolved and, in the process, introduce the culture, key places, and famous people. Indeed, some even have replicas, models, paintings, or photos of major places, along with statues, paintings and photos of famous people. I’m still a fan of these institutions as a starting point for a visit. For example, if you’re visiting Montreal, make sure you check out the Montreal History Centre. Visiting Atlanta? Check out the Atlanta History Center. Chicago? Check out the Chicago Historical Society. Berlin? The Berlin Story.
But these institutions admittedly have a few limitations as a starting point for a visit. Some cities don’t really have such institutions. For example, Toronto doesn’t. (They’ve talked about it, but so far, nothing’s there.) Baltimore’s City Life museums served such a purpose but went bankrupt, and the one city museum—the one-of-a-kind Public Works museum—closed as part of a budget cut. (The Maryland Historical Society fills in some of the slack.)
So what’s a visitor to do?
Take my partner’s advice and take the tour bus. At first, it was something for him to kill time when I had to finish a report during our visit to Istanbul. He loved the experience. I thought it was just about the chance to ride on the open, upper deck of a double-decker bus (no selling point to this cold-adverse person). But he said it gave him a sense of the layout of the city, and he appreciated the background provided by the tour guide.
He also appreciated the flexibility of European city tours. All are hop on—hop off, which let visitors get on and off. If a site intrigues a visitor, the visitor can get off the bus and explore the site, then resume the tour.
He loved the experience so much that, by the third city, he would ask, “When am I going to be able to take my tour bus?”
But along the way, he talked me into trying the tour bus, too. And I found that, like the guided tours of a software applications for new users, or that museums post on their websites, these tour buses act as advance organizers (like those Ausubel proposes for educational programs) for experiencing a new city. Most, though not all, tours provided visitors with a brief history of the city—starting with its founding, introduced the major sections of the city (and, in some cases, put it into the context of its history), and then introduced major sites.
Some are sites that visitors are likely to explore later, like museums and historic locations; others are curiosities, like the Torre Agbar in Barcelona, a building so unique in its shape and size that only the least curious visitor could ignore it (though it is not really a tourist site).
I also learned a few practical things along the way—some that merely prepare me better for future tours, others that inform work in information and instructional design.
Subsequent postings explore:
- The cost of museums
- How visitors learn from museum exhibits
- Lessons for information architecture from museums
- The challenges of displaying difficult material
One of the more interesting surprises of my recent visit to Europe was my discovery of the city tour—you know, those double-decker buses that drive around a city and point out the sites to people.
In the past, I had never seen the point to them. I always felt that the history museum for the city was the ideal launching pad for a visit. These museums describe how the city evolved and, in the process, introduce the culture, key places, and famous people. Indeed, some even have replicas, models, paintings, or photos of major places, along with statues, paintings and photos of famous people. I’m still a fan of these institutions as a starting point for a visit. For example, if you’re visiting Montreal, make sure you check out the Montreal History Centre. Visiting Atlanta? Check out the Atlanta History Center. Chicago? Check out the Chicago Historical Society. Berlin? The Berlin Story.
But these institutions admittedly have a few limitations as a starting point for a visit. Some cities don’t really have such institutions. For example, Toronto doesn’t. (They’ve talked about it, but so far, nothing’s there.) Baltimore’s City Life museums served such a purpose but went bankrupt, and the one city museum—the one-of-a-kind Public Works museum—closed as part of a budget cut. (The Maryland Historical Society fills in some of the slack.)
So what’s a visitor to do?
Take my partner’s advice and take the tour bus. At first, it was something for him to kill time when I had to finish a report during our visit to Istanbul. He loved the experience. I thought it was just about the chance to ride on the open, upper deck of a double-decker bus (no selling point to this cold-adverse person). But he said it gave him a sense of the layout of the city, and he appreciated the background provided by the tour guide.
He also appreciated the flexibility of European city tours. All are hop on—hop off, which let visitors get on and off. If a site intrigues a visitor, the visitor can get off the bus and explore the site, then resume the tour.
He loved the experience so much that, by the third city, he would ask, “When am I going to be able to take my tour bus?”
But along the way, he talked me into trying the tour bus, too. And I found that, like the guided tours of a software applications for new users, or that museums post on their websites, these tour buses act as advance organizers (like those Ausubel proposes for educational programs) for experiencing a new city. Most, though not all, tours provided visitors with a brief history of the city—starting with its founding, introduced the major sections of the city (and, in some cases, put it into the context of its history), and then introduced major sites.
Some are sites that visitors are likely to explore later, like museums and historic locations; others are curiosities, like the Torre Agbar in Barcelona, a building so unique in its shape and size that only the least curious visitor could ignore it (though it is not really a tourist site).
I also learned a few practical things along the way—some that merely prepare me better for future tours, others that inform work in information and instructional design.
- As a result of having no cover and being above the traffic, the views on the upper level were much clearer than those on the lower level . Or, to be more precise, although I may have been warm on the covered and somewhat heated lower deck of the bus, I couldn’t’ see much.
- Most tours operate in several languages (one operated in as many as ten). To do so, most use a system that lets visitors choose the language of choice.
- To make sure that the right narration plays at the right time, the default narration is music. Although I am not certain of this, it seems that the buses and the key sites are equipped with some sort of technology that tells the bus when it’s entering a particular district; that, in turn, causes the system to play the recording associated with that location. The system seems to experience glitches when a bus is idling near a signal; the same narration plays repeatedly until the bus moves away from the signal. (This was a problem in Madrid.)
- Some aspects of consistency are overlooked. All of the Spanish cities had at least two bus routes and they slightly overlapped. In Barcelona, the English narration for one route was by someone with an American accent; the other by someone with a British accent. But in the overlapping part of the routes, the system only had one recording. The sudden change from an American to British voice seemed a bit odd.
- As an added benefit to these systems, the tour companies provide a set of high quality ear phones that visitors can keep. As someone who goes through 3 or 4 sets of earphones a year, this was an added bonus, worth $8 to $10 per tour.
- The tour bus we took in Berlin was the exception to these tours; we had a live tour guide who narrated in both German and English. Even though I was the only Anglophone for part of the tour, he continued to narrate in both languages. And he even translated the jokes!
- This live narration, complete with opinion, provided for a more colorful tour—not just in terms of the jokes, but also the opinions. While providing opinion admittedly risks offending the audience, the absence of some admittedly less-than-pleasant facts can also make a tour seem unnecessarily sanitized. For example, when pointing out the Department of Defense headquarters in Madrid, the narrator of the tour bus noted that construction started in 1932 but wasn’t finished for two decades afterwards. He failed to mention that the country was embroiled in a civil war during those years and the capital was temporarily moved away from Madrid, which might have had an effect on construction.
- Professional organizational communicators often wonder what to do about similar situations. This just reinforces my belief that it’s important to address the “big box in the middle of the room.” Ignoring it does not make the issue go away. Instead, people are likely to fill in the blanks. Sometimes, they’ll do so knowledgeably (even if they have a different viewpoint than the organization would prefer). More often than not, something will seem weird and they’ll make up their own explanation—complete or not, accurate or not. By acknowledging and explaining the situation, the communicator is allowed to address the situation in a way that’s to their benefit. (Kind of what everyone recommended that Tiger Woods should have done when his scandal first broke, but that’s another story.)
Next post: What Museums Cost Visitors.
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