For your inspiration: a sample of cultural institutions using Twitter in different ways...
The Natural History Whale - @NatHistoryWhale – 10,855 followers
New York’s Natural History Museum twitters via the life-size blue whale on its ceiling. It’s a great approach; the whale gives information about exhibitions but also makes funny remarks about visitors below and the existential trials of being a whale stuck on a ceiling. He also provides links to poems he has written and whale-related news stories. An amazing balance of information and whale-style wit.
"Everyone’s talking about how it’s snowing outside. Hello? Why isn’t anyone talking about the 21,000-pound whale in the room?
Maryland Zoo - @marylandzoo – 1,074 followers
Maryland Zoo’s Twitterfeed is everything a Twitterfeed should be – informative, funny and not just a series of posts about exhibition times which, let’s face it, are easily the lowest common denominator of Twitter post. Exhibition info is interspersed with bite-sized information about the zoo’s many species of animal with links to further information and the feed is updated several times a day.
"Rock hyraxes look like oversized guinea pigs but actually are most closely related to elephants! http://ow.ly/qQz 7:35 AM Mar 28th from HootSuite"
Brooklyn Museum - @brooklynmuseum – 21,650 followers
Widely regarded as one of the best museums using social media today, Brooklyn Museum is also one of the first institutions to monetize their Twitterfeed. @BrooklynMuseum provides a dynamic feed with exhibition info and constant dialogue between the museum and its followers. However, for a paltry sum of $20 a year, visitors gain access to an exclusive feed called @1stfans where they can talk directly to artists and get invitations to special events. The mastermind behind this scheme, Shelley Bernstein will be speaking at Communicating the Museum. It’s definitely going to be a highlight.
"Lovely visitor response on the last day of The Black List Project http://bit.ly/2nDnxf (love that this was the last video recorded) 2:23 PM Mar 29th from Tweetdeck"
The Imperial War Museum - @IMWF – 48 followers
The Imperial War Museum is comparatively new to Twitter but in a month it has already found a way to communicate something interesting to its followers with regular “On this day in...” posts. A simple but effective way to give a Twitterfeed another dimension beyond institutional information.
"On this day in... 1943: assassination attempt made on Hitler in Smolensk, Russia 6:53 AM Mar 13thfrom web"
The New Museum is a museum currently being built on Liverpool’s waterfront, due for opening in 2010. The museum twitters from the perspective of the actual building, which discusses its new roof, the view from its new windows etc. Hearing the thoughts of a building is a strange existential experience at first but then becomes quite entertaining. The New Museum shows that Twitter needn’t include any exhibition info at all and will still appeal to followers who feel involved in the museum’s ongoing development.
"I love a good sunset. Here's some new pics of me enjoying one on Friday - with the obligatory seagull of course! http://twurl.nl/vz74dz 1:36 AM Mar 24th from web"
NB. We enjoyed this yesterday (Apr 1st)... Britain's The Guardian announced that it would be the only newspaper in the world to transmit news solely via Twitter. You can read all about it here. (And be sure to read the comments at the bottom.)
Thanks for mentioning me in your post, but you should know that I don't work for the museum, I just hang there and tweet. That is to say the author of the tweets isn't an employee of the museum. Thanks for reading.
-NatHistoryWhale
Posted by: Nat Historywhale | September 30, 2009 at 02:58 AM