August 2018
Designing Experiences in the Ubiquitous Museum
M.W. Burns
The world is a ubiquitous museum, but to enter it we have to get beyond the sense of the ordinary. How can a place, perhaps one we are already very familiar with, be redefined as a facility for informal learning and enrichment?
In this article I will touch on three practices that can inform our approach to designing informal learning experiences in the everyday world. These practices include pervasive gaming, guerrilla installation, and transmedia storytelling. All offer ways of redefining ordinary places by changing our physical and emotional involvement with them. Applied individually or in combination, the practices I mention here have particular characteristics that can endure the complex conditions and challenges that everyday places present.
Pervasive Games
Games use rules and goals to frame our attention and actions. The focus of a game can range from playing out fictional scenarios to solving real world issues.1 The term "pervasive game" refers to those not bound by physical borders (fields, courts, game boards) Instead, they use the world at large as their playing field. Ingress and Pokémon Go, played by using a mobile augmented reality app, are probably one of the more well-known examples of pervasive games. However, digital technology is not an inherent feature of pervasive games. Killer is a classic, pervasive, live action role playing (LARP) game that, while incorporating physical props, requires no technology. Another example is Izgon (Exile). This was a pervasive LARP that spanned four cities: Zagreb and Rijeka in Croatia, Budapest in Hungary, and Boston, MA, in the US in 2015 2 . Technology (the Internet) was used for organizational purposes, and tracking player progress, but gameplay was highly focused on quests within the players physical urban environments.
Pervasive game themes occupy every genre imaginable (fantasy, sci-fi, mystery, politics, horror, war, adventure, etc.) but perhaps most common, and one of the oldest forms of pervasive games are treasure hunts (Jaakko Stenros and Marcus Montola, 2009).
Designing Experiences in the Ubiquitous Museum
M.W. Burns
The world is a ubiquitous museum, but to enter it we have to get beyond the sense of the ordinary. How can a place, perhaps one we are already very familiar with, be redefined as a facility for informal learning and enrichment?
In this article I will touch on three practices that can inform our approach to designing informal learning experiences in the everyday world. These practices include pervasive gaming, guerrilla installation, and transmedia storytelling. All offer ways of redefining ordinary places by changing our physical and emotional involvement with them. Applied individually or in combination, the practices I mention here have particular characteristics that can endure the complex conditions and challenges that everyday places present.
Pervasive Games
Games use rules and goals to frame our attention and actions. The focus of a game can range from playing out fictional scenarios to solving real world issues.1 The term "pervasive game" refers to those not bound by physical borders (fields, courts, game boards) Instead, they use the world at large as their playing field. Ingress and Pokémon Go, played by using a mobile augmented reality app, are probably one of the more well-known examples of pervasive games. However, digital technology is not an inherent feature of pervasive games. Killer is a classic, pervasive, live action role playing (LARP) game that, while incorporating physical props, requires no technology. Another example is Izgon (Exile). This was a pervasive LARP that spanned four cities: Zagreb and Rijeka in Croatia, Budapest in Hungary, and Boston, MA, in the US in 2015 2 . Technology (the Internet) was used for organizational purposes, and tracking player progress, but gameplay was highly focused on quests within the players physical urban environments.
Pervasive game themes occupy every genre imaginable (fantasy, sci-fi, mystery, politics, horror, war, adventure, etc.) but perhaps most common, and one of the oldest forms of pervasive games are treasure hunts (Jaakko Stenros and Marcus Montola, 2009).
Earthcaching in Denali, image by the Natl Park Service
The parameters of pervasive games are contractual boundaries. The gameplay itself defines the player's context as a game environment. This invisible, amorphous border is referred to as the "Magic Circle". But even with this malleable boundary the relationship between the real world and a pervasive game world is highly porous 3. Both the game and the original functions of a place operate simultaneously and can impact each other. The same is true in the ubiquitous museum. The conceptual framework it applies reinterprets the everyday, physical world as a museum, an informal learning space, a gallery filled with a collection of things, places, and phenomena.
"Can You See Me Now" by Blast Theory, 2001
The aspects of pervasive games most relevant to the ubiquitous museum are what Marcus Montola describes as spatial expansion, temporal expansion, and social expansion.4
Spatial Expansion
Much like we see the whole world as a museum, pervasive gaming sees it as a "playground".5 The magic circle exists wherever the player takes the game, and the concept of spatial expansion addresses the fact that it is the player that ultimately determines the game space. In the ubiquitous museum it is the participant's application of a museum lens that differentiates the museum space from ordinary space. It is ultimately a mindset, usually initiated by something (an object, an occurrence, a person) right in front of us. While there are "thresholds" into the museum experience, there are no physical edges, or limits on where the museum experience takes place.
While much of our focus is on "creating" museum experiences in the everyday world, most opportunities in the ubiquitous museum present themselves naturally in an ever-unfolding array.
Temporal Expansion
Temporal expansion does away with the idea of the "game session". Some pervasive games weave everyday life into the gameplay. An example mentioned above is Killer: The Assassination Game. The goal of the game is to "assassinate" your unwitting target (figuratively speaking) through any means as long as there are no witnesses. The target is also an assassin hunting their own target, unaware who is hunting them. An "assassination" can take place in any number of ways. Taking a picture (shooting) with a telescopic lens is equivalent to taking out a target from long range. A letter with the word "BOOM" on it can stand in for a letter bomb, etc. These things can happen to players as they go about their daily tasks. It can happen at home, at work, literally anywhere, anytime. Likewise, in ubiquitous museum our participation is not bound by a single site or building, nor is it determined by hours of operation. Engagement in the ubiquitous museum can happen anytime, anyplace.
Social Expansion
Spatial and temporal expansion create situations where people outside the game become active elements - where they are part of the game whether they recognize it or not. This is referred to as social expansion. Again, Killer provides an example of social expansion as unwitting bystanders can alter the gameplay by their very presence. If someone outside the game sees a player "commit an assassination" that player's score is downgraded).
Similarly, when we engage in the ubiquitous museum other people around us may, or may not, be aware they themselves are "components" of the experience. They are involved, either directly or indirectly. Those without prior knowledge of the "designed experience" may consciously decide to engage after stumbling upon the opportunities placed there by its facilitators.
Spatial Expansion
Much like we see the whole world as a museum, pervasive gaming sees it as a "playground".5 The magic circle exists wherever the player takes the game, and the concept of spatial expansion addresses the fact that it is the player that ultimately determines the game space. In the ubiquitous museum it is the participant's application of a museum lens that differentiates the museum space from ordinary space. It is ultimately a mindset, usually initiated by something (an object, an occurrence, a person) right in front of us. While there are "thresholds" into the museum experience, there are no physical edges, or limits on where the museum experience takes place.
While much of our focus is on "creating" museum experiences in the everyday world, most opportunities in the ubiquitous museum present themselves naturally in an ever-unfolding array.
Temporal Expansion
Temporal expansion does away with the idea of the "game session". Some pervasive games weave everyday life into the gameplay. An example mentioned above is Killer: The Assassination Game. The goal of the game is to "assassinate" your unwitting target (figuratively speaking) through any means as long as there are no witnesses. The target is also an assassin hunting their own target, unaware who is hunting them. An "assassination" can take place in any number of ways. Taking a picture (shooting) with a telescopic lens is equivalent to taking out a target from long range. A letter with the word "BOOM" on it can stand in for a letter bomb, etc. These things can happen to players as they go about their daily tasks. It can happen at home, at work, literally anywhere, anytime. Likewise, in ubiquitous museum our participation is not bound by a single site or building, nor is it determined by hours of operation. Engagement in the ubiquitous museum can happen anytime, anyplace.
Social Expansion
Spatial and temporal expansion create situations where people outside the game become active elements - where they are part of the game whether they recognize it or not. This is referred to as social expansion. Again, Killer provides an example of social expansion as unwitting bystanders can alter the gameplay by their very presence. If someone outside the game sees a player "commit an assassination" that player's score is downgraded).
Similarly, when we engage in the ubiquitous museum other people around us may, or may not, be aware they themselves are "components" of the experience. They are involved, either directly or indirectly. Those without prior knowledge of the "designed experience" may consciously decide to engage after stumbling upon the opportunities placed there by its facilitators.
Guerrilla Installation
Today the term guerrilla is applied to numerous forms of street art, marketing campaigns, and other stealth modes of expression that appear unexpectedly in public places. Dance, music, film, performance, painting, sculpture, literature, architecture, even dining experiences, have all appeared in guerrilla form.
Guerrilla installation is an often quick, temporary, and relatively cheap way of making an impactful impression in public settings. This approach often co-opts ready-made components of an environment to support a message.
The guerrilla marketing campaign shown below is a wonderful example of how existing features of an environment can be adopted as a foundation for messaging. To send a message about "climate change", life rafts were suspended from a building at the estimated height of the future sea level, life vests were installed under public benches, and a life guard was posted, presumably to answer questions and promote the cause.
Today the term guerrilla is applied to numerous forms of street art, marketing campaigns, and other stealth modes of expression that appear unexpectedly in public places. Dance, music, film, performance, painting, sculpture, literature, architecture, even dining experiences, have all appeared in guerrilla form.
Guerrilla installation is an often quick, temporary, and relatively cheap way of making an impactful impression in public settings. This approach often co-opts ready-made components of an environment to support a message.
The guerrilla marketing campaign shown below is a wonderful example of how existing features of an environment can be adopted as a foundation for messaging. To send a message about "climate change", life rafts were suspended from a building at the estimated height of the future sea level, life vests were installed under public benches, and a life guard was posted, presumably to answer questions and promote the cause.
"Stop Climate Change" Design by Rethink, 2008
The element of surprise is an important factor, especially in awakening a regularly established audience of locals and commuters, people who've relaxed their attention in environments too familiar.
Permission
Clearly, most established advertising firms would have gone through the process of permitting and related paperwork before implementing a large guerrilla marketing installation. Not doing so can bring consequences like the project being removed, or receiving a fine, but it may endure long enough to prove a concept, or make a point.
While avoiding government bureaucracies may be preferable for conducting temporary experiments and proof of concepts, gaining community acceptance is key. Involve the community in the planning and installation of a project. Once the community is on-board, bureaucracy is far less of a hurdle.
Place Making and Tactical Urbanism
Placemaking is a practice focused on converting common spaces (allies, sidewalks, empty lots) into cherished social places as a way of revitalizing the community. It does this by appealing to people in the community, thus rallying support for transformations of public space that might otherwise be abandoned under a heap of legal red tape. This begins with Tactical Urbanism, a preliminary step in the process of Placemaking that deploys quick, low cost, guerrilla-style means of testing alterations to the urban environment before attempting permanent solutions.6
Converting a parking lot into a public square or stenciling lines onto the street to test the effectiveness of a bike lane can offer communities a taste of urban features they may wish to make permanent.
Permission
Clearly, most established advertising firms would have gone through the process of permitting and related paperwork before implementing a large guerrilla marketing installation. Not doing so can bring consequences like the project being removed, or receiving a fine, but it may endure long enough to prove a concept, or make a point.
While avoiding government bureaucracies may be preferable for conducting temporary experiments and proof of concepts, gaining community acceptance is key. Involve the community in the planning and installation of a project. Once the community is on-board, bureaucracy is far less of a hurdle.
Place Making and Tactical Urbanism
Placemaking is a practice focused on converting common spaces (allies, sidewalks, empty lots) into cherished social places as a way of revitalizing the community. It does this by appealing to people in the community, thus rallying support for transformations of public space that might otherwise be abandoned under a heap of legal red tape. This begins with Tactical Urbanism, a preliminary step in the process of Placemaking that deploys quick, low cost, guerrilla-style means of testing alterations to the urban environment before attempting permanent solutions.6
Converting a parking lot into a public square or stenciling lines onto the street to test the effectiveness of a bike lane can offer communities a taste of urban features they may wish to make permanent.
Left - "Building a Better Block" Kansas City, 2012. Right - Stenciling for GObike Buffalo, 2017
Although we may associate guerrilla actions with the voice of an individual artists, activist or organization, they can also represent the communities in which they appear. While politics is alive and well inside traditional museums it isn't surprising that politics has a bigger, more complicated presence in the ubiquitous museum. The choice to either avoid permission ("just do it"), seek community support, or slog through official legal channels, is entirely dependent on the nature of the project, its location, and expected duration. In any case, guerrilla installation can play a critical role in designing real world forms of enrichment.
Transmedia Storytelling
Transmedia storytelling (aka transmedia narrative, multi-platform storytelling) refers to the use of multiple mediums and communication platforms to construct a story or "story world". Unlike a single story presented in different mediums - as a film, as a comic book, as a novel - each an interpretation of the same story, transmedia storytelling delivers different facets of a narrative universe across different mediums. A main character in a distant land featured in a film may be a tertiary character in a comic book set in the same distant land with a completely different main character. The story world is the same, but our perspective is shifted.
Henry Jenkins, perhaps the most recognized gurus of transmedia storytelling, uses The Matrix franchise to explain this multi-platform approach:
"[In] The Matrix franchise, key bits of information are conveyed through three live action films, a series of animated shorts, two collections of comic book stories, and several video games. There is no one single source or ur-text where one can turn to gain all of the information needed to comprehend the Matrix universe." 7
Museum exhibitions can be compared to transmedia storytelling in the way content is delivered through a variety of media, each addressing different parts of a story. The obvious difference being that transmedia storytelling is delivered through media platforms spread across everyday life. And, like temporal expansion in pervasive games, transmedia story universes can go on indefinitely.
Transmedia Storytelling
Transmedia storytelling (aka transmedia narrative, multi-platform storytelling) refers to the use of multiple mediums and communication platforms to construct a story or "story world". Unlike a single story presented in different mediums - as a film, as a comic book, as a novel - each an interpretation of the same story, transmedia storytelling delivers different facets of a narrative universe across different mediums. A main character in a distant land featured in a film may be a tertiary character in a comic book set in the same distant land with a completely different main character. The story world is the same, but our perspective is shifted.
Henry Jenkins, perhaps the most recognized gurus of transmedia storytelling, uses The Matrix franchise to explain this multi-platform approach:
"[In] The Matrix franchise, key bits of information are conveyed through three live action films, a series of animated shorts, two collections of comic book stories, and several video games. There is no one single source or ur-text where one can turn to gain all of the information needed to comprehend the Matrix universe." 7
Museum exhibitions can be compared to transmedia storytelling in the way content is delivered through a variety of media, each addressing different parts of a story. The obvious difference being that transmedia storytelling is delivered through media platforms spread across everyday life. And, like temporal expansion in pervasive games, transmedia story universes can go on indefinitely.
"Consiracy for Good", a project by Tim Kring, 2010
Transmedia storytelling may seem different from the other practices I mentioned in that it occupies different media platforms rather than happening in the everyday world like guerrilla interventions or pervasive games do. In fact, transmedia platforms have sometimes been used as content delivery tools in those practices. What is important about transmedia storytelling is the way it exists between platforms that are themselves embedded in everyday experience. If used correctly, transmedia platforms can initiate connections to our personal situation and frame those connections within a narrative or theme.
Conclusion
The ubiquitous museum is the most complete, most complex museum there is to work in. As mentioned, the practices addressed in this article are by no means an exhaustive list of ways the ubiquitous museum can be activated, but what makes these practices so exemplary is their capacity to:
• reframe the meaning and use of an existing site
• be integrated into a site without undermining its original functions
• adapt to a site's pre-existing features
• be scalable/adaptable to similar settings
• be affordable (DIY-friendly)
• accommodate high levels of participation
Finally, I want to reiterate the opportunities that exist in weaving these practices together. Examples of intermingling transmedia storytelling, pervasive gaming and guerrilla installation can be found in various projects by Green Door Labs, Scout Expedition Co., 42 Entertainment (creator of I Love Bees), Donor (the marketing company behind Mazda's 33 Keys ARG) 8, and Tim Kring's Conspiracy for Good. These hybrid approaches deepen the dimensions of the overall experience, operating in multiple environments through different engagement modes that accommodate a spectrum of learning styles and interests.
References
1 Jane McGonigal, "Reality is Broken, Why Games Make Us Better and How They Can Change the World". (New York, Penguin Books, 2011)
2 Ivan Žalac, Diary of a Croatian Larper, http://www.crolarper.com/2016/02/izgon-11.html
3 Marcus Montola, "Pervasive Games, Theory and Practice". (Philadelphia, Taylor & Francis, 2009)
4 Ibid, 12 -16
5 Martijn de Waal, "Some notes on the design of pervasive games. http://themobilecity.nl/2010/05/20/some-notes-on-the-design-of-pervasive-games/
6 Mike Lydon and Anthony Garcia, "Tactical Urbanism". (Washington, Island Press, 2015)
7 Jenkins, Henry, "Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide" (New York, NYU Press, 2006)
8 Mazda's 33 Keys ARG, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xipPDdGYnoM
Conclusion
The ubiquitous museum is the most complete, most complex museum there is to work in. As mentioned, the practices addressed in this article are by no means an exhaustive list of ways the ubiquitous museum can be activated, but what makes these practices so exemplary is their capacity to:
• reframe the meaning and use of an existing site
• be integrated into a site without undermining its original functions
• adapt to a site's pre-existing features
• be scalable/adaptable to similar settings
• be affordable (DIY-friendly)
• accommodate high levels of participation
Finally, I want to reiterate the opportunities that exist in weaving these practices together. Examples of intermingling transmedia storytelling, pervasive gaming and guerrilla installation can be found in various projects by Green Door Labs, Scout Expedition Co., 42 Entertainment (creator of I Love Bees), Donor (the marketing company behind Mazda's 33 Keys ARG) 8, and Tim Kring's Conspiracy for Good. These hybrid approaches deepen the dimensions of the overall experience, operating in multiple environments through different engagement modes that accommodate a spectrum of learning styles and interests.
References
1 Jane McGonigal, "Reality is Broken, Why Games Make Us Better and How They Can Change the World". (New York, Penguin Books, 2011)
2 Ivan Žalac, Diary of a Croatian Larper, http://www.crolarper.com/2016/02/izgon-11.html
3 Marcus Montola, "Pervasive Games, Theory and Practice". (Philadelphia, Taylor & Francis, 2009)
4 Ibid, 12 -16
5 Martijn de Waal, "Some notes on the design of pervasive games. http://themobilecity.nl/2010/05/20/some-notes-on-the-design-of-pervasive-games/
6 Mike Lydon and Anthony Garcia, "Tactical Urbanism". (Washington, Island Press, 2015)
7 Jenkins, Henry, "Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide" (New York, NYU Press, 2006)
8 Mazda's 33 Keys ARG, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xipPDdGYnoM