Extending Museum Exhibits by Embedded Media Content for an Embodied Interaction Experience

This paper presents the results of an interdisciplinary applied research project about the application potential of ubiquitous computing concepts and technologies for knowledge transfer and exhibition design in museums. By interweaving mediated information directly into the context of exhibits and by transferring knowledge through discovery-based embodied interaction, we intend to overcome problems of distraction and social isolation, normally caused by handheld devices and graphical user interfaces. Applying scenario-based prototyping with a distributed hardware system allowed us to evaluate three case studies at three renowned Swiss museums. During the development and the evaluations, we followed five design principles that led to insights relevant for museums, design practitioners, the HCI community and technology developers. We concluded that the approach generates surprising experiences that have to be balanced with the exhibits and are very useful for explaining complex processes and functions, but cannot be implemented as an exclusive exhibition concept.