Internet2 is a non-profit membership organization of 208 universities working in conjunction with government and industry to operate a private national Internet Protocol (IP) network reserved for the exclusive use of the US research and education (R&E) community. The Internet2 network is an advanced, high-performance network that supports advanced or complex applications that do not work on the commercial Internet or do not work well. As the national R&E backbone, the Internet2 Network provides connectivity between institutions and connectivity to international research and education networks thereby providing access to the global research and education community.

What’s the role of Museums in Internet2?

Museums have an increasingly important role in the Internet2 community in helping not only to extend the outreach of educational programs to K12 schools, higher education institutions, libraries and other communities but also for preservation, digitization, and the creation and maintenance of new digital collections. Additionally, new methods of secure, federated access to these large digital collections are being developed among the Imternet2 community with museums taking a big part in leading the way. As of April 2007, there were 83 independent museums, historical, and cultural centers Internet2 across the country and this number is only growing. This number doesn’t even reflect the total number of museums associated with universities that also have access to Internet2.

More than fifty years ago French author and statesman Andre Malraux discussed the increasing accessibility of art images with the prophetic phrase "Museum Without Walls." Today we are seeing expansive applications of this concept through Internet2 enhanced videoconferencing. The benefits to museums include the development of new audiences, the engagement of non-teaching staff in education, and greater access to museum collections. Add to these exciting opportunities the presence of Internet2’s large capacity high performance network and community of practitioners and you have ingredients for exciting projects which could not be implemented previously.

Each advantage: new audiences, access to collections and the engagement of non-teaching staff in education allows the museum as a whole greater connections to the community, be it local, regional or international.

• New audiences reachable through videoconferencing can be those who distance, mobility issues and geography formerly prevented from participating in programs. These include residents of senior care facilities, and those in the justice system as well as those living at great remove from cultural resources.
• Greater access to collections means that items which rotate off view or are too fragile for year-round display may be presented to school and other audiences through videoconferencing. With a percentage of museums’ collections in storage due to space limitations in galleries, the public may rarely be able to see portions of the permanent collection. Using images of these objects in a videoconference permits unprecedented access to these objects as primary source documents. Examples include light sensitive objects such as textiles, and prints as well as small items such as coins or tiny artifacts which may not attract enough attention in a gallery setting but which are important educational objects.
• Using non-teaching staff as on camera presenters can be a way to add expertise and behind-the-scenes immediacy to educational programs. Imagine the Director of Information Technology or the chief museum Conservator presenting a videoconference on educational requirements to students interested in a museum career.
• Additional benefits of videoconferencing include adding on-camera interactivities to formerly more static educational programming and contextualizing traditional lectures (which have moved from the galleries to videoconferencing) with graphics such as maps and timelines. The more complex the on-camera interactivities are the more high speed Internet2 can help. Imagine students in separate cities in a multipoint videoconference viewing works by Van Gogh and then reading to each other portions of Van Gogh’s letters. One might also picture students in a multipoint videoconference conducting experiments with varnishes in order to simulate work done in a conservation lab and then comparing results in real time. The possibilities stretch well beyond these simple scenes.

What are other museums doing with Internet2?

If you are a museum educator or staff and still aren’t sure what Internet2 can do for you, check out some of these featured museum projects listed to the right. The only limit to what’s possible is your imagination so get inspired - find your “muse” to do something truly great in your museum today.