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I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens

sethpurcell.com

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Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens

#341

Post by graemep »

ghaff wrote: post #195
graemep wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you want science for grownups, you have conferences. Adults outside a field do not go to conferences. > As for art museums, the problem is that they are usually just exhibitions, and to be honest, that's boring, especially if you are a kid. Some kids are interested in art. It can be well presented. You can have guided tours aimed at kids.

Go to a big city art museum and they're swarming with school groups.

School groups vary. Some kids are interested, some are not.

I have had some bad experiences with school groups who did not know how to behave in a theatre - mostly Shakespeare plays because of where I lived. Some were enjoying them but were not used to keeping quiet. Some just did not want to be there.

Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens

#342

Post by michaelmior »

kotaKat wrote: post #117
crazygringo wrote: post #5

> But these physical exhibits require maintenance, and I was dismayed to see that several are in bad repair; some of them weren’t even working anymore, some seemed worn out, or didn’t seem well-designed to begin with. To be fair, that's what I remember children's museums being like in the 1980s as well. A significant number of exhibits would be temporarily out of order on any given day. I don't think screens are resp…

> I don't think screens are responsible for that. Maintaining physical exhibits that can survive constant physical contact with kids is hard. That reminds me of something I’d love to learn a bit more about: the Strong Museum of Play . It appears the Wegmans’ supermarket exhibit where kids are able to work with real point-of-sale equipment has actually gotten equipment refreshes over the years itself, and I was really…

I go to the Strong almost every weekend with my kids and they love it. I think there are some examples of poor uses of technology that the OP is talking about (screens that just replicate something you could play at home). But there is also some incredibly cool stuff that combines technology with physical play.

Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens

#344

Post by tomaskafka »

thw_9a83c wrote: post #326
ryandrake wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like half the products the tech industry comes out with aren't really useful, but they exist because of this performative trend-following. Competitor has a mobile app, we have to have a mobile app. Harvard business review says blockchain is big, we need to have blockchain. Our CEO's investor buddy said AI is the next big thing, we need to jam AI in or product.

This has been an increasing problem. People, companies, and organizations implement things not because they make sense or benefit someone. They do it because they need to follow the trend.

That’s because the buyers are no longer connected to their own needs, and instead are easily swayed to buy trend.

Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens

#345

Post by dml2135 »

jack_h wrote: post #165
mikestorrent wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>learned they can charge insane rates It's called "what the market can bear" and it's what corporations with marketing and sales professionals have always tried their best to do; charge as much as you possibly can without losing business. Of course, it only actually works when there is competition, and so the rising prices are kept in check by undercutting competition.... and then, _that_ only works when the undercut…

> A free market actually requires a lot of surrounding regulation to work While I am not a free market absolutist, I think your assertion is based on judging negative outcomes of a free market vs the positive intentions of regulations trying to prevent those negative outcomes, i.e. you’re not considering the negative outcomes of regulations. I don’t think any free market advocate would state categorically that they p…

I think you missed the parent comment’s point. They are not saying that a free market had it’s downsides, but rather that a lassaiz-faire approach often does not even result in a free market, but rather in a market that tends towards monopolization. And a market without competition is not free.

In order to have free, competitive markets, you need to have a referee to enforce a common set of rules, like antitrust.

Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens

#346

Post by ipython »

Congratulations to us. Enshittification has come to museums.

As tfa states, physical exhibits - especially interactive ones - require extensive maintenance. Expensive maintenance is, well, expensive. Must cut costs. And here we are.

Reminds me also of the apocryphical story of a McDonalds mba. They needed to cut a few million dollars and noticed that removing ten sesame seeds from the bun of a Big Mac will do it. Ok, great, but repeat enough times and soon customers will notice.

Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens

#347

Post by dml2135 »

skirmish wrote: post #237
tedggh wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a supply and demand problem. There are just not enough people pursuing these jobs to replace the retiring generation. Some of these small family businesses are quite profitable, but most owners don’t have kids interested in continuing their legacy. Private equity noticed this and went on an acquisition spree. They buy your local HVAC and plumbing company, keep the family-owned branding “since 1976”, hire people…

Recent experience: called a HVAC contractor to fix a heating furnace, they spent 1 hour convincing us to scrap the current furnace and install a new one; once we told him "no" at least 10 times, he spent 30 minutes "diagnosing" the problem while on the phone with somebody with technical knowledge; then he quoted $250 to replace a part that I could buy on Ebay for $15. Finally, I bought the part and replaced it myself…

I understand being annoyed at a sales pitch, but this sounds like about 3-4 hours of work for the contractor, which comes out to about $80/hour. That doesn’t sound so unreasonable to me.

Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens

#348

Post by liveoneggs »

eloisant wrote: post #314
com2kid wrote: post #289

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Now days is is the other way around, the expensive private schools boast no/minimal screens and the public schools have Chromebooks.

Why can't the public schools ditch the Chromebooks? They cost money, parents hate them, what's the point?

teachers love them

Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens

#349

Post by zitsarethecure »

thw_9a83c wrote: post #326
ryandrake wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like half the products the tech industry comes out with aren't really useful, but they exist because of this performative trend-following. Competitor has a mobile app, we have to have a mobile app. Harvard business review says blockchain is big, we need to have blockchain. Our CEO's investor buddy said AI is the next big thing, we need to jam AI in or product.

This has been an increasing problem. People, companies, and organizations implement things not because they make sense or benefit someone. They do it because they need to follow the trend.

Absolutely. RTO mandates. Blanket AI adoption for developers. All these asinine trends done solely to make executives feel like they are still relevant.

Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens

#350

Post by Spooky23 »

CrazyStat wrote: post #157
kleiba wrote: post #94

There is an incredible pressure on a lot of public facing endeavors to include digital , no matter whether it makes any sense at all or not. Take education, for instance - if it weren't such an important topic, it would be almost comical to observe how our schools are trying to jump through hoops to cram more IT into the classroom. (I wish the people responsible would take a look at Scandinavia though, where they are…

My wife and I toured our neighborhood public elementary school a couple years ago. Almost every classroom we passed the kids were staring at their chromebooks, even in the art room—digital art, I guess [1]. In the music room the kids were sitting at rows of desks with electronic keyboards and headphones while the teacher sat at the front of the class and gave them instructions through a microphone (to be heard throug…

We had the same reaction - in our case they were proudly showing off kindergarten students preparing for chrome based assessments.

We ended up going to a private school. Our thought was bad habits are hard to break.

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