Page 225 - AC/E's Digital Culture Annual Report 2015

AC/E Digital Culture Annual Report 2015225submitting comments. Written by the workers, it states that the opinions expressed in it are strictly personal. It is focused on conveying the technological experiments carried out in the museum, and is therefore a transparency effort. We can read about initiatives that have been successful and others that have not but can be improved with the contribution of everyone.That of the Science Museum24 in London was set up in April 2011. The idea is to tell people, about everything that goes on in the museum – exhibitions, collections, research, news, activities, etc. – through its employees and guest bloggers.The platform encourages the community to take part by posting comments. Posts are classified into various appealing themes such as robots, artists in residence, and news about science or punk science.Also in the scientific field, the American Museum of Natural History25 has a very complete blog that brings together informative articles on science, articles specialised in education, podcasts, and even a questions and answers section.It is common in Spain for museums to be present on the various social networks. Now- adays there are many significant examples of good practice. This is not only true of more representative institutions such as national museums; smaller museums with tighter budgets are also making an effort worthy of mentionin this connection. The key to success on the social media lies in familiarity with this tool, planning actions and being willing to enter into conversation more than in the budget allocated to this activity.“Engagement is an indicator that reveals to us followers’ degree of commitment and loyaltyto the page, and it is measured as the relation- ship between the size of the community and weighted level of interaction.”26 According to two studies by Socialwin, one on museums and social networks carried out in 2013, and the more recent one on cultural centres conducted last October,27 the Spanish institutions withthe highest social media engagement are Museo del Prado, MNCARS, Museo Thyssen, Museo Guggenheim, Matadero Madrid and Alhóndiga Bilbao. It is surprising and representative tofind that the Museo del Romanticismo, a small museum with a much more limited budget than the abovementioned institutions, has the highest Facebook engagement rate. This merely corrobo- rates how important good ideas and a change of mentality are, as well as having a qualified team.The researcher Myriam Soteras has analysed theFacebook activity and engagement of Spanish museums,28 drawing the following conclusions: the museums with the highest volume of action receive the highest volume of reaction; museums that respond to users’ reactions receive more participation; users who react once do so more times; museums which publish content that asks questions are more likely to receive a greater reaction volume; and the percentage of positive reactions is greater than that of negative reactions.These institutions have launched various initia- tives with impressive results, inviting audiences to take part by submitting their opinions, photographs, content, etc.The Museo del Prado started up the #AlDetalle initiative on Facebook in 2012 and on Twitter2. Web technology