How will social media affect museum communication?

Social media enable cultural participants to both explore images of themselves and distribute those images across broad online social networks. Museums worldwide are starting to use social media such as blogs, wikis and vlogs to engage online participants with new interactive experiences. This represents a shift in the ways in which museums: act as trusted cultural online networks; distribute community knowledge; and view their role as custodians of cultural content. It is this broader distribution of community knowledge which sets social media technologies apart from more traditional outreach models where museums work with audiences. As the products of social media are readily available online, their existence within museum communication programs presents debate around an institution’s investment in its own continuing cultural authority. This paper will investigate some of the issues surrounding the use of social media in museum programs and will argue that there are strong epistemological reasons for social media to add value to museum programs.