In this paper we discuss how an interaction design perspective on the design of interactive artefacts in public spaces can encourage us to explore certain issues concerning the inclusion of visitor input into our installations. We see the role of technology as supporting people's experiences of heritage Á moving away from simple delivery of information towards enabling visitors to add to the content of the exhibition. This approach encourages active reflection, discussion and appropriation in the tradition of best practice in human-centred interaction (HCI) design. In this paper we discuss two exhibitions/installations in which we have been involved, Re-Tracing the Past and The Shannon Portal. The former was developed with the objective of engaging visitors and enhancing their overall experience of a personal museum collection; the latter had the goal of encouraging visitors and travellers to share their experience of Ireland. We then discuss the impact of this design strategy and analyse the role of visitors' contributions to each exhibit, and the particular interactions between participants and the content they produced.Keywords: interaction design; participatory design; visitor studies; interactive museum exhibitions; museum exhibit design Introduction: interaction design for museums and exhibitions The fields of humanÁcomputer interaction, computer-supported cooperative work and more recently, interaction design, are all concerned with the relation between people and information technology in a variety of settings Á in the workplace, the home and, more recently, people on the move or in public places. What distinguishes the best of this work is sensitivity to both setting or place and a 'user perspective', informed by a serious attention to the details of both place and the user, or visitor, experience. The field of museum studies has also been developing over the past several decades into a well-established and fruitful interdisciplinary research domain. As well as research on such topics as the collection, preparation and display of artefacts, issues of overall museum design and layout, exhibition design and installation and various approaches to conducting visitor studies have all been examined. The roles of the artefacts, the curators, the buildings in which the collection is housed and, occasionally, the visitors themselves, have been topics for discussion. While we are familiar with some of this extant literature, without claiming to be experts in the museum studies field, our aim in this paper is to provide a perspective on issues concerning the design of visitor experiences in public spaces, including museums, from the viewpoint of interaction designers with a particular interest in issues of user engagement and
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