It may not seem like much, but those red letters mean a lot to me. They've been up there since I was very small and droolled a lot. When I was at that age, NMPFT was a magical place - somewhere I actually wanted to come.
Then I grew up, but NMPFT didn't. For some reason that I'm still trying to figure out I got a job there, and in those six years I've seen a lot changes. It seems that most of those changes involved removing the magic one little bit at a time, and there's not a lot left.
The photograph here marks the moment when NMPFT made one of its biggest changes I've seen whilst working there: It's changed it's name to the National Media Museum. It might not seem like much, and to some it probably makes sense, but to me it just hightlights a growing trend at the museum. For the last four years the museum seems to have been in a state of constant flux. Nothing, it seemed, was good enough and therefore needed to change. And then change again.
Four years of that has taken its toll. I don't think the museum will ever get back to where it was when I was a kid.
As for the future? The name change also comes with an expanded remit, which will no doubt entail further change. Not that I'm afraid of change. Change is healthy. But only if you get a chance to actually benefit from that change before the next wave of changes arrive.
Anyhoo. I've ranted on enough. The National Media Museum has arrived, and that's that. They even have a new website that I helped code. Check it out ;o)
4 comments:
There's much truth in what you say. While the comparison with one's chidlhood perceptions may be a bit unfair the NMPFT never seems to have any stability to take stock and build on what it has before the next major change comes along. There's a tremendous resource there, too few curatorial staff and sadly an apparent need sometimes to meet the lowest common denominator...
Yeah, I suppose you're right about the childhood reference. Everything seemed more magical then ;o)
That is one of the saddest sights I've seen in a while, glad I wasn't there to see it. By the way, why don't you have a feed on your blog? It seems wrong that I'm reduced to finding out you've had another thought through Technorati!
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Ah, yes. Well spotted. I got half way through redesigning the site, and then got fed up with it. Looks like I missed out the RSS feeds :(. Not to worry - I don't have that much interesting to say!
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