December 10, 2016 — As many museums move towards diverse open data policies, one would assume their choice of CMS would follow suit. One would be WRONG.

In this talk I will begin by reviewing the current state of technology in museums, with a focus on their usage of open source Content Management Systems (where Drupal reigns supreme and WordPress is only for blogging). I will discuss why the perceived lack of os software competition in this sector keeps museums trapped in systems they cannot afford to update. I will end by sharing ways the OS community can get involved in the would of Cultural Institutions.

November 21, 2016 — Always wanted to contribute to the community but think you have to be a developer? WRONG! Contributing is within reach of everyone. Learn about the available projects, meetups, and communities. Find the perfect place to get started and have fun.

December 12, 2015 — As one of the first museums to fully digitize its collections and make them available online for the public, the Freer and Sackler Galleries, Smithsonian has embraced open source tools to empower its audience and staff to discuss and experience art. We are counting to leverage this open attitude by working with a small group within Automattic to research, plan, and design the Freer and Sackler site. As a team, we are developing custom plugins and code in-house that will be made available to the public and other cultural institutions on GitHub in hopes of furthering open source within the cultural environment.

During the presentation, we will briefly discuss the democratization of art, review our planning and design process and how we are working to make sure the tools we develop are usable by others. We will finish with an open discussion on how cultural institutes can maximize their use of WordPress. While the case study will focus specifically on a visual arts museum, the lessons learned and tools used can be applied to any WordPress-driven website rollout.

November 6, 2014 — You’ve been managing content in WordPress, maybe you’ve dabbled with modifying a file, but you’re not sure where to go from here (other than total failure). In this session we’ll cover how to transition from dabbler to budding developer, learning opportunities around the web, and issues that can impact your learning, ranging from imposter syndrome to gender and generalisms to non-computer science educational backgrounds.