The British Museum has introduced a set of handheld guides that are designed to teach many of its six million annual visitors about its collections.
The Multimedia Guide is available in 11 different languages: English, Korean, Arabic, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Mandarin, Russian, Spanish and British Sign Language. It features in-depth audio-visual descriptions of more than 220 objects. Also included are three guided tours with directions for Highlights of Ancient Egypt, the Parthenon Marbles and the Korean Gallery as well as an interactive map.
See the above page for further details.
Speaking for myself I find the introduction of handheld audio guides a flaming nuisance to those of us who don't use them. They turn people into zombies, and you find yourself trying to see displays which are characterized by motionless figures standing still like immovable rocks oblivious to the world around them. At busy times they form inpenetrable walls. The machines are also frequently loud, leeching intrusively into the would-be quiet gallery space - at the very least there ought to be a cap on the volume.
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