from The Washington Post -
Is There a Future for Old-Fashioned Museums?
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At the end of the day, given all the expectations heaped onto museums - as sites of experiential learning, as venues for an enlightened lifestyle, as institutions for memories preservation - the one aspect which must differentiates the museum from all other knowledge-based institutions is the fact that museums are , first and foremost, about collections and artefacts whether on-line or off, tangible or otherwise.

For other related articles on the proliferation of virtual museums:

from The Guardian -
Virtual museums buddy up online
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from The Art History Newsletter -
The Virtual Museum
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from 3pointD.com -
Open-Source Museum Opens in Second Life
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from Wired -
Dresden's World-Class Art Gallery Duplicates Itself Online
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from Learning In Real Time Blog -
Second Life for Museums
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from Museums and the Web 2007 -
A Second Life for Your Museum: 3D Multi-User Virtual Environments and Museums
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