24 Hour Museum - official guide to UK museums, galleries, exhibitions and heritage
Gateway to Over 3,000 UK museums, galleries and heritage attractions
Skip to navigation
Launchball And My Brighton And Hove Win Museum Website Awards
By Jon Pratty, Editor, 24 Hour Museum
12/04/2008
Image: shows a screenshot of a web game
Launchball - almost addictive!
Two very different UK museum and gallery websites are among winners announced April 11 2008 at the annual Best of the Web awards in Montreal.
Launchball, a cutting-edge physics education web game from the Science Museum, won the best innovative website gong and the major honour of overall Best of the Web at the prestigeous awards held as part of the Museums and the Web conference.
In contrast to Launchball, My Brighton and Hove, a community website set up in 2000, won best community site and best small museum site. My Brighton and Hove is written, edited and uploaded by a large group of local enthusiasts - but with the emphasis on human scale interactions, rather than cutting edge technology.
Image: shows a screenshot of a website
Based in the community, built on local values and skills - My Brighton and Hove
Launchball is a massively popular webgame that centres on an addictive but simple set of challenges that involve materials, physics - and lots of online fun. Since launch in late 2007, the game's been garlanded with prizes, plaudits and lots of players logging on.
Best of the Web judges were fulsome in their remarks about the game: "...Impressive array of interactive, and very stimulating games. Superb graphics and multimedia integration...Very intelligent scripting," said one judge on the MW 2008 awards page.
"The visual design is very well done keying on strong, high-contrast colours and iconography. The interface design is simple and easy to learn," added another judge on the MW 2008 website.
"Man, I have literally played with this for hours now. Even better is the open-endedness of it all and the user contributions. I can't stop fiddling with it," said another.
My Brighton and Hove is a content-rich website produced by a growing band of community users, led by volunteer co-ordinator Jennifer Drury. It's all about sustainable use of appropriate technology, and also building networks of people who remember the past of a place - in this case, the twin cities of Brighton and Hove.
On the MW 2008 site, judges commented: "The quality of the stories sets it apart from other entries. So evocative, with many gems from multiple authors. It's had a while to stew (8 years), and it shows..." wrote one.
"Really sweet. Possibly the best of the local history/memory sites I've seen lately," said another judge.
The site is a treasure trove of different kinds of heritage, from the traditional historical approaches of oral reminiscence about past conflicts, to the recent past of the Mod era, the Grand Hotel bombing and more recently, the night club scene.
My Brighton and Hove was set up by multimedia developer Jack Latimer in the wake of an award-winning exhibition at Brighton Museum - also called My Brighton. The website is written by many local people, and is coded and uploaded by a group of volunteer workers, initially using HTML, but more recently a specially-developed content management system by Community Sites is being used.
Go further - read more from Launchball's initial team leader Mike Ellis about how the project was born.
Science Museum, London
Exhibition Road, London, SW7 2DD, England
Open: Daily 10.00-18.00
Closed: Closed 24-26 December
Related Articles
Science Museum Reveals Robot That Could Revolutionise Medicine
News In Brief - Museums, Galleries And Heritage News
News In Brief - Week Ending September 21 2008
London's Science Museum Brings Us The Science Of Survival
Back To The Future - In Plastic - At The Science Museum
The Science Museum Asks - Does Flying Cost The Earth?
MGM 2008 - Top Ten Events For The May Bank Holiday Weekend
E-news registration
E-mail story to a friend
Tell us what you think
National Portrait Gallery Acquires Tudor Double Portrait
Sheffield Metal Master Wins Museum's Inaugural Design Award
DCMS Launches Consultation Into The Future Of World Heritage Sites
A Selection Of Festive Fairs - Fun Days and Exhibitions
Royal Society Announces Plans For 350th Anniversary
Art Website ArtisanCam Wins Coveted Children's BAFTA
Former Floorboards Of Founding Father Franklin Facilitate Funny Four
Mark Leckey Wins The 2008 Turner Prize And Scoops £25,000
Library Thief Update: Sentencing Adjourned Until January 16, 2009
Fund Aims To Realise Long-Standing Campaign For Cardiff City Museum
Culture Secretary Slaps Export Ban On George I Chandelier
Shakespeare's Globe Costumes Go On Show In Nottingham
Britglyph Art Campaign Uses Web To Make Mass Geoglyph
Inaugural Awards Ceremony Honours UK Arts Philanthropists
Rare Silver Cup Commemorating Coronation Of Charles II Is Saved For The Nation
London Fire Brigade Museum Escapes Closure - For Now
Another Busy Year For Archaeology On Orkney In 2008
Severndroog Castle To Be Restored Thanks To Lottery Grant
Search this site
Home Page
News Page
Exhibition Page
What's On
Trails Page
Website of the Week
Letters Page
Welsh Home
Graphical Version
Copyright © 24 Hour Museum
Information published here was believed to be correct at the time it was prepared. Welsh language pages developed with CYMAL: Museums Archives and Libraries Wales, funded by the Welsh Assembly Government.