Virtual Museums - Pioneers (online Before 2000)

Pioneers (online Before 2000)

The following online museums were pioneers. At that time, web pages were simpler, bandwidth was scarce, the concepts of the online museum were still developing, and there were limited multimedia technologies available within web browsers. Some online museums began in other (not web site) electronic forms, or were established by existing physical museums. Some online museums have become significant sources of scholarly information, including extensive citations within Wikipedia.

• Museum of Computer Art (MOCA) - Founded 1993. Directed by Don Archer, a non-profit corporation under charter from the Department of Education of New York State (US). MOCA was awarded .museum top-level domain (TLD) status by the Museum Domain Management Association (MuseDoma) in 2002 and is hosted on the Web as http://moca.virtual.museum.

• Web Museum, Paris — founded 1994, online 1994. A pioneering virtual or web museum is the Web Museum, Paris created by Nicholas Pioch. It is hosted by ibiblio.

• The Lin Hsin Hsin Art Museum — online 1994.

• The Museum of the History of Science in Oxford — opened 1683, online 21 August 1995 - Located in one of the earliest purpose-built museum buildings in the world, the Museum was able to initiate a website relatively early because of the advantageous networking facilities and expertise available in their university environment.

• Ljubljana: Open-Air Museum — founded 1993 - online 1996. Ljubljana, the capital of Slovenia was presented as a huge museum where streets were the expositions of the architecture and building interiors were museum rooms.The method of the presentation were interactive maps and interactive Virtual Reality panoramas.

• Virtual Museum of Computing — founded 1994. This is an eclectic collection of links and online resources concerning the history of computers and computer science.

• Virtual Museum of New France — online 1997. Established by the Canadian Museum of Civilization Corporation.

• The Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County - Founded 1910, online 1998. The museum is the largest natural and historical museum in the Western United States and an active research center.

• WebExhibits — founded 1999, online 1999. WebExhibits is an interactive, web-based museum that encourages visitors to think about and explore scientific and cultural phenomena in new ways. Exhibits include "Investigating Bellini’s Feast of the Gods," "Causes of Color," "Color Vision & Art," Pigments through the Ages," "Butter," "Van Gogh’s Letters," and "Poetry through the Ages," "Calendars through the Ages," and "Daylight Saving Time."

• the Science Museum in London — founded 1857, online 1999. One of the major science museums in the world was able to establish an early web presence partly due to the proximity of Imperial College, but was also spurred on by the fact that the Natural History Museum, which is next door, had recently established the first dedicated museum web server in the United Kingdom.

• ibiblio — founded 1992, online 2000. An online exhibition with the backing of the Library of Congress, ibiblio hosted EXPO Ticket Office with exhibits including a Vatican Exhibit and even a virtual "restaurant" and "post office". This looks very simplistic now, but was novel in 1991.