Founded in 1946, the International Council of Museums (ICOM) is the organization of Museums and Museum Professionals which according to its web site (http://icom.museum) “is the international organisation of museums and museum professionals which is committed to the conservation, continuation and communication to society of the world's natural and cultural heritage, present and future, tangible and intangible”. ICOM supports the Virtual Libraries Museum (VLmp) pages which according to its site is the “oldest catalogue of the web” and was started by Tim Berners Lee who was the creator of HTML.
The Museums Around the World website is part of the VLmp pages. It says at the top of the page that it is an eclectic collection of web resources connected with museums from around the world. The site is authored by Dr Jonathan Bowen whose impressive credentials include: Chairman of Museophile Limited in Reading from 2002; Emeritus Professor of London South Bank University from 2007; Visiting Professor at CREST, King's College London; visiting academic at University College London since 2006‐2007; and Associate of Praxis High Integrity Systems in Bath since 2008.
There are three links (with pictures that did not display) at the top of the page. The first link Virtual Library takes you to the VLmp page. The second link Museums takes you to the VLmp Museums page and the third link is a search box which unfortunately did not work. Under these links is an explanation of symbols above a list of the countries covered. Sites that have a star next to the link indicate the site has a large collection or is recommended although it states that if enough people ask for a star to be added to an item it will be. Sites that have a purple exclamation mark next to them indicate a new or updated site. The explanation continues to note that some countries are listed on separate pages for reasons of space. These countries are listed on the Museums link and under these is a link to Rest of the World which directs you to the Museums Around the World site. The countries listed on the Museums link page tend to be countries that have star symbols next to them on this site. When you click on a country that is not starred you are taken to their entry further down the homepage where museums are listed under their country. The countries are listed alphabetically. Also, at the top of the page there is a link to a submission form in case you know of a museum that has not been included. There is a request for visitors to the site to consider maintaining a list of museum links for their country as part of the Virtual Libraries Museums Pages (VLmp) and to contact Jonathan Bowen if they would like to do this.
Each country's page is maintained by individuals from that country, usually a museum professional, on behalf of the site and their contact details are displayed at the top and/or bottom of the page. Although each separate page might look the same some have different features. For example, the United States' page has a series of filters at the top so you can look at museums by state, name and type, to name a few. There is even a search facility which worked when I used it. At the bottom of the United Kingdom page there is an option to view the list of links by geographical location, although the alphabetical list is the default setting. Users can display just Star Sites and this option is at the bottom of the alphabetically listed page and at the top of the geographical list page. Once a user has clicked on a country the museums listed are used as a link to their site and next to it is a short explanation of the museum, its collections and location. Some of the country names on the long list are hot links to museum pages of their country, e.g. Museums of Portugal and these pages are defaulted to English although the language can be changed. These do not always work though as the link for Malaysia's museum page did not make sense as it seemed like a general tourist site rather than an official site of Malaysia's museums.
The site is quite plain, visually unexciting and looks somewhat amateurish. The layout consists of a white background and black text. I did not find it user friendly and did not find the initial explanations about some countries having their own pages clear. One suggestion is to include an option to return you to the top of the homepage when a country that is listed further down the page is clicked. This page is very long and it can become frustrating scrolling back up to the top. Another suggestion is to open links to other pages in a separate window or tab to make returning to the directory easier.
The site states it was last updated on 12 April 2006 which could explain why some of the links do not work or make sense. Also, some of the links stopped after I started this review. The site needs further updating, although I noted it had received well over six million visits since August 1994. As far as a free resource goes, if you want a good directory of museums and related information this site is acceptable.
