[aaronwidd]

Haven't explored this subject before, but I'd guess there's likely some sort of social, psychological and biological basis for why museums exist and are popular in the first place. Likely the activity involved in "discovering" objects and then inspecting them as if you found them for the first time, simulates "seeking" behavior and solidifies the memory in the context of finding the information on your own instead of being shown it.

If the reason for why museums assist in learning, and are driven by the rewards of "discovering" something and experiential aspect of inspecting something in a 3D environment, then there are certainly some fascinating opportunities to create not only augmented museum experiences or virtual museums, but take the behavior to new places. There are maybe new types of museums that wouldn't be possible in the physical world. Pretty exciting