Hands-on high-tech, Technology brings Newseum to life

Washington's just-inaugurated Newseum, which bills itself as "the world's first interactive museum of news," is as much a paean to the latest in computer and telecom technology as it is a "celebration of freedom of the press," in the words of Vice President (and former reporter) Al Gore.

Located in suburban Rosslyn, Va. - just across the Potomac from the nation's capital - this $50 million megaproject was conceived and financed by the independent, non-profit Freedom Forum. It took three years to get the museum up and running and will cost $11 million a year to keep it in business.

The Newseum houses thousands of historical artifacts, including an original Guttenberg Bible, Charles Dickens' pen, an 18th-century wooden printing press, columnist Ernie Pyle's typewriter and the microphone used by radio broadcaster Edward R. Murrow to report the bombing of London during World War II.

But what makes the Newseum special is its use of technology.

"Without the developments of the last 10 years, the Newseum would not have been possible," says Eric Newton, the Newseum's managing editor.

The Newseum's 126-foot-long video news wall boasts nine state-of-the-art projectors and 350 satellite and fiber optic feeds from all over the world, allowing visitors to watch real-time CNN, Deutsche Welle and BBC feeds before they become packaged news products.

An interactive newsroom lets visitors become TV anchors on the Newseum News Network, using MPEG 2 digital video technology that wasn't available even two years ago. Other exhibits allow tourists to appear on a magazine cover, investigate a news story or edit the front page of a newspaper using one of 100 interactive touch-screen computers.

At a nearby broadcast studio, students can watch as real news programs are produced for radio and TV, and talk with well-known journalists such as Helen Thomas or Ed Bradley. Next to the gift shop, a bank of computers allows visitors to punch in the month and year of their birth and get a "front page" printout of that month's most important news events.And at the News Byte Cafe, visitors can surf news-related sites on the Internet, thanks to an interface developed by Blair Dublair, a local software firm.

One of the Newseum's most popular attractions - particularly with out-of-town visitors - is its display of the front pages of 70 U.S. and foreign newspapers.

"The daily papers come from around the world," Newton explained. "About half of them arrive automatically as Quark or PDF files straight into our system via e-mail. The other half are a combination of the editors converting them into files our system can read, and sending them manually. Some newspapers we really want to display are simply not available.

Employees arrive as early as 3 a.m. to begin printing out the converted files at 130% of normal size on Hewlett-Packard printers. "People look for news of their state. Teachers use them to compare story displays. Visitors like to browse the whole place," Newton said. "Technology makes it possible to find something of interest."