Hacking: Toward a Creative Methodology for Cultural Institutions

The word hack has taken on multiple meaning but in the last century it has been commonly associated with an individual or collective technological skills to illegally access computer systems. However, over the last fifty years, the terminology of hacking has changed, offering new definitions. This paper propose to review and define what hacking means outside its illegal meaning as well as describe a creative methodology approach based on it. Events such as hackathon or places such as hackerspaces have started transforming the meaning toward a positive experience and as a possible creative tool, however, little literature has yet studying these recent phenomenon and what could be their impact on cultural institutions. Our study proposes, based on events organized in the last decade, a possible new creative methodology in the arsenal of creative tools for cultural institutions and particularly museums.