NFC technology applied to touristic-cultural field: a case study on an Italian museum

In this paper the authors present the design of a multimedia mobile guide for the visitors of the Wolfsoniana museum of Genoa. The system presented is part of an upcoming field trial aiming to research about Usability and User Experience (UX) of Near Field Communication (NFC) technology applied to the touristic-cultural field. Therefore, moving from the assumption that the visitor experience could be enhanced in making more interactive and engaging the visit, the mobile application will interact with NFC and QR Code technologies to allow the visitor to easily access to additional contents and social functions with his/her smartphone. The subject treated in this paper is a preparatory work for the future test of the Wolfsoniana Smart Museum mobile application during the field trial, one of the few ones on NFC coming from Italy till today. In particular, the authors describe the different steps followed in the mobile application design process, focusing on the main findings about better user experience and usable user interface (UI).