Talk held at Urban History Exhibited. Seminar at Den Gamle By in Aarhus, Denmark. 25th October 2011. Jette Sandahl, Director of Museum of Copenhagen As nations decrease in importance and as the power of big cities increases, city museums become potentially more interesting. The scale and tempo, the richness, the contradictions and conflicts, the diversity and dilemmas of contemporary urban cultures are forcing many city museum realize that they are lagging behind, barely keeping up with their cities, and they have to examine their mission and purpose, their strategies and core values. The Museum of Copenhagen is one such museum trying to find methods of permanent change to keep up with the rapid and dynamic changes of our city; trying to find ways of anticipating, responding to and interpreting the sometimes intangible qualities of life; trying to develop platforms which support mediation, living with complexity, with disagreement, and which encourage participation, and invite users to engage with and challenge each other.