Hi all,
I have a comment inline below. Humor me on my rampage about the US and
our desperate need for a more organized GLAM movement in this giant
country.
On 11/2/12 8:01 AM, Samuel Klein wrote:
* Institutional support for the GLAM related activities in the US (until
the US Federation is fully functional, if ever)
I agree there is room for a global GLAM support for regions that don't have
local [chapter] organization. Why do you feel this is a special problem
for the US, compared to other archive-rich parts of the world - given the
two regional chapters and numerous present and past Wikipedians in
residence?
The United States is a legendary place when it comes to this discussion.
Numerous fellow-US-Wikipedians and myself have spent countless nights
mulling over this. If you live outside of Washington, D.C. and New York
City vicinities, the Wikipedia world in the US is a VERY lonely place.
Perhaps not for everyone, but for many more than you'd think. I meet
Wikipedians in the US who have no clue there is a grant program. Like
some countries in global south - I know Wikipedians in Chicago who
attend meet-up's with 2 people on a regular basis. I mean Chicago?
Really? Yup.
I live in San Francisco. I'm lucky: I'm wrapping up a year long
fellowship, I'm a social butterfly, but it took me almost one year of
doing GLAM projects on my own budget before I realized that I could
apply for a grant to go to a conference. I thought there was no way I'd
get a grant to attend a museum conference. Lori Phillips has done a lot
of work in her one year coordinator position. She has tried her best to
bring together US Wikipedians - and for many of us, that's like herding
cats. She's redone our website, she's created a blog, and she's got 100
GLAMs breathing down her neck who want Wikipedians in Residence - all
this while GLAMs are undergoing hiring freezes and are lucky if they can
send one staff member to a conference where Lori, myself, and/or Dominic
speak about the subject.
The development of the US GLAM Consortium[1] was a concept Lori hoped
could make up for a few things: the lack of chapters in the US (the US
is like Russia - it's freaking huge, and having two small chapters on
one side of the country doesn't necessarily help those of us in
Oklahoma, Indiana, New Mexico, or Oregon, per se), the lack of GLAM
organization around the subject, etc. We've got a great group of
advisors from some of the biggest GLAMs in the US - however, the
Consortium has no money. GLAMs don't have the free cash to throw at
organizing it, and the Foundation won't support it unless a GLAM steps
up to throw money in - if they do the Foundation will match them. And
we've had little to no luck thus far at getting outside funding. But,
most of these GLAMs have hiring freezes, can't even afford to pay a
Wikipedian in Residence a small stipend, and all of the staff members on
the US Consortium project are doing it as volunteers. One of the most
important things we need to do is have a Consortium meeting - in person,
not online - and we can't financially fund it because of this matching.
I don't blame anyone we're working with - Asaf is great and he works his
ass off and cares a lot for what we're all doing. But, in the US - we
can't financially do a lot of things because we're limited by distance,
lack of chapters, and situations like this matching thing. I get we
can't rely on the Foundation for everything, but in the US, outside of
one area, it's the only thing we have.
And trust me - having "numerous present and past Wikipedians in
residence" doesn't make up for having financial and chapter support.
While it's great that museums want to fly us around the country to talk
about our projects - they can't afford it. I was asked to speak at one
of the finest museums in the United States - the Met of the West, so to
say, and they had to cease planning the talk because they can't afford
to bring me down from San Francisco to LA, and I surely can't afford to
do that myself. And a ticket to fly to LA generally costs about $150 -
not expensive. And there is only so much that me, Dominic and Lori can
do. (And that's having families, jobs and school)
I could go on and on and on about this, but, a few of us in the GLAM US
movement have learned that we can ask the Foundation for grants when
needed, and we are grateful, but, other than that, you're on your own -
and many of us also know that if we had a US GLAM Consortium - who needs
to meet in order to get the ball rolling - then we'd probably have a
chance to bring in outside funding and so forth. I'm continuously
grateful for the support participation grants have given me, but this
isn't about me, I'll be okay - it's about the large scale impact in the
US which we still need to make.
Things have started to move a bit though - organizations like the Open
Knowledge Foundation have taken notice that we need better organization
regarding OpenGLAM in the US. It just takes time, and we've wasted a lot
of it already.
And no, I'm not starting a chapter anytime soon. Someone else can do
that. :)
-Sarah
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:GLAM/US/Consortium
--
*Sarah Stierch*
*/Museumist and open culture advocate/*
>>Visit sarahstierch.com <http://sarahstierch.com><<
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