Open Forum

I have been reading about this option for awhile and I wonder if anyone on this list has been a part of this tactic for getting some collex work completed and what their experiences have been.  I must admit - at first it just freaked me out - but the more I read - it does sound like it could be just super if the topic is interesting enough.  I am concerned about management of this type of project - or lack of?

Jackie

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Jackie Hoff
Director of Collections Services
Science Museum of Minnesota
Saint Paul MN
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Are you familar with the Australia Museum's virtual expeditions approach? I think it's a very attractive idea and all indications are that it has been a smashing success. See http://volunteer.ala.org.au/

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James Bryant
Curator of Natural History
Riverside Metropolitan Museum
Riverside CA
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The link James sent to the work in Australia is fascinating. In my own work here in Oregon, we have used volunteers outside of Oregon and including Canada to help us transcribe oral histories. And taking a page from my days doing CRM - we designed collections projects to be volunteer friendly.

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Samuel Shogren MPA
In Transition - Currenly Seeking New Opportunities
Beaverton OR
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At our institution we participated in a statewide social media campaign to raise funds and awareness for the preservation of a significant object.  It was organized by the Conservation Center in Philadelphia.  We were fortunate to have earned the People's Choice Award, which was a significant accomplishment with over 1 million votes.  However, no money was attached to the voting and the clicking was unlimited.  We recommended to the Conservation Center that they adjust both of those things with future efforts.  We achieved about 1/3 of our rather substantial goal and are still working on fundraising the old fashioned way.  Raising awareness was great.  Raising the rest of the funds is challenging, especially when the momentum has sort of dissolved.

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Ellen Endslow
Director of Collections/Curator
Chester County Historical Society
West Chester PA
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I recognize that I missed part of the point of the original question.  However, I think that some of the crowd sourcing/crowd funding concepts overlap.  Someone needs to keep the engine running and the train on the tracks.

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Ellen Endslow
Director of Collections/Curator
Chester County Historical Society
West Chester PA
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You may be thinking on a larger scale, but I thought I'd share my recent experiences:

For our recent baseball exhibition, we used a tumblr page (spread the word through press release, PR, events, postcards, blog posts, etc) to find artifacts to include in the exhibition. I think the important thing about these initiatives it to limit your expectations. It was certainly not a viral success, however in the scale of the exhibition it was very successful! It was a way for fans and interested parties to get excited about the exhibition in advance. We also made connections with a handful of people whose personal stories and artifacts were included in either the exhibition or companion book. Those stories and artifacts were not something we would have been able to find at a lending institution or in our own collection. Things can get a little crazy. Social media does not run only during set business hours....

The tumblr site is now largely defunct, though still available to view. We are about to launch another public collecting project with a new focus. 

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Alisa Kraut
Curatorial Assistant
National Museum of American Jewish History
Philadelphia PA
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Original Message:
Sent: 09-30-2014 05:00 PM
From: Jackie Hoff
Subject: "Crowdsourcing" for Collections Work

I have been reading about this option for awhile and I wonder if anyone on this list has been a part of this tactic for getting some collex work completed and what their experiences have been.  I must admit - at first it just freaked me out - but the more I read - it does sound like it could be just super if the topic is interesting enough.  I am concerned about management of this type of project - or lack of?

Jackie

-------------------------------------------
Jackie Hoff
Director of Collections Services
Science Museum of Minnesota
Saint Paul MN
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