At 11:10 AM -0700 4/12/00, Pam Reid wrote: >I am afraid that Joe is right, but I hope he isn't. The ONLY reason >that there is Census Special Project in the bylaws is because Kay fought >her way onto to Board and the committee and made sure it was worded that >way. She had a plan LONG before it was put into effect. She is also >probably the reason the Archives is called a special project in the >bylaws. Perhaps in some ways, it is. But, by the definition of SP that >we are using now, it isn't. The USGenWeb Archives is a central >repository for ALL records and the, in my book anyway, is a library! Pam, That is why I think it is very important to make a distinction between The USGenWeb Project Archives and The USGenWeb Archives Project, both terms which are used in the ByLaws. The USGenWeb Project Archives is the "central repository for ALL records" that you speak of. It is defined in the ByLaws as "a Digital Library called the USGenWeb Project Archives." The ByLaws never refer to the USGenWeb Project Archives as a Special Project. They DO refer to The USGenWeb Archives Project as a Special Project. It is necessary that The USGenWeb Archives Project be a Special Project because that is the only way that the Archives File Managers can get an Advisory Board seat or vote in USGenWeb elections. In all ways that count, the USGenWeb Archives Project is a full-fledged Special Project. But, that doesn't mean that the USGenWeb Project Archives are a Special Project. They aren't a project at all, they are a repository. Projects have members, staff and coordinators. Repositories have contents, files, and locations. Libraries don't vote, people do. This is the way I see the organization: USGenWeb Project Archives = USGenWeb Digital Library = files, not people USGenWeb Census Project = a Special Project, composed of volunteers who focus on getting census transcriptions submitted to the USGenWeb Project Archives USGenWeb Tombstone Project = a Special Project, composed of volunteers who focus on getting cemetery transcriptions submitted to the USGenWeb Project Archives USGenWeb Archives Project = a Special Project, composed of volunteers who act as custodians for the USGenWeb Project Archives, and who also coordinate volunteers to gather for submission content of miscellaneous types not covered under any other Special Project (including scanned images, even if they are images of censuses or tombstones.) The three special projects are of equal status under the ByLaws, and none is subordinate to the other. None of them can vote in each other's elections, or have any say in choosing each other's leaders. But the USGenWeb Archives Project does have a special responsibility for the USGenWeb Project Archives that the other Special Projects do not. The other Special Projects focus on providing content, the Archives Project focuses on storing that content and facilitating access to it. I think this was the intent of the ByLaws, and I think that clarifying this distinction was the main intent of Motion 99-4, which we voted to rescind. But in voting to rescind it, I did not mean that I didn't concur with its intent. I just felt that it wasn't very clearly stated, and having caused as much confusion as it was meant to relieve, it would be better replaced with a statement that spelled things out in a more 1-2-3 fashion. One would hope that on any matters requiring a coordination between two special projects, the volunteers of each would work together to come up a solution that worked for everyone. For example, for uniformity, it would be best if the permission notice that is inserted in each file was the same no matter which Special Project's volunteers provided the transcription. So the volunteers of ALL the Special Projects should be consulted in coming up with the wording. But decisions about which columns of the census to transcribe and how to format the tables, or whether to list burials alphabetically or locationally, would be up to the Census and Tombstone volunteers. Since redundancy of file storage is actually highly desirable (as opposed to redundancy of effort), I think Special Projects should even be ENCOURAGED to duplicate files on as many different hosts as possible. The locations and directory organization for those "backup" copies would be entirely up to the Special Project. But maintaining such backup directories or supplementary indexes would not substitute for the primary obligation of the Special Project to submit any plain text files it generates to the USGenWeb Project Archives. -- Teri (See also http://www.best.com/~tpettit/usgenweb/ArchivesQA.html )