Wikimedia Australia invited the cultural institutions of Australia (the ‘GLAMS’ – galleries, libraries, archives and museums sector), to a gathering held at the War Memorial in Canberra last week. I could be wrong but it sounded a bit like the GLAM sector people were getting ticked off by a bunch of Wiki people, Creative Commoners and their followers. Perhaps that explains why the conference produced, in me at least, an irritation that lingers.

Bearing this in mind, here are my bullet point obs:

• It was awesome to see a bunch of Wikipedians lined up on stage – the flesh and blood presence of the invisible army that has created a such an important resource (and revolutionary model of knowledge sharing).
• The spectacle of fevered idealism on the podium in a series of personas over two days made me feel amazed and full of admiration.
• I came away with a greater sense of the value of the information that describes an archival collection and therefore an even greater sense of the importance of how well we must share it.
• I came away wondering what we can do to reconcile the contradictory messages going from government to the film industry and government to the film archive. While telling filmmakers to be more commercial, to focus on marketing, to get into ‘online’ and to work out ways to ‘monetise the web’, government is also telling the National Film and Sound Archive to make its content more accessible. This creates an interesting tension.
• I was uplifted to hear Kate Lundy in her speech ‘Finding the Common Ground‘ mention ‘ICT reform’ and to say ‘Open standards are taxpayers’ insurance against future cost blowouts’.
• It is frustrating to hear generalisations applied to GLAM holdings as if they are all equally capable of being liberated to the public. Equating ‘free access’ with democracy is great when you’re talking about information that the public has a right to. But when online access of cultural assets means streaming a feature film online it is a different proposition.
• Publicly funded does not mean publicly owned. Government funds many endeavours that are creative but are expected to be commercially exploited, including film and television programs.
• We are living in exciting times and the comparison of this era and the cultural change underway with the Enlightenment is an apt one, so thanks to whoever contributed that. (I’d appreciate it if anyone can attribute that).

Photograph by Gnangarra.