The sustainability of the project in the long term really depends on the country, what's been done so far, and other factors.
I can see why in the Netherlands you might feel that you almost exhausted the options, but this is not the case for other countries, because:
1) Many countries didn't participate this year, including quite a few with active communities and/or chapters, including: Australia, Bangladesh, Finland, Hong Kong and Macau, Hungary, Indonesia, Portugal, Taiwan, UK and Venezuela.
2) For many countries the whole issue of monuments is new, maybe because the government doesn't pay too much attention to it and there are no well-defined lists, maybe because there is no awareness in the public, etc. Examples include Israel and Ghana (correct me if I'm wrong).
3) Many countries simply can't realize their potential because of lack of volunteering organizers, or geographic size, or other reasons. The biggest example in the United States where at the current pace the competition can be held for hundreds more years (this is a compliment btw, not criticism). On the flip side, countries not facing this problem, e.g. Germany and Netherlands, can probably identify many monuments in their tens-of-thousands-long-lists that are underrepresented, and put more effort into getting people to photograph those, e.g. by organizing free trips to underrepresented cities, etc.
4) We really have to look at how many of the pictures we get are actually good (usually a very small percentage, for example in Israel 219 pictures out of over 6,000 passed the screening process) and do two things with that, which can extend the life of the competition for a long time to come: we can encourage the photographers who submitted the best pictures to participate, for example by giving them better equipment (for chapters that have access to it, or through partnerships with photography schools, etc.) on the condition that they submit photos. On the flip side, consider monuments that have many pictures but no good ones as underrepresented and steer participants to those monuments.
Having said all of the above however, the question we should ask is whether there is no better of the extraordinary effort requires by all of our volunteers to organize this competition. I'm sure that for some countries the answer is yes, there are better ways to spend this time. However, the answer is rarely clear-cut and each country needs to consider all the options.
—Ynhockey.
On Mon, Nov 5, 2012 at 4:03 AM, Roel Balingit
<roel.balingit@wikimedia.org.ph> wrote:
If I may just provide input, at the height of Wiki Loves Monuments Philippines, we received a phone call from Natural Wonders Foundation (Philippines) about a proposal that they would like to launch a similar project like Wiki Loves Monuments, in this case featuring the natural beauty of the country. I informed them that we are very interested about it, we may just need to discuss it after WLM international has completely wrapped-up, by then we would have finished our documentation. Though in the hindsight we are looking at Cultural mapping activities, because unlike most countries, heritage is often neglected in our country, so we better start going around photographing and documenting it.
Roel
WLMPH
On Mon, Nov 5, 2012 at 6:15 AM, Ilario Valdelli
<valdelli@gmail.com> wrote:
On 04.11.2012 15:39, Jane Darnell wrote:
I agree WLM doesn't fit in GLAM as GLAM is now, and the heritage organizations are mostly government sponsored groups who live, work and act completely differently than institutions in the GLAM world (the name says it all). Monuments people are field workers, they like to go outside, look at buildings and places, ask questions, and (most important of all) are not scared of meetups.
WLM is a good example to organize an event coordinating several organizations because the formula is clear.
GLAM at the moment is a "quid" that may change every time and in every context. For this reason it seems that GLAM can include WLM.
--
Ilario Valdelli
Wikimedia CH
Verein zur Förderung Freien Wissens
Association pour l’avancement des connaissances libre
Associazione per il sostegno alla conoscenza libera
Switzerland - 8008 Zürich
Tel: +41764821371
http://www.wikimedia.ch
ROEL BALINGIT
Treasurer
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