Conference Wrap Up

Years ago I used to do a stand up comedy routine at the annual meetings of the Society of Southwest Archivists. For weeks prior to the event, I would pour over tired old jokes to see if I could somehow flip them to direct the humor at librarians and archivists, and eventually I would come up with enough to fill up a couple of small notecards with reminder cues that allowed me to keep up the patter for about a twenty minute presentation. It was very nerve wracking because I knew once I had to begin drawing tickets for door prizes (ostensibly the reason they kept asking me to do it) I would have to ad lib, and horrid were the tremors of “flop sweat” that I endured. I needn’t have worried. Every act for a decade turned out OK and the audience enjoyed regardless if they won a prize or not.

This meeting of the Art Library Society of Australia and New Zealand was different. Other than my nervousness about doing a Power Point presentation, I felt no pressure at all from these lovely people and was perfectly relaxed. This was especially true yesterday when, as part of a panel discussion that ended the conference, I was able to respond to questions with a clear head and a easy stomach. It also

helped that every presentation prior to the panel discussion was worth listening to. One of my favorites was presented by Michael Proud of the National Library of Australia regarding their handling of a massive photographic collection backlog. It warmed the cockles of my archival heart to hear them say they realized early on how ridiculous it would be to attempt item level description for these images and opted for arrangement and description practices of archivists to gather the photographs into large, relevant subject series. Still taking the time to individually number the items, the practice allows for the future addition of item level cataloging data at leisure or demand. If only all library managers were so enlightened! We work so hard to create searching platforms that are merely online collection advertisements designed to give the uninformed the illusion they are actually doing research.

I had so many people come up to me and say they agreed with my True Archives web blog and its vicious anti-Information Science rhetoric, too. That was worth coming to the far side of the globe to hear all in itself, but of course we have more things to look at before Jayne and I return to our benighted homeland. Today is the first day I have had to myself after two days of conference activity and Jayne has been a bit of a homebody during that time. Sticking close to this gulag of an apartment (the television does not work, the carpet is old and stained, the kitchen supports wildlife, and there is no artwork on the walls except for a collage of old greeting cards) Jayne has been bored out of her mind. While I was out at the conference banquet last night, and had the pleasure of seeing Russell Crowe walk by my table with his son, she was stuck here watching YouTube videos on this dinky, slow-loading laptop. I have to get her out into downtown Sydney during our last day before heading to Melbourne on the train tomorrow.