Hi all ---
 
         First, I want to applaude John Chadwick for both the amazing work
that he has done with museum-l and for his patience with a group
that sometimes fails to realize how much work running a list of this
volume can be.  I mean it folks, we owe John a HUGE thanks.  He has
proven again and again to be exactly the kind of person NEEDED to make
the Internet work... caring, generous in time and thought, and
responsive to the needs of subscribers.
 
        I have been thinking that Museum-L has about three separate
purposes and that maybe we should have three separate moderators to
deal with those purposes...  Here are my thoughts on those purposes.
I would welcome corrections or other purposes that I have neglected
to mention:
 
1.)  Museum-l provides a place for general announcements of new
and upcoming events both in real museums and in more "virtual" realms.
This would include postings concerning meetings, museum exhibitions,
new WWW servers, calls for papers, etc...
 
2.)  Museum-l provides a forum for discussion of important
non-technological issues concerning all aspects of museum management
and maintenance.  The range of issues is obviously vast but also
exceedingly important.  Some issues recently brought up include
cultural sensitivity, use of white out to mark specimens, etc...
 
3.)  Explicitly computer orientated discussions both technological
and non-tehcnological concerning the role these technologies
play in the future of museums... obviously this includes the Internet,
database structuring and other issues.
 
        We should have a monitor for each one of these divisions
if we are to have monitors at all.  I am a little concerned that
more anarachy will ensue concerning the issue of moderation than
would be resolved by having moderators.  I guess I feel pretty
darn ambivalent.
 
Cheers,
 
Robert Guralnick   | Museum of Paleontology   | University of California
Berkeley, CA 94720 | [log in to unmask] | (510) 642-9696