In deference to David Haberstich, who correctly pointed out
the thread title was a bit misleading, I've changed the
title of the thread slightly.

One previous post pointed to examples in Memphis and
Louisville that could have been interpreted as competition
but were in fact collaborations.  Large scale events such as
those described could only be pulled off through advance
planning and communication.  Is it possible that those
audiences intepreted five quilt exhibits as museums
competing?  I hope not.

A situation that occurred in this community not long ago
illustrates the type of wasteful competiton that I mean.  We
do a program that we call the "make-n-take" workshop for
kids.  They make a historical toy or game and take it home.
Fairly straightforward.  Lo and behold, after we had ran
this program (once a month on Saturdays) I looked in the
newspaper and two different entities were doing the same
workshop as us on the same day!  One entity even called
their program "Make-It-and-Take-It."  It was silly,
wasteful, competition.  We haven't completely solved the
the issue, but we have been in contact with one of the
entities and decided to join forces to offer staggered
weekend activities so that kids (and parents) aren't forced
to choose between entities, and the kids have more to look
forward to.

Jay Smith
Reno County Museum
Hutchinson, Kansas