Eric's message kind of defines the ideal concept of not-for-profit
organizations and their appropriate motivations that we all started with.
 
For a variety of reasons (all grounded in simple economics?)
not-for-profits are no longer so not-for-profit these days.  In many areas
not-for-profits conduct moneymaking business right alongside for-profits,
and often the not-for-profits exert competitive pressure on the
for-profits.  The for-profits complain that competing not-for-profits are
advantaged in freedom from taxes and many other requirements enforced on
for-profits, and that in many cases the not-for-profits are well outside
their legistlated or regulatory charters in entering the business arena to
earn operating funds.
 
The most recent AAM AVISO mentions this "unfair competition" as one of
its four areas for concern vis-a-vis regulatory developments in Washington.
 
One difficult example of great interest to private practice conservators,
is the trend to ever-increasing marketing of conservation services by
"regional centers" to museums, institutions, corporations, and various
clients well beyond their originally-designated scope of operations.
 
This trend squeezes local conservators as business which could keep them
viable and serving their area or which could attract them into an area
needing local service, is siphoned off to help support a "regional
center" located elsewhere.
 
The trend is exacerbated by the widely held but completely incorrect
prejudice that conservators working for not-for-profits are more committed
to "further the cause"  than their private practice colleagues who after
the same training and often after service experience in not-for-profit
laboratories, put their careers and their meagre funds on the line to
"further the cause" on a for-profit basis.  In recent years many such
private practitioners have been forced into their attempts at profitmaking
by staff reductions and lack of opportunites at museum and institutional
conservation laboratories.
 
Coming from the same background as their colleagues still employed at
not-for-profits, private practice conservators are also unfairly
disadvantaged by the incorrect presumption that conservation expertise at
"regional centers" is superior.  The things consistently greater at
"regional centers" than at private laboratories are the investment of
public funds, the numbers of administrative staff, the numbers (not
necessarily the quality) of conservators employed in one laboratory, and
the resources allocated to marketing (excuse me, should we say
to "education and development?").
 
There isnt any simple response to the question of advertising vs. public
information.  For-profit or "not-for-profit", in the conservation
profession we're all in the business of preserving the physical aspects of
our cultural heritage, and our contributions to MUSEUM-L are good examples
of collegial information-sharing.  Let's minimize any emphasis on one
type of source over another!
 
 
 
On Wed, 7 Sep 1994, Eric Siegel wrote:
 
>           Can I propose a simple response to the question of
>           advertising vs. public information?
>
>           Howzabout if we just agree that not for profits (including
>           Universities) are not in it for the money, but to further
>           the cause. I know that there is competition among
>           not-for-profits, but this still seems like a reasonable
>           guideline.
>
>           Anybody offering for profit services probably needs to tread
>           lightly, but lets not limit information exchange because of
>           nervousness about commercializing the net.
>
>           Eric Siegel
>           [log in to unmask]
>