I've been following this topic with great interest because I
once had to deal with a volunteer, a retired librarian, who
insisted on doing various egregiously bad things, and who
invariably met attempts to change things with haughty rejoinder
"Young man, I've been working with old books since before you
were born!" No longer a young man (but not as old as she), my
mind too is now hardening into the set that anything or way
that I do not know is irrelevant. . . especially, that
volunteers are frequently more trouble than they are worth.
My law school contracts professor, in developing the
distinction between "gift" and "implied contract for exchange
of consideration," used the socratic tool "When is gift not a
gift." One hypo he posed was "What if someone leaves a goriller
[he was from the Boston area]on your front porch?" Too often,
volunteers are a goriller.