STORYTELL, an email discussion list, used by storytellers and storytelling fans since its creation in 1995 by Karen Morgan, then a graduate student, at Texas Women's University, has a new home: the National Storytelling Network.
Have a storytelling question regarding technique, business, or material and want to crowdsource the answer? Storytell, while not the largest online forum for storytellers, is a very active list.
Most of my readers will already now about Storytell, but I'm posting this info as virtual bread crumbs to create a trail to its new URL.
For instructions on subscribing and using the list: http://www.storynet.org/storytell.html
Showing posts with label national storytelling network. Show all posts
Showing posts with label national storytelling network. Show all posts
August 26, 2009
July 08, 2009
Escaping from the Well
"Brand storyteller" Michael Margolis of Thirsty-Fish on "Finding Meaning and Authenticity in the Storytelling Brand"
Margolis's content is not groundbreaking.
That you can read it here is.
Margolis's content is not groundbreaking.
That you can read it here is.
May 19, 2009
National Storytelling Network: 2009 Annual Budget Released
The National Storytelling Network has, for what may be the first time in its history, published its annual budget on its public web site (link). Thanks, NSN!
It has also released its IRS 990 tax statement for tax year 2007 (as a nonprofit, NSN's tax returns are public information. If you knew where to look, you could find this information). It's not that easy to locate though, so, here's a VERY brief summary of NSN's finances over the past years. I collected this information from its publicly available IRS tax returns.
I'm not sure when NSN files, but I'll find out when the 2008 tax return will be available.
(I got the announcement via NSN's e-newsletter to members, at approx. 382 days after the organization's finance chair publicly announced the finances would be available "soon." I haven't stopped the clock yet on the widget below until I know more about if and when the 2008 audit will ever be published).
It has also released its IRS 990 tax statement for tax year 2007 (as a nonprofit, NSN's tax returns are public information. If you knew where to look, you could find this information). It's not that easy to locate though, so, here's a VERY brief summary of NSN's finances over the past years. I collected this information from its publicly available IRS tax returns.
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I'm not sure when NSN files, but I'll find out when the 2008 tax return will be available.
(I got the announcement via NSN's e-newsletter to members, at approx. 382 days after the organization's finance chair publicly announced the finances would be available "soon." I haven't stopped the clock yet on the widget below until I know more about if and when the 2008 audit will ever be published).
May 03, 2009
National Storytelling Network Financial Situation: They Tell Me it's OK
The Back Story:
So, the National Storytelling Network, the primary national organization for storytelling in the United States, hit a financial crisis recently. The impacts of that crisis are ongoing, and the particulars of the crisis has never been fully explained.
On December 5, 2007, NSN Board Chair Karen Morgan sent out an official NSN bulletin via email informing its membership that since at least 2005, expenses for the organization had exceeded revenues, and the organization was drawing down its savings. In addition to changes in financial and operational procedures at the time, the Board of NSN charged a task force of "elders," various respected board and staff members who had served NSN over the years, to review the finances and present a plan for the organization's sustainability.
They did, and their plan would have re-shaped the organization from a membership network to a quasi-foundation, cutting staff to a bare minimum.
An official email bulletin from NSN on December 31, 2007, noted that the Elders' plan had an annual budget of $234,000.
It also noted-- and this was news to us members-- that Executive Director Bobbie Morgan and the NSN staff had come up with their own counterproposal to streamline procedures and enhance revenue, with an annual budget of $623,000.
What they didn't tell us at the time was how big a budget NSN had before that.
The bulletin also announce that the majority of the Board decided to go with a modified version of the Staff plan and NOT the Elder plan, and that as a result, three experienced Board members were resigning.
As 2008 came along, no financial news was forthcoming from NSN. I spoke with two Board members at the time personally on phone calls, who assured me that things were looking up, that the tide had turned, and the organization would be fine. I asked that financial statements be made available to the members (not only for transparency's sake, but because of the large disconnect between a $234K and a $623K budget).
On April 14, a bulletin from the Board noted that the organization would need major restructuring to survive-- and that the Executive Director position was being eliminated.
On May 2, 2008, the Board posted an FAQ, and an explanation of the financial crisis (in the simplest terms. It didn't name names, but, if you knew who to talk to, you could find out who spent what-- and the names of the Boards of Directors (who nominally had fiscal oversight for the organization, even if they failed to exercise it) were public knowledge, although no one was reporting on this.
That FAQ noted that NSN would make available to its members the results of the audit and a budget for 2008, once it had been completed.
I've had various board members since that time assure me that the finances were in such a mess the audit was delayed, and that it would eventually be completed. Also that the financial report to those who attended the conference in summer 2008 was very well received. Also that the finances were looking good.
Also that I could get my very own copy.
That's all very nice, but without numbers, it doesn't mean a thing. I've posted public reminders on the NSN forum, which was set up for members to communicate with the Board. Repeatedly.
...for an entire year.
The NSN Board of Directors has been paying lip service to transparency since the crisis began. I'm attempting to hold them to it.
(The transparency, not the lip service.)
March 28, 2009
Storytelling Conferences: Shouting Down a Hole
There's a motif in several European fairy tales, where a sister has to rescue her brothers from a supernatural fate (such as their transformation into geese, or ravens), by remaining silent for a lengthy period, say, seven years, seven months, and seven days. Often, the consequences of remaining silent bring her hardship and grief, and in some stories she digs a hole in the earth, and into this hole releases a torrent of emotions in words and sobs. She must then cover the hole, and bury her emotions, so that no one will know that she has broken her silence.
Sometimes I think of storytelling conferences in this way.
Conference attendees gather from all over, get together to speak, but the logistics of the conference are such that if you weren't there, you'd never know that anything was said. For all intents and purposes, the conference covered over the hole where the discussion went on.
I don't envision gatherings of storytellers as sharing of grief, though. So the other vision I have is that of Fight Club. Or maybe a conference of ninjas. The attendees think of themselves as a secret brother and sisterhood, with knowledge to share among each other, but not to those outside the secret club.
Now I've been to some of these conferences. I've learned a lot at them, networked a lot, met some great people, seen some terrific stuff happen as a result of conversations that started at these conferences. I'm not knocking storytelling conferences per se.
I am knocking their dissemination and distribution.
I can think of a lot of historical reasons why storytelling conferences didn't publish proceedings, probably many related to logistics and money (i.e. no papers to publish (because the focus was not academic), there not being enough financial incentive to record and distributed keynotes).
That's all changed. The barriers to entry for publication and distribution have fallen dramatically with the advent of the World Wide Web.
Ten years ago, Story, from fireplace to cyberspace : connecting children and narrative (1998), a conference of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign's Allerton Park Institute published its proceedings as a journal. Nice to see that they've released all the contents digitally... so you can read what presenters like Anne Shimojima, Janice Del Negro, Joseph Sobol and Karen Morgan said there. (Link)
I can't find a single storytelling conference since then that has done the same. Online? In print? Anything? It's been ten years. (Please-- someone, anyone-- correct me! Show me I'm wrong!)
In 2007, I was not able to attend the National Storytelling Network's National Conference, held in July. In October, I inquired about obtaining a copy of a recording of a keynote. It took months for anything to happen (An audio of the keynote was, for a brief time, made available for sale. It is not currently). For that 2007 conference, the text of the keynote by Ron Turner is publicly available via the Web (link) for anyone to read. The text of the keynote by Jo Radner is publicly available via the journal Storytelling, Self, Society. (And good luck trying to get a hold of a copy of that particular issue of that particular journal if you're not an academic).
In 2008, Eric Wolf brought his own recording equipment to his panel discussion at the National Storytelling Conference and released the audio of the entire session on the Web as an mp3 file, under a Creative Commons license. I can't find any evidence that any other part of the conference is available, in text or in audio.
(BTW, Eric Wolf is singlehandedly doing the work of a national storytelling advocacy organization: via his podcast, he is disseminating discussion and insights from a wide variety of respected practicioners to an international audience. For free.)
<Oops. Left out a significant source of conference coverage and interviews on the Web: Storyteller.net. See comments, below.
With the economy what it is these days, I'm predicting that there will be fewer people in attendance at storytelling conferences this year. That makes it even more essential that these gatherings make an effort to share and disseminate widely the goings on.
I'm attending a storytelling conference next month. I had hoped to encourage liveblogging and twittering during my session. Turns out my room will not have WiFi coverage (although, there may be cell phone access if anyone wants to text out). I will be blogging from the conference.
Coming up in future posts: I'm going to look at various storytelling conferences held in 2009 across North America and rate them on their accessibility for those who could not be there in attendance. (I'll likely look at both accessibility during the conference (via blog posts and Twitter), and dissemination afterwards (via their own websites, YouTube, blogs, Storytell, etc)-- let me know in the comments if there is a metric you think I should track)
Sometimes I think of storytelling conferences in this way.
Conference attendees gather from all over, get together to speak, but the logistics of the conference are such that if you weren't there, you'd never know that anything was said. For all intents and purposes, the conference covered over the hole where the discussion went on.
I don't envision gatherings of storytellers as sharing of grief, though. So the other vision I have is that of Fight Club. Or maybe a conference of ninjas. The attendees think of themselves as a secret brother and sisterhood, with knowledge to share among each other, but not to those outside the secret club.
Now I've been to some of these conferences. I've learned a lot at them, networked a lot, met some great people, seen some terrific stuff happen as a result of conversations that started at these conferences. I'm not knocking storytelling conferences per se.
I am knocking their dissemination and distribution.
I can think of a lot of historical reasons why storytelling conferences didn't publish proceedings, probably many related to logistics and money (i.e. no papers to publish (because the focus was not academic), there not being enough financial incentive to record and distributed keynotes).
That's all changed. The barriers to entry for publication and distribution have fallen dramatically with the advent of the World Wide Web.
Ten years ago, Story, from fireplace to cyberspace : connecting children and narrative (1998), a conference of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign's Allerton Park Institute published its proceedings as a journal. Nice to see that they've released all the contents digitally... so you can read what presenters like Anne Shimojima, Janice Del Negro, Joseph Sobol and Karen Morgan said there. (Link)
I can't find a single storytelling conference since then that has done the same. Online? In print? Anything? It's been ten years. (Please-- someone, anyone-- correct me! Show me I'm wrong!)
In 2007, I was not able to attend the National Storytelling Network's National Conference, held in July. In October, I inquired about obtaining a copy of a recording of a keynote. It took months for anything to happen (An audio of the keynote was, for a brief time, made available for sale. It is not currently). For that 2007 conference, the text of the keynote by Ron Turner is publicly available via the Web (link) for anyone to read. The text of the keynote by Jo Radner is publicly available via the journal Storytelling, Self, Society. (And good luck trying to get a hold of a copy of that particular issue of that particular journal if you're not an academic).
In 2008, Eric Wolf brought his own recording equipment to his panel discussion at the National Storytelling Conference and released the audio of the entire session on the Web as an mp3 file, under a Creative Commons license. I can't find any evidence that any other part of the conference is available, in text or in audio.
(BTW, Eric Wolf is singlehandedly doing the work of a national storytelling advocacy organization: via his podcast, he is disseminating discussion and insights from a wide variety of respected practicioners to an international audience. For free.)
<Oops. Left out a significant source of conference coverage and interviews on the Web: Storyteller.net. See comments, below.
With the economy what it is these days, I'm predicting that there will be fewer people in attendance at storytelling conferences this year. That makes it even more essential that these gatherings make an effort to share and disseminate widely the goings on.
I'm attending a storytelling conference next month. I had hoped to encourage liveblogging and twittering during my session. Turns out my room will not have WiFi coverage (although, there may be cell phone access if anyone wants to text out). I will be blogging from the conference.
Coming up in future posts: I'm going to look at various storytelling conferences held in 2009 across North America and rate them on their accessibility for those who could not be there in attendance. (I'll likely look at both accessibility during the conference (via blog posts and Twitter), and dissemination afterwards (via their own websites, YouTube, blogs, Storytell, etc)-- let me know in the comments if there is a metric you think I should track)
May 04, 2008
Arts Administration + Shirky: it's a Whole New World
Over at his blog, The Artful Manager, the ever-relevant Andrew Taylor reflects on a recent conference, and combines that with some fascinating (and transformative) perspective from Clay Shirky, to raise this question:
And while the National Storytelling Network is not a "professional arts organization," at this particular junction in its life cycle, the leadership and members would do well to consider Taylor's initial thoughts on the relevancy (or, the increasing irrelevancy) on the traditional roles of an organization.
Link to Taylor's post: The Artful Manager: Three words, three problems
Link to Clay Shirky, describing the concepts in his new book, Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations, in a 42 minute lecture at Harvard's Berkman Center for Internet & Society. (Also available on YouTube).
...each of those three words -- ''professional,'' ''arts,'' and ''organization'' -- is in radical flux at the moment. That suggests that a phrase (and an assumption) combining all three could mean less and less in shorthand form.
And while the National Storytelling Network is not a "professional arts organization," at this particular junction in its life cycle, the leadership and members would do well to consider Taylor's initial thoughts on the relevancy (or, the increasing irrelevancy) on the traditional roles of an organization.
Link to Taylor's post: The Artful Manager: Three words, three problems
Link to Clay Shirky, describing the concepts in his new book, Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations, in a 42 minute lecture at Harvard's Berkman Center for Internet & Society. (Also available on YouTube).
May 02, 2008
Turning a Battleship
Well shut my mouth and call me clammy.
The National Storytelling Network, a membership-based organization dedicated to the promotion of storytelling (primarily oral storytelling), has been in poor fiscal health for some time. The Board finally made some necessary hard decisions and thus the organization now finds itself with no Executive Director and no current plans to get one (until such time as it can afford one).
I've had some issues with the organization, mainly regarding communication.
So to my astonishment, the Board (which is necessarily taking a more active role, since staffing levels have dropped) have set up their own Web site (using Google sites) for the express purpose of communicating with the membership.
(Although NSN has its own web site, I'm guessing that both the site design and its content management system are the wrong tools for this purpose).
Furthermore, the site is interconnected with a Discussion forum, courtesy of Google groups.
This is the first time in my nine years as a member that the Board has taken such proactive steps to communicate with the organization membership on the state of the organization and what the Board is doing... and to invite participation in a discussion in a public forum.
(Okay, I'm biased. I recall that the Board usually wrote some 400 word piece in the magazine every once in a while, about... something. They surveyed the membership once or twice. And they talk at the annual conference).
Whatever the outcome of this experiment in communication (and it will be an experiment: most of the NSN membership shy away from using web tools for communication), I am very glad that the leadership made the move towards public transparency, and open communication, and using the Web to make it happen.
How very twenty first century.
(Now if only my state liaison might do the same).
Link to the NSN Board site: http://board.nationalstorytelling.net
Link to the NSN Board site discussion forum: http://forum.nationalstorytelling.net
(Coincidentally, I received the word about the new site on the very day that the International Storytelling Center's glossy fundraising brochure for their capital campaign... although the wording in the accompanying letter made implied that it would soon be the go-to organization for storytelling advocacy and networking.)
The National Storytelling Network, a membership-based organization dedicated to the promotion of storytelling (primarily oral storytelling), has been in poor fiscal health for some time. The Board finally made some necessary hard decisions and thus the organization now finds itself with no Executive Director and no current plans to get one (until such time as it can afford one).
I've had some issues with the organization, mainly regarding communication.
So to my astonishment, the Board (which is necessarily taking a more active role, since staffing levels have dropped) have set up their own Web site (using Google sites) for the express purpose of communicating with the membership.
(Although NSN has its own web site, I'm guessing that both the site design and its content management system are the wrong tools for this purpose).
Furthermore, the site is interconnected with a Discussion forum, courtesy of Google groups.
This is the first time in my nine years as a member that the Board has taken such proactive steps to communicate with the organization membership on the state of the organization and what the Board is doing... and to invite participation in a discussion in a public forum.
(Okay, I'm biased. I recall that the Board usually wrote some 400 word piece in the magazine every once in a while, about... something. They surveyed the membership once or twice. And they talk at the annual conference).
Whatever the outcome of this experiment in communication (and it will be an experiment: most of the NSN membership shy away from using web tools for communication), I am very glad that the leadership made the move towards public transparency, and open communication, and using the Web to make it happen.
How very twenty first century.
(Now if only my state liaison might do the same).
Link to the NSN Board site: http://board.nationalstorytelling.net
Link to the NSN Board site discussion forum: http://forum.nationalstorytelling.net
(Coincidentally, I received the word about the new site on the very day that the International Storytelling Center's glossy fundraising brochure for their capital campaign... although the wording in the accompanying letter made implied that it would soon be the go-to organization for storytelling advocacy and networking.)
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