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Volunteer-generated content at the Goodwill Computer Museum

Page history last edited by Patricia Galloway 13 years, 6 months ago

Session title: Volunteer-Generated Content at the Goodwill Computer Museum

Session chair: Patricia Galloway

Presenters: Patricia Galloway (Associate Professor, School of Information, UT-Austin); Russell Corley (Director, Goodwill Computer Museum); Carlos Ovalle (PhD student, School of Information, UT-Austin)

 

Abstract:

 

The Goodwill Computer Museum in Austin (http://www.austincomputerworks.org/museum/about.html) aims to collect and display functioning historic computers dating from the 1960s to 1990s. In order to do this, the computers it collects must be restored to running order. At the museum, volunteers drawn from the local computer industry carry out this restoration and provide expertise for the creation of exhibits. This exemplifies an unusual level of volunteer participation behind the scenes, but discussions are now going on about ways to create a visible laboratory to share and perpetuate this expertise through online sharing of the documentation and video recordings of practice generated by this process. In addition, the museum plans to harvest online videos being posted by the large worldwide retrocomputing community to YouTube and individual websites, as well as to engage this community more directly through live participation in particularly complex phases of restoration. This panel will consist of three formal presentations on different phases of the museum's planned outreach to the broad community of technophiles.

 

 

Session Info

  • Type: Full Panel
  • Keywords: technology museum, volunteers, restoration, live participation, web
  • Relevance: This session should be of some interest to any museum that intends to exploit its activities behind the scenes to allow online visitors to watch care, conservation, restoration, and exhibit construction practices. It would be of additional interest to science/technology museums.

 

Presenter bios, titles, and presentation abstracts:

 

Patricia Galloway

Patricia Galloway is Associate Professor in the School of Information at UT-Austin. BA French, MA and PhD Comparative Literature, PhD Anthropology; 1979-2000 Special Projects and IT Manager at Mississippi Department of Archives and History; 2000-present teaching Archives and Museum Studies at School of Information, UT-Austin. Research interests include digital archives, personal digital recordkeeping, and cultural institution-building.

Title: "The Retrocomputing Community as a Resource for the Goodwill Computer Museum"

Abstract: The worldwide retrocomputing community has grown strong via communication opportunities offered by the Internet, and in the online context it has acted to preserve legacy computing history and technology by maintaining legacy software archives and posting restoration videos online, just to name two prominent activities. The potential contributions this community can make to the Goodwill Computer Museum, when added to the onsite expertise of skilled volunteers, are great; in return, the museum can act to provide an archive of last resort for online materials in danger of loss and thereby act in its turn to preserve the important voluntary activities of early personal computer developmment.

 

Russell Corley

Russell Corley is Director of the Goodwill Computer Museum. BS Industrial and Systems Engineering; fifteen years in computer industry with IBM and Dell; Began as volunteer at GCM and now directs the Museum full-time. Has hosted graduate student volunteers at the GCM and forged a partnership with the School of Information, UT-Austin.

Title: "Emergence of the Goodwill Computer Museum"

Abstract: The Goodwill Computer Museum emerged over a number of years as a spinoff from the major electronics recycling effort carried out by Goodwill Industries of Central Texas, and today it boasts a full-time director, dedicated space in a new GICT building, a cadre of skilled engineers who volunteer regularly to undertake computer restoration and research projects, and a growing partnership with the University of Texas School of Information and major archives on the UT campus. Volunteer contributions from engineering professionals and students have been indispensable to the development of the museum and volunteer participants have taken ownership of several of the museum's major initiatives.

 

Carlos Ovalle

Carlos Ovalle is a PhD student in the School of Information at UT-Austin. MSIS, now PhD student; also works as Computer Systems Development Specialist for School of Information, UT-Austin. His research interests center on intellectual property and copyright and how they affect cultural institutions.

Title:"Recording Restoration Practice at the Goodwill Computer Museum"

Abstract: Computer restoration is central to the activities at the Goodwill Computer Museum, whose mission includes the display of computing equipment in working order. The project reported here is devoted to developing a protocol for the observation and recording of expert restoration practice in order to document the state of the museum's computer holdings by including the tacit knowledge embodied in a restored computer and to be able to share this expertise with others.

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