[Advisors] IT and Culture

[Garth Graham]

On 2014-03-13, at 10:06 AM, Tracey Axelsson wrote:

> ...to get more space we'd have to have a compelling argument that we are a 'cultural' organization or one that supports cultural activities.
> Do any of you recall and piece of research that suggest unfettered internet access supports cultural activities?  Or any other compelling
> piece of support for this assertion?  We understand our arguments were not impressive in the RFEOI phase.

Not seeing your arguments, the following may be obvious.  I don't think you want to narrow your mandate too much away from being an open platform for community driven use.  But your support of "cultural" activities may be more broadly based than you are identifying. For example:

1. Immigrant group use of the Internet to sustain contact with their culture of origin and their transfer payments to family members assists acculturation to Canadian society.  What's the inventory of immigrant groups using VCN that way?

2. First Nations use of broadband for community development is as much motivated by control of the levers of cultural survival as it is economics.  What's the inventory of First Nations groups using VCN that way?

3. Projects by arts and cultural organizations these days usually have a pronounced web space presence. And yet the recognition by arts organizations that those tools/skills have become critical to their community engagement activities, their marketing, and their collaborations remains minimal.  What's the inventory of arts groups using VCN for horizontal collaboration or direct programming?

If VCN use along those lines doesn't add up to a compelling case, perhaps you could say you need the space to move in those directions?

GG