Re-edited to cut out rambling:
I've worked in, with, near, and around a couple of nonprofits in my life, as well as studying them academically. I am by no means an expert, but I know some experts. In my experience, communities, together, make the nonprofits within them work. Successful nonprofits are partners and collaborators with the communities they seek to serve.
Nonprofits are the amalgamation of a lot of peoples' work and time and love, and every last contributor deserves to have their resources and time respected, tended, and stewarded. Unfortunately, perfect management of resources, time, and labor is more of a goal than an accomplished fact for pretty much every nonprofit I've ever seen or been involved with. Also, I have yet to meet any small group ever that managed to check personality conflict and human drama at the door.
Listening to the concerns of contributors and participants has yet to be unimportant in any group enterprise I've ever seen ever.
That said, few things in the world piss me off as much as people whose basic grudge is that someone decided to do something and doing things is irritating, and it's awfully easy to write off all concerns as that kind of naysaying, which in my personal experience at least gets hazardous. I wish I had a perfect way of distinguishing between curmudgeonliness and less-than-perfect useful concrit.
I am extremely pleased with some of the AO3's legal work. I use and enjoy their archive. I don't volunteer or give money to the organization, but I am part of the community that it serves and appreciate the good work that it's done. I don't view being part of the community a nonprofit participates with as a one-way endeavor. I don't have any particular insight into the structure or operations of the AO3, any more than anyone else has seen, but we all seem to be talking about nonprofit structure and goals right now, and I am throwing some feelings out there.
Thank you, all of fandom, for the work you do to bring us all delight. Thank you, everyone who does imperfect work because there's no perfect work in this world and the alternative is not doing cool stuff; thank you, everyone who works and speaks and tries to make the imperfect a little better every time. I love being part of this community; thank you for being part of my life.
I've worked in, with, near, and around a couple of nonprofits in my life, as well as studying them academically. I am by no means an expert, but I know some experts. In my experience, communities, together, make the nonprofits within them work. Successful nonprofits are partners and collaborators with the communities they seek to serve.
Nonprofits are the amalgamation of a lot of peoples' work and time and love, and every last contributor deserves to have their resources and time respected, tended, and stewarded. Unfortunately, perfect management of resources, time, and labor is more of a goal than an accomplished fact for pretty much every nonprofit I've ever seen or been involved with. Also, I have yet to meet any small group ever that managed to check personality conflict and human drama at the door.
Listening to the concerns of contributors and participants has yet to be unimportant in any group enterprise I've ever seen ever.
That said, few things in the world piss me off as much as people whose basic grudge is that someone decided to do something and doing things is irritating, and it's awfully easy to write off all concerns as that kind of naysaying, which in my personal experience at least gets hazardous. I wish I had a perfect way of distinguishing between curmudgeonliness and less-than-perfect useful concrit.
I am extremely pleased with some of the AO3's legal work. I use and enjoy their archive. I don't volunteer or give money to the organization, but I am part of the community that it serves and appreciate the good work that it's done. I don't view being part of the community a nonprofit participates with as a one-way endeavor. I don't have any particular insight into the structure or operations of the AO3, any more than anyone else has seen, but we all seem to be talking about nonprofit structure and goals right now, and I am throwing some feelings out there.
Thank you, all of fandom, for the work you do to bring us all delight. Thank you, everyone who does imperfect work because there's no perfect work in this world and the alternative is not doing cool stuff; thank you, everyone who works and speaks and tries to make the imperfect a little better every time. I love being part of this community; thank you for being part of my life.
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