A slide deck from 1997, illustrating an academic digital library consortium "project" and all of the things that went wrong with "it". More detail on my work website: http://www.silversprite.com/?page_id=2242

1. Project LANES
Mismanaging the project consortium
from hell - a cautionary tale

2. LANES: Librarians Astronomy National
Electronic Service
• 3 partners
• Integrated magazine and
subject gateway
• Manager at Avonmouth site
• 1 director from each site
• Technical development at
Leafborough site
• Funded for 30 months, pilot
and launch in 18 months

3. Months 1 to 6: general faffing around
 Project acronym - set up committee to
oversee suggestions for acronym
 Project logo - hired graphic designer at
£3,600 to come up with appropriate logo…
…rejected all 18 suggestions…
…project manager’s 11 year old son knocks up
LANES logo on his PC

4. Month 7: Project manager discovers...
 …lists of overseas conferences on various
Web sites.
 “Hmmm. Just do the one event in Honolulu -
they have an observatory there, bound to
bump into an astronomer at some point…”

5. Months 7 to 9: hiring staff
 Interviewed at Avonmouth for a project
assistant, training officer, and end-user liaison
officer
 Some very good candidates applied…
…however, candidates who got the jobs were:
 friend of manager from library school days
 ex-girlfriend who manager still had a crush
on
 ex-convict cousin of manager (record for
actual bodily harm, breach of the peace)

6. Public relations disaster no.1 : email
To: <list name deleted>
From: <name deleted>
oh god not again; I’ve just got yet another
request for a report from the JISC office - how
the hell are we supposed to do real work
when bombarded with report requests; what
can we fob them off with this time?

7. Months 10 to 14: getting down to work...
 Many meetings held between Avonmouth and
Clydebank
 Much late night discussion over a pint and
curry on the future of astronomical resource
access
 Manager and directors ignore JISC organised
meetings and development workshops as
they clash with overseas events
 Meanwhile…technical staff at Leafborough
working furiously to build something

8. Months 15 to17: the consortium starts to
crack...
 Technical staff not invited to meetings to
discuss technical implementations
 One-way communication (management to
technical staff) regarding tasks and progress
 Technical staff aggrieved at working 65 hour
weeks while manager jaunts around the world
 Month 13 - technical staff headhunted by city
firm paying 3 times wages...

9. Public relations disaster no.2 : the launch
 Spent 2,000 pounds on hiring celebrity to
launch the system
 Lots of mock-ups and impressive powerpoint
slides...
…but no system
 Upon questioning, manager explains that pilot
system ready “in a few weeks”

10. Months 19 to 24: getting something
working...
 Budget shot to pieces after launch - cannot
hire good technical staff to finish behind-
schedule pilot
 …got undergraduate students to do it as part
of their coursework; dodgy programming
ensues...
 …pilot system finished - but works only if:
 you don’t add any content
 you don’t delete any content
 you don’t change any content

11. Month 25: half-baked pilot system
launched...
 Pilot appears - with all credit, appearance,
accountability going to Avonmouth University
 Clydebank University throw a wobbler (“What
about our input?”) and pull out of the
consortium - nasty letters sent to the JISC
office
 Party amongst the remaining staff (3) to
celebrate the launch

12. Month 26: “shit, we need an exit strategy,
quick”
Chickens coming home to roost…
 Manager and directors hadn’t kept up with
technical developments (too many trips
elsewhere)...
 …LANES worked only on 1999 protocol and
standards technologies…
 …consequently, cannot find partners to
collaborate with for e.g. interoperability, joint
bids for funding leading edge developments

13. Public relations disaster no.3 : copyright
 Magazine had an article from another magazine, from
an author who claimed it was his own work
 Magazine also contained an article slandering another
project
LANES hadn’t investigated copyright implications…
…or checked factual accuracy of articles
 Consequence - legal problems...
 …and vitriolic slanging match on public mailing list

14. Month 29 (of 30, remember): evaluation of
pilot
 Team works out evaluation strategy, based on
the use of the system
 Logs of the system are checked…
 …to find that they have had 43 users in 3
months (of which 41 had only looked at it to
see how slanderous the infamous article was)
Reason: Pilot system launched with no
publicity or dissemination

15. Month 30: “Dubious evaluation”
 Project managers family, friends, contact,
students, undergraduates, office cleaners etc.
press - ganged into using the system
 Evaluation of the results indicates that either
the pilot system was bewildering, or the
testers did not have very good knowledge of
astronomy...

16. Lessons
…all of the incidents in this presentation have
happened to various UK digital library
projects. Names have been changed or
omitted because legals.
Lessons to be learned: 1 of 1:
Communication

17. Take Heart
“No matter how badly your VRE project is
doing
- there is always a Lottery funded project
somewhere that is doing worse”