A Virtual UNIMA

A VIRTUAL UNIMA CENTRE?

by Mary Sutherland

When I had the good fortune to attend the 17^th UNIMA Congress in Budapest last year (my thanks to the Australia Council) and heard reports from UNIMA Centres from around the World, I was struck by the realisation that Australia has no identifiable home base for our Centre. It is in the nature of our country and community that we are decentralised and separated by great distance.

We do have a number of concentrated communities in each of the big cities but hundreds or thousands of kilometres separate each of these communities. There are also many other smaller groups and individuals still more isolated. Our isolation is not only national but international, it is very easy for European and North American UNIMA members and delegates to meet in person, not so with us the cost is prohibitive except for the lucky few who can attend the Congress and Festivals. There have been suggestions over the years that centralised archives and resources would be of benefit to us all in addition to some sort of office as a communication centre where enquires could be made and notices to members could be posted.

The major stumbling blocks have always been, the cost of renting premises, the cost of staffing and running expenses and a convenient location to allow access by as many members as possible. Until now there has never been an ideal solution. I believe that a viable solution would be a VIRTUAL UNIMA CENTRE - by this I mean a home page on an Internet Service Provider (ISP) eg. OzEmail.

I expect by now some of you will be having visions of William Gibson’s Neuromancer or Neal Stephenson’s Snow Crash, or simply ‘beam me up Scotty’. Don’t despair it is really no more difficult than using the phone, fax machine or microwave - actually I haven’t mastered the microwave myself.

To enable access to the VIRTUAL UNIMA CENTRE all an individual would need is the web address and access to a computer with a modem and an account with an Internet Service Provider. Before you say "Impossible, I don’t even have a computer", know that there are, sprouting all over the country and the world, Internet Cafes with computers set up specifically to serve the technologically disenfranchised, in addition to services provided by schools, colleges and local libraries.

A VIRTUAL UNIMA CENTRE would also have benefits for those members who don’t as yet have easy access to the Internet:

It would help lift the profile of our organisation with Government bodies, Educational Institutions and the general public in Australia and Globally (as they say in Information Technology circles).

It could be set up so that anyone who types in PUPPET, while ‘surfing the net’ would be able to visit our site.

Future events could be publicised to enable visitors to any state to easily find out what’s on and whom to contact.

Access is possible 24 hours a day 7 days a week. Anyone who has tried to exchange detailed information with centres in Europe and elsewhere, constantly trying to catch brief windows of opportunity when both parties are at work, will appreciate the advantages this could bring, and at little more than the cost of a local call.

Ease of communication may enable us to realise and respond to opportunities to follow our organisation’s prime objective, to use the art of puppetry in the pursuit of human values such as peace and mutual understanding between peoples (eg. Information and resources for disadvantaged communities).

What I am proposing is that we would have a UNIMA web site with an introduction to UNIMA Australia and a number of links to other topics.

Some of my suggestions for the links would be:

A history of UNIMA Australia.

A program of up-coming events.

A notice board publicising employment opportunities, parties, etc, this could be limited to access by members only if desired.

An archive of published articles.

A membership list. With links to additional pages containing biographical and contact information (1 to 2 pages as desired) and a photograph of their work. It is even possible to put up video clips but the expense would need to be borne by the individual.

There are probably many other possibilities that I haven’t thought of yet.

What is a Web site and how does it work?

OzEmail (one of Australia’s largest ISPs) allows its members to host a web site with up to 5MB of data on their server (active computer), for the cost of a normal subscription.

The cost would be $25 joining fee, which includes 5MB of data storage and 5hrs free access. The cost of extra access is $ 5/hr 7am – midnight and $2.50/hr midnight - 7am. In the case of an UNIMA Web site, access on behalf of UNIMA would only be needed for updating and maintenance and only for a few minutes at a time if done correctly. Otherwise the person visiting the site pays the cost of accessing the site, like the cost of a phone call at the above rates.

It would be possible to have some of the access limited to members only if desired.

If we wanted to store more than 5MB of data terms must be negotiated with the Internet Service Provider. Likewise if the site starts getting lots of hits (visits) again extra costs may be incurred (this would be unlikely in the near future).

This is an example of how much space in megabytes a document takes up. I had a 32 page document with 7 high resolution scanned photos that in MS Word took 1.1mb of space, when converted to HTML, the text took 0.031MB, and the pictures took 0.4MB (note that pictures take up a lot of space).

There should be space for approximately 83 documents of about 0.03mb + 1 photo each.

I expect this proposal will provoke much discussion and I am aware there are many issues to consider, but I hope it will be received in the spirit it is offered, to help promote communication.

I do not think it would in any way conflict with the role of our now excellent magazine. It would have a large permanent component, the histories and the personal pages and a small section of headlines promoting Events, Displays, Workshops who knows possibly one day even a Festival, this section would need vigilant updating.

Joseph Sutherland, professional computer guru, and husband of Mary Sutherland has volunteered his time to build and maintain the site if the offer is accepted.

If you have any questions about the information provided please contact Mary Sutherland c/o the Editor or at msuther@ozemail.com.au and we would be pleased to answer them. Its Joe who knows, I’m just doing my best to explain in language the rest of us can understand.