[OpenGLAM] #milkmaidsyndrome

Wed Dec 24 17:30:42 UTC 2014

Hi everyone,

While working on the Sum of all Paintings Wikidata project, I have been
admiring the beautiful varieties of paintings we have on Commons (sarcasm).
Specifically those that suffer from Yellow Milkmaid Syndrome, where one
painting will have 3-5 difference versions of it, thanks to various scans,
photographs and renditions found online. Many of these are often versions
that are available for purchase, too.

So, I created a Tumblr

http://yellowmilkmaidsyndrome.tumblr.com/

You can also submit your own via the hamburger button (aka the little three
barred menu in the upper left corner of the tumblr) it falls under the
following criteria:

   - Is public domain or the artwork itself is freely licensed
   - Varies in color, shape, size, etc.

It's been getting some decent traffic; we're using the hashtag
#milkmaidsyndrome. I generally add a gently snarky comment with each
submission (And I mean gentle, those of you who know me know I'm pretty
damn snarky - but hey, I'm looking for a job :) ).

This tumblr was inspired by "The Problem of the Yellow Milkmaid: A Business
Model Perspective on Open Metadata" by Harry Verwayen, Martijn Arnoldus and
Peter B. Kaufman. If you've never read this paper, you're missing out on
one of the best papers ever about the wild west of the web in regards to
digitized artworks... [1]

I also love that you can see the difference between "official" versions
offered by GLAM websites (if any) and the different colored versions Google
made - these paintings have identity problems, obviously.

Remember GLAMs: you're the authority, you have the power to flood the
internetz with high quality, "proper" versions of your collection - but
until then, this is how your'e being represented on the web, including
Wikipedia.

Enjoy and submit your own! :)

-Sarah

[1]
http://pro.europeana.eu/documents/858566/2cbf1f78-e036-4088-af25-94684ff90dc5

www.sarahstierch.com
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