That’s great–but I’m not the one you should be volunteering to. I’m not even sure who *should* be working on this–only that it isn’t me, not any longer.

(I don’t think you “crashed LITA bloggers Sunday night”–at least not if you were at the OCLC Bloggers Salon. That’s not LITA, and I don’t think it would be considered crashing anyway…)

In the case of LITA Interest Groups, that can’t happen–at least not for very long. At least when IGs were established (when LITA reorganized itself, got rid of Sections, and got rid of most of its appointed committees), they had to be established by petition and the petition needed to be renewed every three years, a “sunset clause” so that no-longer-interesting IGs would just disappear. They’re also entirely self-governing: No appointments, no real place for “puppets.”

I think the renewal process may have changed, but the fundamental idea is still there and, I think, still sound. And, discouraged as I may be by LITA, it definitely does not have a bloated committee structure–it’s been known to change committees to IGs (which can then disappear). Actually, that’s been one of the complaints from some quarters: LITA doesn’t have enough appointive positions for people who only get funded for conferences if they’re holding an appointive position.

The problem isn’t interest; the problem is communication–and interest in adding members.

(If you look at the LITA page, the list of “Inactive interest groups”–0nes that haven’t renewed–is almost as long as the list of current ones, and I believe there are some IGs that predate that list.)

It may be worth noting that IGs in LITA are different from Discussion Groups in most other divisions (I think one other division has now gone to a self-governing-IG structure) in some ways: They can propose programs and ask for budgets, where DGs can normally only discuss.