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Category Proposal: Olympic Memorabilia


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Dear Fellow Waymarkers,

 

Maybe it's because I live and work in a city that has hosted the Olympic Winter Games, but I see reminders of the games on almost a daily basis, throughout the area. I have been thinking of this category proposal for quite some time now, and have spent the last few months editing and re-editing a category description. I have established a group with some seasoned Officers, who have helped to further refine the category description.

 

I want to state up front that I do understand that there will undoubtedly be some overlap with other categories. However, the overlap will likely be minimal in any one particular category. It is our intent to exclude any submissions that are covered in the "Modern Olympic Venues", as they would completely duplicate entries in that category. We will, however, allow non-competition venues in our category. I also believe that there are many sites with Olympic memorabilia that do not fit into other existing categories.

 

This is not intended to be limited to only Olympic venue cities, but will extend to memorabilia of Olympic Athletes that are located in their homeland as well.

 

We would welcome and appreciate comments and suggestions prior to bringing it to peer review. Please view the category description Olympic Memorabilia for additional detail on this category.

 

Thanks!

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Dear Fellow Waymarkers,

 

Maybe it's because I live and work in a city that has hosted the Olympic Winter Games, but I see reminders of the games on almost a daily basis, throughout the area. I have been thinking of this category proposal for quite some time now, and have spent the last few months editing and re-editing a category description. I have established a group with some seasoned Officers, who have helped to further refine the category description.

 

I want to state up front that I do understand that there will undoubtedly be some overlap with other categories. However, the overlap will likely be minimal in any one particular category. It is our intent to exclude any submissions that are covered in the "Modern Olympic Venues", as they would completely duplicate entries in that category. We will, however, allow non-competition venues in our category. I also believe that there are many sites with Olympic memorabilia that do not fit into other existing categories.

 

This is not intended to be limited to only Olympic venue cities, but will extend to memorabilia of Olympic Athletes that are located in their homeland as well.

 

We would welcome and appreciate comments and suggestions prior to bringing it to peer review. Please view the category description Olympic Memorabilia for additional detail on this category.

 

Thanks!

 

You may want to consider addressing the issue of coordinates if the memento is inside a museum. If there is more than one Olympic collection in a museum (for different athletes), is only one waymark allowed?

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You may want to consider addressing the issue of coordinates if the memento is inside a museum. If there is more than one Olympic collection in a museum (for different athletes), is only one waymark allowed?

 

Hey Max and 99, excellent questions! Further proof that going to the forums before going to peer review can be valuable in refining the category. To be honest I hadn't even thought about these issues, but thank you for bringing them to my attention. I have updated the category description to address both of your questions.

 

Just so that you don't have to go dig through the description to find the answers, I'll add them here, as well.

 

With respect to taking location coordinates for memorabilia inside a building, such as a museum, here is what I added to the description:

 

"3. For memorabilia located within a building, such as a museum, please take your location coordinates from outside the main entrance."

 

With respect to multiple collections within a single building, such as a museum, here is what I added to the description:

 

"4. In instances where multiple "displays" are present, each with a specific theme or honoring a specific athlete, or group of athletes (such as a basketball team or a bobsled team), each display can be waymarked separately. These may be inside, such as in a museum, or outside, at an Olympic venue, public plaza or other location."

 

I think that multiple collections should be handled similar to how separate art pieces in museums, such as the Louvre, the Hermitage, or the Smithsonian, can be submitted as separate wyamarks. I don't see a reason to limit the waymarks, just because they are in the same area.

 

Thanks again for your input!

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Are the Paralympics covered by this proposal?

 

Yes, I believe that the Paralympic Games and Paralympians should be included in this category.

 

I have edited the Category Description as follows:

 

Under Description, I added to the end of the existing sentence:

 

"This Waymark Category is for recording the coordinates of Olympic Memorabilia throughout the world. This includes Memorabilia of the Olympic Games and the many Olympians who competed during the Modern Olympic Games, including the Modern Paralympic Games."

 

Under Expanded Description, I added two short paragraphs:

 

"The Winter and Summer Paralympic Games are held immediately following the respective Olympic Games. The Paralympic Games involves athletes with a range of physical and intellectual disabilities, including mobility disabilities, amputations, blindness, cerebral palsy, and other disabilities.

 

Any further mention of Olympic Games and Olympians in this category, implies the inclusion of the Paralympic Games and Paralympians, respectively."

 

Thanks for pointing out the omission!

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I am personally not much interested in sports events, but I have to say that you have done a really great work with this. I think this can pass peer review with 100% yea, I cannot think of any reason to vote against it. You set the standards high for all categories to follow.

 

There is one point I don't agree, but not that it would change my mind. #4 in the posting instruction does allow multiple entries for the same location, like a museum. This can lead to power trails that are not interesting. Not for the officers and not for potential visitors. There is nothing wrong in combining those into one submission. Nobody wins by having 200 waymarks for a national hall of fame or maybe thousands in the International Olympic Museum in Lausanne (plus one for the museum itself), except the statistics of the poster. I know, other categories do the same, but it was probably not the best choice for some of them.

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There is one point I don't agree, but not that it would change my mind. #4 in the posting instruction does allow multiple entries for the same location, like a museum. This can lead to power trails that are not interesting. Not for the officers and not for potential visitors. There is nothing wrong in combining those into one submission. Nobody wins by having 200 waymarks for a national hall of fame or maybe thousands in the International Olympic Museum in Lausanne (plus one for the museum itself), except the statistics of the poster. I know, other categories do the same, but it was probably not the best choice for some of them.

 

I agree.

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Great points, fi67, Max and 99, and thegorilla23! We've had an Officers vote on the category, so, as I understand the process, we can't make category description edits until after peer review. But we'll definitely have an Officers discussion on these points. I personally, would lean towards thegorilla23's suggestion to limit the number of submissions for any one waymarker within a specific area. You mentioned that the Woodmen of the World does this. I believe the LEGO Sculptures and Models does, as well. There are probably others. We'll see what the other Officers think. Thanks for the input!

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- Who will be the Officers for this category (delay) ?

- What's about the first official Olympic language = French ?

- No variables ?

 

Regarding Language:

Le Mouvement olympique reste attaché à la langue de Molière.

La Charte olympique en son article 24 relatif aux langues précise notamment :

1. Les langues officielles du Comité International Olympique sont le français et l’anglais.

2...

3. En cas de divergence entre le texte français et le texte anglais de la Charte olympique et de tout autre document, le texte français fera foi sauf disposition expresse écrite contraire...

Edited by Biquidou
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- Who will be the Officers for this category (delay) ?

As always, the officers will be the ones who created this category:

 

http://www.Waymarking.com/groups/details.aspx?f=1&guid=733b01bf-b952-4d2c-af78-9144c9fca455

 

- What's about the first official Olympic language = French ?

- No variables ?

French is the first official Olympic language, and may be mandatory for all official statements and publications of the Comité International Olympique.

 

English is the first official language of Waymarking, and is more than just best practice to demand at least an abstract of the main content in English for non-local categories, although the officers are free to decide what way they want to go. (And what variables they want to have, if at all.)

 

Groundspeak or Waymarking are not sub-departments of the IOC and not related to them in any way, so their language policy has absolutely no relevance here.

 

Regarding Language:

Le Mouvement olympique reste attaché à la langue de Molière.

La Charte olympique en son article 24 relatif aux langues précise notamment :

1. Les langues officielles du Comité International Olympique sont le français et l’anglais.

2...

3. En cas de divergence entre le texte français et le texte anglais de la Charte olympique et de tout autre document, le texte français fera foi sauf disposition expresse écrite contraire...

C'est vrai. Mais nous ne sommes pas part du mouvement olympique. Donc, ce n'est pas important du tout.

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Thanks fi67, I didn't realize that it wasn't so easy to find our group. I appreciate you adding the link to our category management group.

 

This is what I found online from the Olympic Charter - In force as from 9 September 2013

 

23 Languages

1. The official languages of the IOC are French and English.

2. At all Sessions, simultaneous interpretation must be provided into French, English,

German, Spanish, Russian and Arabic.

3. In the case of divergence between the French and English texts of the Olympic Charter

and any other IOC document, the French text shall prevail unless expressly provided

otherwise in writing.

 

As I read it, both French and English are the official languages. It appears that when there is a difference it text, the French version takes precedent. I would have no problem duplicating the text in English and French, except that I have two concerns, possibly three.

 

First, there have already been comments about the length of the category description. Some even stating that it is probably the longest one yet. Adding French would approximately double the size of an already lengthy description.

 

Second, I don't speak French. If I were to translate the category description text from English to French, I would use Google Translate. As helpful as it is, it's not perfect. Furthermore, since I don't speak (or read) French, I wouldn't know for sure whether google performed the translation correctly. If French were to take precedent when there are differences between the English Text and the French Text, particularly when determining whether a submission meets the qualifications of the category description, I would have no idea whether the French Text said what I had meant it to say when I had written it in English. It seems like adding a French translation would add complexity, and possibly grief for the submitter and the reviewer.

 

Third, I'm not sure if there is a limit to how many characters that can be used in a category description. Would text in both French and English fit within the limits? In a recent waymark I submitted, I exceeded the 15,000 character limit and had to revise my submission to fit. Again, I'm not sure if there is the same limit for a category description, so I don't know if this is a real concern or not.

 

Also, during the process of formulating the category, we didn't identify a single variable that we just had to have. I believe there are many category where the variables definitely add something valuable to a waymark. However, there are some categories that seem to have superfluous, or even redundant, variables that don't seem to add much, if anything, to the waymark. Since we didn't identify a variable that would add value to a waymark submission in this category, we decided not to add any variables. Items of information that might have fit into a variable, could just as easily be contained within the text of the submission. In fact, we've asked for some of that in the category description. It just seemed "cleaner" to omit any variables.

 

I appreciate the concerns you have raised, and I hope that my responses make sense.

 

Chasing Blue Sky

Edited by Chasing Blue Sky
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I finally vote "Yea" but a last question:

Why your group "Goin' for Gold" is "open enrollment: OFF" ?

http://www.Waymarking.com/groups/details.aspx?f=1&guid=733b01bf-b952-4d2c-af78-9144c9fca455

 

Comme dirait le Baron Pierre de Coubertin "L'essentiel est de participer" !

 

Good question.

Our intention was to leave open enrollment off until after a positive outcome in peer review. In my opinion, there's no point having a bunch of people join a group that doesn't go anywhere. However, it's looking like that won't be an issue.

Thanks, Chasing Blue Sky

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This didn't occur to me when we discussed the category proposal, but now I'm wondering if Senior Olympics/Senior Olympians will be included? I hope so, since I found a marker for one, and what an interesting story he has!

 

Say yes, please, officers.

 

Nice suggestion. I'll take the idea to the Officers.

 

My suggestion is they are included only if it is at an international level. The senior Olympics are also conducted at a local level.

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This didn't occur to me when we discussed the category proposal, but now I'm wondering if Senior Olympics/Senior Olympians will be included? I hope so, since I found a marker for one, and what an interesting story he has!

 

Say yes, please, officers.

 

Nice suggestion. I'll take the idea to the Officers.

 

My suggestion is they are included only if it is at an international level. The senior Olympics are also conducted at a local level.

 

Good point! There should be a distinction between local and international.

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This didn't occur to me when we discussed the category proposal, but now I'm wondering if Senior Olympics/Senior Olympians will be included? I hope so, since I found a marker for one, and what an interesting story he has!

 

Say yes, please, officers.

 

Nice suggestion. I'll take the idea to the Officers.

 

My suggestion is they are included only if it is at an international level. The senior Olympics are also conducted at a local level.

 

Good point! There should be a distinction between local and international.

 

As an Officer, I believe the intent was for the Internationally recognized Olympics which, to the best of my knowledge, covers the 'Olympics" (IOC) and the Paraolympics (IPC). The Paralympics are conducted almost in conjunction with the 'Olympics (IOC)' since they tend to follow the traditional games. I searched the Internet to discover is there is an international Senior Olympics with a similar structure and international standing/support as does the Olympics and Paralympics. I found National (US) Senior Games and many local so-called Senior Olympics, but could not find anything of similar international standing.

 

I believe that the senior Olympic plaque mentioned by Max and 99 could go in Citizen Memorials category.

 

Take care, Outspoken1

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