Origami Hakken
Beyond the fold
For quite some time I've had a project in mind (likely not an original one) that brought together my background as a Librarian and decades-long love of Origami. In a largish nutshell: The creation of an online, collaboratively built and maintained, Origami database that featured images of contributors' original models and/or diagrams. The database would be populated with extensive and voluntarily provided metadata from each contributor as a means of making the overall database searchable at a high level of both free-text and control vocabulary granularity in order to provide access to photographic, illustrative, linked, and textual content I haven't seen in other databases of this type.
Imagine the cultural, social, academic, artistic, historical, instructional, and just plain inspirational benefits of such an online resource!
Oh yes....as well as how ridiculously challenging it would be--on more organizational and technical levels than I care to mention here--to cobble together something like this, maintain it, and help it evolve to be a continually useful and supportive site. I get it.
Still, I think there is a need for such an aggregated tool. Something that is more than a replication of what currently exists, and constitutes a next step in a centralized collecting, cataloging/indexing, sharing, and archiving of what can be safely assumed to be a wealth of decentralized and unsolicited information. Anyone immersed in Origami to a significant degree recognizes the creation of new models, techniques, use of materials, and exciting avenues being explored (by origamists at all levels of skill) is anything but static or predictable. To be able to cobble together and to some degree, codify, a communal tool that more easily and efficiently shares what has and continues to spring from a craft-form that simultaneously cherishes the traditional while seemingly redefining itself...well, I find this both terribly exciting and daunting.
Understandably important issues such as (but not limited to) costs, privacy, copyright, database sustainability, and the development of as comprehensive as reasonably possible indexing schema would take a lot of time to hash out. You don't need to be a Librarian to recognize the hurdles, and would require a core group volunteers with different areas of expertise to take them on. However, it would start small—no one starts building something at step nineteen. Besides, overly fixating on the challenges robs time from exploring the reasons and ways to work through them.
Trying to put all the pieces of such a project together in my head was/is an exercise in possibilities and more communal sharing, but on my own it's hard to take it much further than that. Therefore, I decided to do two things in the way of testing the waters--that is, seeing if anyone else has thought similarly about the next step in an Origami database, even if just at the occasional daydream stage. Thing 1: Start with an effort to build this (friendly) Frankenstein's monster so that it only solicited submissions from a small part of the U.S.--perhaps just a single state or region. Then, through a team effort, learn from the mistakes/successes and gradually scale up from there. Thing 2: See if I could put together a "mind map" to illustrate what data points it would be desirable to collect (if available and applicable to someone's submission) as well as a rough out an idea of how the processing/workflow necessary to make it work...well, might work. The result of my first and rudimentary iteration of the mind map appears below. (Apologies for how small and hard it may be to read: I was working within the confines of my monitor, application, graphic elements, etc. When you look it over, please remember this is not a blueprint or anything approaching a polished flowchart. (Clearly.) Only an effort--supported by no small degree of caffeine, stubbornness, and fear that a sudden idea might be lost--to get something on paper.
That said, it serves its purpose if only to jump-start some conversations with others for whom this kind of long-term project resonates in some way. If it does, you want to know more, or (conversely) wish to civilly share your thoughts on why such a project is as doomed to failure at the outset—as was the attempt to invent a flying machine--feel free to reach out via the following email address (which appears elsewhere on this site): origamihakken@gmail.com
I'm hopeful something this conceptually big can be created by starting with small steps, brief conversations, and a talented team. Perhaps not. That said (and I'm grasping for a metaphor here), even the most complex Origami models start with a single crease or a fold. And an idea.
Thank you for taking the time to read this!
Afterthought: If the amount of feedback I receive starts making individual responses difficult--and I should be so lucky--I'll start working on an FAQ to help with common and/or anticipated questions.
