Can we talk about the mess that was UKAN last week??
For those who don’t know, the UK Audio Network was set up by Lily Ames, and it’s a group where audio producers can share ideas, tips, (paid) opportunities/jobs, and other audio-related stuff.
Last week it was trash.
Why? Well. A debate broke out about posting about paid/unpaid work – something very close to all our hearts and wallets. Some people say asking people to volunteer their time is exclusionary, others say volunteering is an important way to get into the industry and people already in the industry like volunteering too etc etc – I’m sure you’ve had this conversation many times before with friends / colleagues. What started off as a semi-constructive conversation later descended into pettiness, insults, and silent observers like myself dreading checking our inbox to see how inflated with emails our social tabs on gmail had become. I remember talking to one senior producer who said that after all the messiness of previous UKAN debate she had to opt out of the UKAN emails. I think about that sometimes.
In case you missed it (or rather well done if you did), here’s what happened from what I can tell:
UKAN member puts out post asking for volunteer radio presenters
Other UKAN member says this is a breach of the guidelines of the group, all jobs posted must be paid gigs
Debate ensues about whether voluntary roles are different to unpaid internships (two words that should never be together)
We enter Dante’s fifth circle of hell
The words ‘chubby’, ‘illiterate’ and ‘saddened’ are thrown about
Eighty emails later, it’s over
Lots of resolutions to the issue of posting paid/unpaid work were discussed and actioned, including the newly created UK Audio Volunteers group. One other solution that cracked me up came from this UKAN member: ‘abeg, please reply to the person, rather than “reply all”.’
For all drama, I do think UKAN can be a great place, and I see a lot of camaraderie in the group. Whilst I’m not naïve enough to think this won’t happen again, being a part of other audio networking google groups (like Sounds in Colour) where this sort of thing rarely, if ever, happens makes me optimistic that this type of hullabaloo can be kept to a minimum.
I have changed my UKAN email frequency notification settings to ‘digest’ (thanks Sam!) though. Just for time being.